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Before Rambus RDRAM ever appeared on PCs, it was a component of the Nintendo 64, which utilized 4MB of RDRAM running at 500MHz. Two years later, PC builders would get a taste of this proprietary RAM when Rambus and Intel entered into a license contract to exclusively use RDRAM with Intel CPU chipsets. That meant that if you wanted to build a Pentium 4 system with an Intel motherboard, you had to use RDRAM. Intel even planned to make a half billion dollar investment into Micron fabs to boost the adoption of RDRAM. Intel figured that the success of RDRAM could generate a lot of licensing revenue from Rambus, and was confident in the superiority of RDRAM over alternatives. At the time, PC-133 and even DDR SDRAM wasn't nearly as fast as the 400MHz (PC800) Rambus offering, and it wasn't until dual-channel DDR 400 came out that SDRAM was dethroned.
Even with its speed advantage, memory vendors strongly resisted the adoption of RDRAM due to the high cost of manufacturing and expensive licensing fees. And as SDRAM prices continued to fall, motherboard manufacturers opted to utilize chipsets that supported SDRAM from chipset makers like VIA rather than Intel. Even Intel's subsidy of RDRAM by bundling RIMMS with Pentium 4 CPUs didn't help the standard. Today, Rambus has ceased development of RDRAM and is currently pursuing lawsuits against other RAM makers which it alleges conspired to depress the price of DDR memory to [successfully] kill off RDRAM.
The first "internet appliance" the 3Com Audrey was poised to revolutionize the way we interacted with computers in the household. Released in 2000 for a modest $500, this touchscreen PC was marketed as a way for families to take the PC out of the office and into the family living space. It came bundled with a dial-up modem, two USB ports, and a Compactflash slot, meaning you could email, or surf the internet for dinner recipes without leaving the kitchen. It even synced up to Palm handhelds (though those didn't fare so well in the long run, either). The Audrey's creators envisioned the device as the hub of the connected household.
Even though the Audrey attracted lots of media buzz and a devoted following, not enough consumers were convinced that they needed a simplified computing device for their living rooms or kitchens. The dot-com crash didn't help matters, and 3Com pulled the plug on the Audrey just a few months after its launch. The open-source community quickly adopted the device to hack its operating system, and has since developed custom internet browsers, MP3 players, and photo viewing software for the Audrey.
Despite the Audrey's failure, the concept was sound, and it paved the way for current all-in-one PCs like HP's Touchsmart line and Dell's Studio One computers. In fact, one of our current favorite gadgets, the Chumby, has a striking resemblance to the Audrey.
Intel’s NetBurst. Like all things, Intel’s NetBurst architecture that was used in the Pentium 4 can be spun two ways: a success that sold tens of millions if not hundreds of millions of parts over the years. From the enthusiast point of view though, it was a failure. During its life, it was lost various battles to the Pentium III it was supposed to replace, AMD’s Athlon and Athlon XP as well as the Athlon 64.
As we’ve said before, the Pentium 4 could never close the deal and coffee, as we know, is for closers. That’s not to say there weren’t successes. The Extreme Edition variants were indeed fast as were the initial “Northwood” derivatives. Near the end of its life, the Cedar Mill versions also had good reps as overclocking parts. Still, for a company that had a multi-decade track record of smoking the competition, the Pentium 4 / NetBurst era is nothing to call a success. It didn’t help that the first Pentium 4s were tied to the uber-expensive Direct RDRAM memory that ignited a rebellion among RAM vendors against Intel (see above).
The Pentium 4 even faced an internal rebellion. With the realization that the hotter than hell design would never make it a true mobile CPU, a splinter development started working on a Pentium III derivative codenamed Banias. Banias would eventually turn into Pentium M which morphed into Core Duo and finally Core 2. More than AMD, Core 2 put the final bullets into the Pentium 4 and sent it to languish in the stomach of the Sarlacc for a thousand years.
Did you buy into these or any other technologies that just didn't deliver? Share your nostalgia in the comments below!
Comments are closed on this article
Bless
May 25, 2009 at 11:56pm
I bought zip250 in the year 2000 and believe it or not I'm still using it right now in 2009, in the year where they are able to create a 16 GB usb disk :) even I'm still Using the same zip disk that came with the hardware. Sure there are a couple of errors where I'm forced to delete that misfortune files, but considering how old it is, it's pretty understandable. I remembered how the zip disk saved my life many times, being able to copy and delete files where the CD-RW were still in the womb. Even until now I still prefer my zip disk compared to CD-RW hence you can copy and delete files instantly, not having to wait for that burn time is a bless for me.
