10 gadgets that failed in 2014

In 2014, Amazon thought it was onto something. It thought it could reinvent the phone again. Coupled with a new sensor system, Amazon's Fire Phone had a 720p screen, and the entire setup was called perspective display. It also has powerful internals, but frankly, Amazon was not reinventing the wheel. It was a good Android phone, but straddled by the limitations of Amazon's store for apps, and lack of integration with Google's services, which are the secret sauce behind Android. It was hyped and it bombed despite all the sensors, cameras and "intelligent apps" that claimed to identify objects in real world.

The idea of the Android One programme is novel. It attempts to have standard hardware and software in place for low-cost smartphones. Software wise, Google handles everything, from the interface to the updates and it is awesome. Unfortunately, the three Android One smartphones launched in India in September had identical hardware, which was inferior to what was already available in the market. Because of Android's fragmentation, people really do not know the advantages of stock Android, so hardware matters more, and that is where the initial Android One devices fail. Result: It didn't create buzz in the market. The fact that Google's hardware partners also pushed their own phones instead of Android One phones probably contributed to the doom and gloom.


Also Read: The Review of Spice Dream Uno and Micromax A1

When the Intex Cloud FX was launched, it was billed as the cheapest smartphone in India. While, true, the reality was that the smartphone experience it provided was not even close to being a smartphone experience in the truest sense. It was even inferior to similarly priced features phones at performing basic tasks. For instance, the Intex claims it has a camera, but to use it one has to invest in a separate microSD card. Now this would not be a big issue if the phone was priced around even Rs 5,000, but for phone that costs less than Rs 2,000, that is a major overhead.

The BlackBerry Passport was supposed to be the crazy, whacked out project that would revive the Canadian company's smartphone business. Well, it was crazy on many accounts, but by no means it revived its business. In fact, it was a weird phone. By all accounts as for the first time, there was this QWERTY BlackBerry flagship, which did not provide a rock solid typing experience. The duality between the odd hardware keyboard, the BB10 swipe gestures, and the dependence on the touch screen just added to the steep learning curve behind the phone. For many, this alone made for an unpleasant smartphone experience, leave for the large unwieldy form-factor of the phone, the odd shape of the screen, and the general poor quality of apps on the phone.


Also Read: The Full Review Of BlackBerry Passport

Created out of the remnants of the MeeGo team that left Nokia, the Jolla smartphone had only one mission -- "reinventing the smartphone experience". It has a unique multitasking system in place, which we feel is complicated to learn and has support for Android apps. Its biggest 'Achilles Heel' is perhaps its uninspiring hardware, which found few takers. In India too, the phone launched recently, but not many have gone for it. Frankly, there are better options in the market, which are cheaper and more familiar.

After its amazing unveil at Google I/O 2012, there has not been much news about Google Glass. Glass was supposed to be a consumer product by 2014 at the latest. But now there are rumours that developers are abandoning support for Sergey Brin's pet project. As of now, use cases for the product have not been fleshed out properly, and it is a very expensive product to own. There are reports that it will make a return in 2015 in a more capable cheaper avatar with Intel inside. Looking at history, we are inclined to take this information with a grain of salt.

The innovative folks at Lytro have been at it at reinventing the way we take photos with light-field technology. Its Illume camera with its CMOS sensor and 40-megaray light field resolution attempted to make the foray into the world of professional photographers. But its novel technology has not been able to convince photographers to abandon the old and trusted DSLR cameras they are using. In addition, it clearly is a first generation product, which is very expensive, so it does not make a lot sense in its current state. Perhaps, next year Lytro will return with a cheaper and more polished product.

The Samsung Galaxy Note Pro was supposed to be the product that brought Windows like productivity experiences to an Android tablet. Moreover, it did to a certain extent, so what happened? Firstly, it was grossly underpowered and it lagged a lot (the insanely high-resolution screen did not help matters) and secondly it was expensive. It was also product probably ahead of time because when it launched Microsoft's industry leading Office apps were not free on Android. Now they are. Lastly, the Galaxy Note Pro was quite a massive tablet, which is never a good thing.

On paper, the PowerShell case by Logitech for the iPhone was a great idea. Apple's iPhone has always been home to the best mobile games and a case that doubles as a gamepad was a great idea. However, it was big and clunky and it was expensive. This meant that many people were not willing to carry it. Besides this, as most of the games were optimised for touch, they never really made good use of the joy pad. We expect Logitech to return with a better model next year, this time around cheaper and possibly with support for more games.

Only recently, Microsoft entered the battleground of wearable technology. It entered with the Microsoft Band, which is a sort of a turnkey solution based around a new platform called Microsoft Health. Microsoft claims that it has developed some new sensors for the product, and unlike Apple and Google's platform, Microsoft's platform works on iOS, Android and Windows Phone alike. So what is the problem? Uninspiring hardware to say the least. Bluntly put, the plasticky Band is not something most people would want on their wrist. It software too is not fully developed. Of course, things are bound to get better both from a software and hardware point of view. Nevertheless, it is easy to see why the Microsoft Band tanked in its first attempt.