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Photo Gallery: 10 greatest tech flops

From the Apple Newton to the Nokia N-Gage - these are the products that failed to catch on. (Words: Chris Jager)

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Top 10 biggest tech flops

Fate can be a fickle mistress: especially if you're a piece of technology. Behind every successful gadget there is a pile of failures languishing on the scrap heap.

Some of these products were atrocious abominations that deserved their fates. Others were unfortunate victims of circumstance. Whatever the reason, they all failed to connect with consumers on a meaningful level.

LaserDisc (Pioneer)

When it comes to failed video formats of the 1980s, most people think Betamax deserves the wooden spoon. However, Pioneer’s LaserDisc format was by far the bigger flop. LaserDisc resembled a cross between a CD and a vinyl record, with discs measuring a hefty 30cm in diameter. The format was only capable of storing 60 minutes of video per side, with the user required to flip the disc halfway through.

Despite being expensive, noisy and obscure, the LaserDisc format managed to limp along until 2001, when DVDs finally rendered it obsolete. There remains a tiny, bearded subset of humanity that continues to champion the LaserDisc format. Like stamp collectors and train set enthusiasts, these people are best avoided.

Virtual Boy (Nintendo)

Nintendo's first stab at a handheld 3D console was a career-destroying misfire. The monochrome graphics, awkward interface, headache-inducing 3D and dearth of games all conspired to make it Nintendo's biggest hardware flop to date. Consumers hated the thing on sight and it was scrapped by the company after just seven months on the market.

The Virtual Boy can also be blamed for inadvertently causing the death of Game Boy creator Gunpei Yokoi. No really. After the Virtual Boy flopped, Yokoi left Nintendo in disgrace to develop the rival Bandai WonderSwan console. He was then killed in a car accident on his way to work. If the Virtual Boy never happened, the grandaddy of portable gaming would probably still be alive.

UMD movies (Sony)

The Universal Media Disc format was a misfire from the very beginning. At a time when movie downloads and burnable DVDs were gaining momentum, Sony expected consumers to embrace a fiddly, non-rewritable disc format that only worked with one niche product - the Sony PSP. To add insult to injury, the titles cost significantly more than their DVD counterparts (until they were consigned to the bargain bin that is). On top of all this, the Sony PSP came with a MP4-friendly memory card slot that allowed film buffs to bypass the format entirely.

Studio support has since trickled away to almost nothing, with even Sony ceasing production of UMD movies. The next-generation PSP will reportedly come with an entirely new disc format. UMD, we hardly knew ye.

Newton (Apple)

The Newton MessagePad was an early precursor to the PDA. Originally appearing in 1993, the Newton's main claim to fame was its handwriting recognition software; a feature that didn't actually work very well. This was memorably lampooned on an episode of The Simpsons, with town bully Dolph recieving the memo 'eat up Martha' after writing 'Beat up Martin'.

The Apple Newton languished in development hell for eight years, with Apple reportedly investing US$100M into the project. When it finally reached stores, customers were unimpressed by the buggy software, short battery life and $700 price tag. One of Steve Jobs' first acts as CEO was to axe the whole division. Few mourned.

Gizmondo (Tiger Telematics)

The rise and bloody fall of Tiger Telematics is a corker of a story, filled with embezzlement, organised crime and excessive coroporate greed. It culminated in the company's CEO crashing a $2,000,000 Enzo Ferrari sportscar and filing for bankruptcy - just months after the console launched in the US. (Forget The Social Network - this is the tech bio we want to see!)

Despite strong ties to the Swedish mafia, the company couldn't convince consumers to adopt their Game Boy rival, which suffered from a poor games library. With only 25000 units ever sold, it is the worst selling handheld in history. (The car-crashing executive is currently on trial for extortion and aggravated assault.)

Apple Lisa 1

The Apple Lisa 1 was a personal computer aimed at business users that was first released in 1981. It ran on its own GUI operating system and featured a 5MHz Motorola 68000 microprocessor, two megabytes of RAM, multiple expansion slots and a full a numeric keypad.

A serious commercial failure, the Lisa 1 struggled to compete against IBM's cheaper PC offerings. Its CPU was ill-equipped to run the system's sophisticated business programs and the whole kit cost close to $10,000 - and that's in 1982 money.

Zune (Microsoft)

The Zune media player was a case of too little, too late. It originally came to market in 2006 - nearly half a decade after the Apple iPod had established an unassailable lead.

The Zune never really caught on with consumers. Despite Microsoft's huge marketing muscle, it currently has a market share of less than two per cent. If a recent report published by Bloomberg is true, Microsoft is preparing to abandon the brand entirely. If only they'd come up with those cool dancing silhouettes first.

N-Gage (Nokia)

Nokia's ill-fated gaming phone debuted in October 2003, where it received heavy criticism for its unconventional user interface. To insert a new game, users had to remove the phone's plastic cover and pull out the battery compartment. Every single time. Meanwhile, making a phone call involved talking into the side of the device like some kind of deranged mental patient. It failed as a phone and as a console, with the dodgy buttons adding to the misery. Tellingly, the N-Gage was outsold by the Game Boy Advance by a factor of 100 to 1 during its first week on sale.

Despite several drastic redesigns, the N-Gage never won the public's favour. Indeed, the platform remains a frequent object of ridicule and scorn, some five years after its death.

3DO Interactive Multiplayer (3DO Company)

When Electronic Arts' founder Trip Hawkins left the company to launch the 3DO in 1991, many people thought he was crazy. They were probably right. With an RRP of $699.95 it was simply too expensive for the time. The lack of a 'killer app', like Mario or Sonic, didn't help matters either. It didn't take long for the stench of failure to sink in: console magazines began refering to the beleaguered CEO as Trip "3DOh go on, buy one!" Hawkins, which summed up his desperation quite nicely.

The 3DO company moved into software sales before finally filing for bancruptcy in 2003. Despite its failure, the 3DO wasn't a bad console - in many ways, it paved the way for the Sony PlayStation. Ahead of its time.

HD DVD (Toshiba)

Having apparently learned nothing from the Beta vs. VHS war that plagued the 1980s, the video industry embarked on another format tussle in 2006. In one camp was Sony's Blu-ray technology, in the other; Toshiba's HD DVDs. The HD DVD format originally seemed to have the upper hand, with industry experts proclaiming it to be the likely victor (bizarrely, this was mostly based on the fact 'HD DVD' sounds like 'DVD'). Then Sony stated Blu-ray would not support porn; another considerable blow.

But Sony had a magical ace up its sleeve: the PlayStation 3 console. This helped tip the scales in Sony's favour, with film studios gradually shifting their support to Blu-ray. By January 2008, the writing was on the wall - development ceased soon after.

Top 10 biggest tech flops

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Photo Gallery: 10 greatest tech flops

From the Apple Newton to the Nokia N-Gage - these are the products that failed to catch on. (Words: Chris Jager)

Top 10 biggest tech flops

LaserDisc (Pioneer)

Virtual Boy (Nintendo)

UMD movies (Sony)

Newton (Apple)

Gizmondo (Tiger Telematics)

Apple Lisa 1

Zune (Microsoft)

N-Gage (Nokia)

3DO Interactive Multiplayer (3DO Company)

HD DVD (Toshiba)

Top 10 biggest tech flops

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