LightScribe

Windows phone. I really liked Windows phone and how it meshed design wise with Windows 10 desktop. I also don't like the duopoly that iOS and Android share. I felt Windows 10 mobile was a pretty good OS and mainly it was the lack of apps that was just insurmountable and ultimately made Windows phone a non starter. However, I'm also disappointed in how Microsoft handled their mobile efforts, Nokia, carriers and developers. I still think they could have still been a solid 3rd mobile OS worldwide if they did not give up.

I with you : Pebble!

I wouldn't so much say a specific tech or company, so much as a loss of so many and a real variety in hardware.

For all the talk of "performance" between Intel and AMD, or Radeon vs. GeForce, generally speaking the software differences across these platforms is basically nil.

Back before x86 and to a lesser extent PPC kicked EVERYTHING else to the curb, there was so much variation in hardware capabilities AND what it took to program that hardware. Sure the incompatibilities and outright oddball differences were challenging -- but that was part of the fun.

Even when you had the same processor there was NO guarantee porting the software from one platform to another was even possible. Atari 400/800, Commodore Pet, VIC=20 and 64, Apple ][ -- they ALL shared the Motorola 6502 processor or a derivitve of it meaning they WERE binary compatible... but since they didn't map memory the same way, include the same ROM's, use the same video chipsets, so on and so forth ALL of them felt like such radically different machines. Same goes with the Z80's that were more popular on the business side in the states apart from the black and white TRS-80's, though our friends across the pond in the UK got all sorts of Sinclair goodness; but just because something ran on a TRS-80 Model III didn't mean it had a snowballs chance in hell of running on a Sinclair Speculum.

... and those were the more common choices. The TI 99/4 series use of the 16 bit TMS9900 was strange as hell since they didn't give it enough 16 bit SRAM for the 16 bit access to be useful, so mass DRAM was mapped through the video controller. (dragging most of the performance improvements you'd expect into the 9th ring of hell). TRS-80 Colour Computer used a Motorola 6809 which was a really powerful chip for what was basically their entry level bargain gaming computer.

Whilst today you have these wildly lit cases, all sorts of fancy cooling solutions and what-not... when it comes right down to brass tacks and you sit down to use them, REGARLDESS of Linux/Windows/OSX, they're all this same bland homogeneous washed down experience.

When you sat down at the early 8 bit and 16 bit machines, you could tell which one they were just from how the text was drawn and the resolution. The integrated keyboard varied so wildly in quality (or lack therein, hi Sinclair) that every system was a unique experience.

Hell, my first computer I built from plans in the back of Popular Electronics using a RCA 1802 processor. Had to hand assemble my machine language and enter it one bit at a time on toggle switches.

... making matters more 'fun' was that to do anything TRULY useful on these early micros you basically HAD to write in assembly. Higher level languages just weren't fast enough; and when you consider that EVERY processor family has it's own DIFFERENT machine language? It wasn't "you learn C and can now target everything" -- hell prior to about 1990 few people on microcomputers gave a flying **** about C, or any other high level language for that matter. It was either the ROM BASIC built into the system for toy-like learning, or Assembly for anything serious.

I think that's why I collect so many vintage systems. (And I do have a decent collection) They were all so unique. Nowadays regardless of platform it's like eating mashed potatoes with vanilla pudding 3 times a day 7 days a week.

I also suspect that's why I'm a sucker for 'new and innovative' stuff and so let down when MOST of it turns out to be pointless oversold overhyped crap; and BOY do they LOVE to overhype stuff now.

Software. lol