Tech Fail! The 10 Biggest Flops of the Last Decade

[Julio Franco]

Over the years we've seen our fair share of tech flops, and while some very quickly explode in a ball of hot, fiery failure, others linger around for years before slowy fading away into obscurity. In no particular order of uselessness, here are our top ten biggest tech fails of the last ten years.

Read the full article here.

https://www.techspot.com/article/1511-biggest-tech-fails/

 

[Humza]

It's good to see such fails and mishaps, keeps the industry interesting.

 

[hahahanoobs]

Don't forget Steam Machines!

 

[dirtyferret]

AMD bulldozer CPUs?

 

[fktech]

Windows 8.

 

[Skidmarksdeluxe]

Windows 8.

Win 10 would've been the same thing all over again if it wasn't rammed down our throats.

 

[stewi0001]

Windows 8.

Win 10 would've been the same thing all over again if it wasn't rammed down our throats.

8 is still worse than 10

 

[p51d007]

Smartwatches....the solution, to a problem that never existed.
Too expensive, too short of a battery life.

 

[mrtraver]

Not sure if I would call home 3D printers a fail yet - I wonder if their time just has not come.

 

[amstech]

Success is going from failure to failure without a loss of enthusiasm.
(Said by someone much smarter then me)

 

[Theinsanegamer]

I miss Windows Phone. It ran great on weak hardware, had a lot of stuff built in that Android/iOS dont (mobile IE eliminated the need for email and youtube apps,
OS had a built in QR reader, ece) and it could get updates straight from MS,
along with being able to uninstall carrier apps.

MS could have had a gem if it didnt constantly drop the ball on hardware support/updates. Onedrive integration, continuum, and Domain Management were all talked about for WP, and would have made it a stand out player in the business and prosumer world.

AMD bulldozer CPUs?

I'd go bigger, and say AMD's utter mismanagement from 2006 to about 2016. A full decade of clowns and morons nearly tanked that entire company. The first phenoms, the delay in phenom IIs, the bulldozer generation, the lackluster 6000s, the ReBrandeon years of the 200 and 300 series, wasting hundreds of millions on seamicro, ece.

 

[Kibaruk]

Don't forget Steam Machines!

Oh boy I completely forgot about this one!

Because of how big the impact was, I would say Equifax hack should be number 1 for all times.

 

[misor]

I wonder why apple is successful with no partners in iPhone/ipad development (aside from suppliers) while Microsoft failed badly with many half-hearted partners..

 

[thelatestmodel]

Windows 8.

Win 10 would've been the same thing all over again if it wasn't rammed down our throats.

8 is still worse than 10

8.1 with ClassicShell is the best version of Windows available.

Also 3D printing is alive and well, and does not belong in this list.

 

[HafizNafes89]

Windows 8.

Win 10 would've been the same thing all over again if it wasn't rammed down our throats.

8 is still worse than 10

It could be windows vista or windows ME

 

[Ascaris]

8 is still worse than 10

It took the horror of Windows 10 to truly make Windows 8.x look like a decent product. Like most everyone else, I hated 8 at first, and 8.1 didn't do enough to fix it (although it was evolving in the right direction when the 8.2 "threshold" update was cancelled and turned into the Windows 10 initial release).

When 10 came out, with all of the problems and abuses that we've all seen described a hundred times, I began to forget why I hated 8 so much. Sure, it shared the "app" stupidity with 10, and the Explorer ribbon, and the tiled Start (I don't see a great deal of difference between the start screen and a tiled start menu. One's just a bigger version of the other), and it took the flatness to new heights of ugliness. Those UI issues were still there in 10, but with a lot of other nasty stuff thrown in too that made the UI mess seem less important.

With some elbow grease, the Win 8.1 UI can be chopped, hacked, cajoled, folded, spindled, and mutilated to produce a decent OS. Windows 10... not so much. It's a lost cause trying to keep it de-stupidified with the insane "WaaS" update schedule. Even if you figure out how to hack out the stupid (and there is a lot more to do than with 8.x), MS will just turn around and hit you with a new version in six months that puts it right back in, only now your hacks may not work. De-stupidizing Windows 10, like Windows 10 rollouts in enterprise, is the never-ending task. Right when you think you're done, a new build (with all kinds of features you never wanted, but none of the ones people have been really asking for) arrives on your doorstep, and the process starts all over again.