Xylogeist
September 09, 2009 at 10:06am
Pfft, you can buy custom made 64GB USB drives these days - they are over 250$ regularly though :P
1mustdie
May 23, 2009 at 11:52pm
Wow!! I did own
Kenwood TrueX, Intel i740, Iomega Zip Drive, MPEG-2 DVD Decoder Card (Creative), Rambus, and the Prescott!!! Boy do I feel like a loser, but in the end it helped me learn through the years....
Asterixx
May 20, 2009 at 6:40pm
Nunc est bibendum!
I'd call the LS-120 drive a bigger failure than the Zip. At least the Zip made it into the mainstream and stayed there several years.
FrancesTheMute
May 20, 2009 at 2:08pm
I had one of the Kenwood 72X drives. I thought it was great, never had any problems with it and it did seem to read disks pretty fast. I guess I got lucky and got a good one.
Baer
May 20, 2009 at 1:30pm
Even Apple Fanbois have to admit that the Apple III was a dismal failure. It was quickly replaced by the Apple ][G.
Five Rabbits
May 20, 2009 at 11:46am
I concur on the zip drives, they may have become obsolete but they weren't a techonological failure. They filled an important niche for 5-6 years in the computing world. Data had become too big for floppys and, as mentioned in the article, CD-Writers were too slow and the media too expensive, especially when you consider ZIP media was reusable. Yeah I know RWs existed but they were and remain a pain in the butt to use, whereas ZIP meida was as easy as click and drag. It wasn't until CD-Wrtiters became faster, the media dirt cheap and burning process more relaible that they were able to replace the ZIP (If CD-Writers hadn't done it USB drives eventually would). And I'd suggest it was their use in the sneaker-net that made ZIP drives a success and not their use as a backup medium.
mrvander
May 20, 2009 at 10:39am
Sadly, I had both the Kenwood drives and the IBM Deathstars.
Sadly #2, it was because MaxPC/Boot (whichever it was at the time) recommended both of them with glowing reviews and just quite possibly a Kick Ass award.
Yusonice
May 20, 2009 at 1:47am
Hello p4 brothers!
I have cedar-mill @ 3ghz. its the final version of p4!! Who doesnt desire better processor? Still it meets my need and dont really need upgrade
kyleb2112
May 20, 2009 at 1:30am
Iomega made bank on zip drives. Any tech that is a defacto standard for several years is hardly a failure. They were even pre-installed on systems--a situation any hardware vendor would kill for. You want a total fail, talk about the Iomega JAZ drives. Those literally failed. I ran a small business at the time and had the misfortune to purchase 5 Jaz drives at once. They all failed immediately and repeatedly until the warranty expired and Iomega said tough luck--even though they spent their whole lives at Iomega's repair shop and less than a collective week in my possesion. I've been rooting for that company's death ever since.
yogurt80
May 20, 2009 at 12:22am
Since this is "tech" failures and not just PC failures, I'll add two glaring exclusions- HD-DVD and MiniDisc.
Havok
May 25, 2009 at 9:25am
They make great coasters for both beer bottles AND shotglasses respectively!
OMGWTFBBQ
Blaze589
May 19, 2009 at 10:38pm
I'm using a Pentium D 830 processor. Essentially it's two Pentium 4 processors [Prescott] glued together and of course is based on the NetBurst microarchitecture, one of the noteworthy failures mentioned in this article... It has served me well enough but its age is showing under certain circumstances. Thankfully my annual five year build is next year; I'm hoping to get my hands on a 6 core i7. Hopefully 5 years after that build there wouldn't be an updated article mentioning that a component of that build is a failure...
Saiyan Monkey
May 19, 2009 at 9:00pm
Sadly, as I sit here typing this (completely devoid of any sogginess in my trousers), I'm still "rockin'" my Pentium 4 Prescott :-( . I didn't know any better back when I bought it, but MxPC has shown me the way...now if only there was anything in my wallet to do something about it...*sniff*
GFC
May 19, 2009 at 10:58pm
Don't be so sad, I'm using my Pentium 4 (Northwood @ 2,66), so you're not alone. But I too wish I had the cash for a new build...
Keith E. Whisman
May 20, 2009 at 1:53am
I just gave my old P4C 3Ghz Northwood CPU and DFI Lanparty 875Pro motherboard to a friend. The thing still runs and WinXPee is still just as speedy as ever. I had overclocked that CPU to 4ghz with ease. He is going to use it along with my trusty old EVGA Nvidia 6800GT video card and a gig of Corsair DDR 800 ram.
