For Tedium, Ernie Smith compiled an awesome list of 10 pieces of hardware that didn’t stand the test of time. Some of these I’d heard of, like the Brøderbund U-Force, a NES infared controller. But most of these passed me by, such as The Intel Ottoman PC:
Anyone who knows about the supercomputing firm Cray knows that there’s an audience for computing devices that double as furniture.
However, those people might be surprised to learn that Intel once tried something similar, developing a concept PC that fits in an ottoman with the help of SozoDesign, an industrial design firm.
It was built around the idea that computing power would be more elegantly integrated into the home. But it came off as kind of silly.
This came out in 1999, to the surprise of no one who knows mid-to-late 90s tech. I hope there’s a museum or warehouse holding some of these.