Beta software should not be used for important work, and Windows 10 is permanently in beta, particularly in the consumer space. Rapid updates and an appalling lack of QA testing mean that a lot of buggy code makes it into the release channel, and that won't change as long as MS sticks to its "no tester" policy.

 

[senketsu]

Also 3D printing is alive and well, and does not belong in this list.

note the article said 'Consumer' fail. 3D printing may (I think will) be a success in the consumer market, but it hasn't made it yet.

 

[Vrmithrax]

I think calling 3D printers for consumers a fail is a bit premature. They are getting constantly cheaper and more readily available. I can go buy any one of about half a dozen models at my local Fry's Electronics (some for as low as $200), and according to the sales staff there the printers are selling steadily into the hobbyist market at the moment. 3D printers are also flooding into schools with students using them day in and day out, and many new units on the cusp of release are shaped around design sharing and collaborative printing, which is right up the current generation's social media-centric life.

I'd say it's more of a "slowly building momentum" and less of a tech fail. It's still a fairly niche consumer technology that is still finding its footing and "must have" reasons or features, but that's not unlike many other consumer products that have slowly become part of our daily lives.

 

[Skidmarksdeluxe]

8 is still worse than 10

I never thought very much of 8, 8.1. It did work fine though. 10 works well enough as well but it's so invasive.

 

[bolski]

Windows 8.

Win 10 would've been the same thing all over again if it wasn't rammed down our throats.

8 is still worse than 10

8.1 with ClassicShell is the best version of Windows available.

Also 3D printing is alive and well, and does not belong in this list.

They prefaced it with how it was marketed to the home users as well and that's where it failed.

 

[meric]

How do you make an article about biggest fails and not mention amd bulldozer? it's the biggest fail in 10 years

 

[tbjamies]

I wonder why apple is successful with no partners in iPhone/ipad development (aside from suppliers) while Microsoft failed badly with many half-hearted partners..

Its because Apple is the only tech company that is infallible. You cannot compare them to anyone because of their users they can do stuff that would sink other tech companies.

 

[GregonMaui]

I'm going to respectfully disagree on smartwatches being a fail. Yes, most manufacturers got it wrong because they didn't do the homework first, but there is something to be said with the success of iWatch. I, for one, use the smartwatch for a monitoring device during exercise because of a heart condition. It is a heck of a lot more useful than lugging a phone around on a 6 or 7 mile jaunt. With the addition of LTE, not only can my family know where I am, but have the assurance that I could call for help if I needed it, while I have the convenience of not carrying anything extra around. (And lets not underestimate the value of knowing where your children are). That and not too mention being enrolled I a heart study that constantly tracks my my heart rate and exercise levels.

So, no, its not necessarily a super mass-market item, but success is measured in the number of sales I suppose. I'd hardly call it a fail.

 

[torchyear]

Ouya game console.

IMHO Windows 8 is fine, it's probably the most stable and least bloaty Windows available if you ignore the weird UI. I still use it on my workstations.

 

[Boilerhog146]

I miss Windows Phone. It ran great on weak hardware, had a lot of stuff built in that Android/iOS dont (mobile IE eliminated the need for email and youtube apps,
OS had a built in QR reader, ece) and it could get updates straight from MS,
along with being able to uninstall carrier apps.

MS could have had a gem if it didnt constantly drop the ball on hardware support/updates. Onedrive integration, continuum, and Domain Management were all talked about for WP, and would have made it a stand out player in the business and prosumer world.

AMD bulldozer CPUs?

I'd go bigger, and say AMD's utter mismanagement from 2006 to about 2016. A full decade of clowns and morons nearly tanked that entire company. The first phenoms, the delay in phenom IIs, the bulldozer generation, the lackluster 6000s, the ReBrandeon years of the 200 and 300 series, wasting hundreds of millions on seamicro, ece.

Windows mobile largely failed due too a number of factors,first ,many consumer had m$ on their pc and refused to entertain it everywhere.peops chose icons instead.icons still,in 2017,really.
Marketing was a fail ,also getting app devs ,fail.
Funny office is on ios and android now,go figure.M$
Should have never bought Nokia.no hardware manufacturer ,wanted to compete with that,fail.

I personally never owned an apple device,.had an android.went back to windows.I'm still getting updates as an insider.so someone is still working on mobile.should have fired the guy who made all the fail choices.