That Northwood CPU isn't all that old and they are still pretty speedy. Sure my Core 2 Duo E8400 is alot faster we are talking about a 3ghz CPU. That CPU was fast and is still pretty speedy for Windows XP and some games.
He is going to be playing WOW with my old hardware and WOW seems to run just fine with my old hardware. In fact back in the day I had a hard time finding games that were too much for my hardware. Doom 3 and HL2 ran great at high resolutions on that hardware.
Saiyan Monkey
May 21, 2009 at 12:08am
I forgot to also mention that my system is a Dell Dimension 3000 (seriously, I didn't know any better back then), so my upgrading options are severely limited (I mean, they (Dell) went so far as to remove the AGP port on the motherboard! Who f-ing does that??!? I can't solder, so I can't fix it (and, again, back then I didn't even know what an AGP port was *shame*) so I'm stuck with a PCI graphics card (Diablotek GeForce FX 5500...I still didn't know better, sorry). Still, the machine works quite well (I've never experienced a crash of any sort that wasn't my own doing), and I've been using it to learn more about PCs (I just love messing with shite in my tower) by exploring and upgrading what I can (maxing out the RAM, expanding storage from 80GB to 830GB, setting up a dual-boot with Windows 7 and XP(Home, not Pro *sniff*), and just generally experimenting as much as I can).
It wasn't until I bought a book put out my MxPC called something like: "How to Build Your Dream PC" (I think it's Will Smith that has the author credit) that I learned the folly of my thinking thinking my machine was remotely powerful (ignorance is bliss and all that). I got that book along with another put out by MxPC (which I'd sadly never heard of until I found these books at a bargain book store) that was a Buyers Guide for 2005 I think, which, though outdated at the time I bought it, was still supremely useful in teaching me what to look for in PC parts, all I ahd to do from there was keep up to speed on current gear (which MxPC is terribly helpful with).
All this means two simple things:
1. my computer sucks, but at least it's functional (and not too shabby in gaming, so long as I don't want to play anything too new (it rocks in Doom 3 though, and is at least playable in Far Cry).
2. MxPC has shown me the folly of my ways and my thinking and bestowed unto me Holy Geeky Spirit (at least enough for me to become an aspiring geek at least...hey, man, I'm poor, cut me some slack).
Oh, and they taught me how to do things with a simple USB flash drive that gets my trousers all soggy.
Arkhon
May 21, 2009 at 5:21am
The first time I ever worked around inside a computer was about a month ago, and I was working without any knowledge on the subject. I took apart my computer (An Athlon XP build, with GeForce FX5600 DT or something, I'm not quite sure) completely, even disassembling the fan on the video card, and emptied a can of air trying to dust that thing out. I pulled a ring of dust and cat hair out of the CPU fan, and it remained intact until I threw it in the trash. I didn't have any problems putting the entire thing back together, either. Building a PC is really, really easy, if a 17-year-old with no knowledge on the subject can do it without problems. The hardest part is choosing the components, making sure they are compatible with each other. My friend, who has long claimed greater knowledge of the inner workings of computers than me, recently bought a PCIe x16 video card, but his Dell Inspiron 531s can't fit it. I laughed at his stupidity, and now I'm building my first computer from scratch in a few weeks to celebrate my graduation. I'll get one of my dad's old video cards (he had 2 8800 GTs in SLI, replaced them with a GTX 275), and lord it over my friend, because that's what we do to each other.
(personal story over)
I pick hardware based mainly on what I read here and on Tom's Hardware.
Cache
May 19, 2009 at 7:27pm
RDRAM may have failed, but the Rambus 'Sue everyone with a pulse' philosophy has paid off handsomely so far. Do they even have a business model that doesn't involve the court system?
Keith E. Whisman
May 20, 2009 at 8:43am
US Court System=Fail. Well at least when it comes to the ease at which anyone can sue anyone for anything and have a good chance at wining.
compro01
May 20, 2009 at 10:42am
You don't even need to win or have a chance of winning. You just need to be able to drag it out, causing your oppenent to rack up legal fees, making a go-away settlement a more attractive proposition than fighting it in court, even if you're in the right.
Havok
May 19, 2009 at 7:23pm
I totally expected to see the Intel i740 "graphics" card on this list.
Epic lols and fails.
OMGWTFBBQ
JAMES SINR
May 19, 2009 at 7:42pm
http://www.dvguru.com/2006/10/03/the-dvd-rewinder/
OMG I THOUGHT U WERE SHITTIN US LMFAO HAHAHAHAAHA
thefuzz4
May 19, 2009 at 8:00pm
I think that I might need to get one of those for all those DVD's I need to rewind
