5 of the worst tech products launched in 2022

 

The year 2022 witnessed the launch of a wide range of powerful technical devices, as well as some important innovations in various technology sectors, such as QD-OLED from Samsung, which makes OLED screens more resistant to the problem of screen burn-in. But 2022 also saw controversial product failures, devices that offered extremely low value for money, and even promising innovations that failed due to poor pricing. Regardless of the reason, the common factor here is that these devices came to light in 2022 but failed to satisfy the target audience. Below we highlight 5 of the most important of these products that suffered an unfriendly fate this year.

 

iPhone 14 Plus

 

With Apple's launch of the iPhone 12 series in 2020, we saw for the first time a new version in the lineup, which is the smaller version, the iPhone 12 Mini. At the time, it was received strangely because the phone deviated from the market trend of increasing the screen size increasingly, but Apple was targeting a limited segment of users who needed a small phone that could be used with one hand easily. But due to the sacrifices made in order to reach the small size, which affected sensitive elements such as the battery with a limited capacity, the phone did not achieve the success that Apple expected. Nevertheless, the company made another attempt to win over the public by launching the iPhone 13 Mini in 2021, although it provided great improvements compared to the previous generation, but once again the return was not as planned by Apple.

 

In light of this, Apple decided to make a different bet this year with the announcement of the iPhone 14 Plus, which followed the opposite path of the Mini series and at the same time is a middle option between the higher phones in the lineup (Pro & Pro Max) and also the basic model iPhone 14 if it includes a version The Plus screen and battery are similar to those of the iPhone 14 Pro Max, but this is not enough to attract public appreciation, according to the feedback.

 

The iPhone 14 Plus looks like a somewhat independent phone, it still maintains good technical specifications and has the well-known strengths of iPhones in general, including superior imaging quality. But when looking at the phone closely, we find that it not only maintained the same old design of the iPhone 13, but also the same old processing chip (A15 Bionic), in addition to a higher price of $ 900, a difference of $ 200 from the iPhone 13.

 

As soon as the phone reached the market and tests and comparisons were conducted on it, the specialized media began to criticize it severely, especially after it highlighted the strong similarities with the iPhone 13 and even the selling value close to that of the iPhone 13 Pro, as it seems a more reasonable alternative to the iPhone 14 Plus. With additional features such as a 120 Hz screen. Therefore, the phone was not welcomed to the extent that Apple decided to stop producing the phone due to weak demand.

 

Motorola Razr 2022 phone

 

Razr is the most successful series of phones from the well-established Motorola company, and the V3, which was introduced in 2004, is the first and best-selling phone in the series, followed by other versions that maintained their weight in the mobile phone market for a long time. But as with Nokia, Motorola's response has been slow to develop new products in the growing touchscreen market, and the Razr's popularity has declined significantly. Until 2019 came, when Motorola revived the series with a foldable smartphone, the Razr 2019, which came with a design inspired by the original Razr style and mainly appeals to the most nostalgic audience! But it had flaws that were hard to ignore such as a small battery, poor build quality, and also limited performance as a smartphone.

 

Part of these problems was solved with the introduction of the new version Razr 5G in 2020, but at that time the phone was overshadowed by the competition from the new Samsung phone (at that time), which is the Galaxy Z Flip, which offers the same idea, a vertically foldable phone, in addition to its work with the most powerful processing chip There are excellent cameras in the market that offer better image quality. Here, Motorola decided to stop for a while and backed off from launching a new version in 2021 in order to reassess its capabilities and whether it will continue its journey in the foldable smartphone market.

 

Indeed, Motorola's strategy succeeded in regaining its strength, so it kept watching the market well and used competitors' phones as a strong source of inspiration to come to us this year with the Razr 2022 phone, which already presented an attractive package of technical specifications, starting with the Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1 processor, the most powerful in the world of Android phones, and the supported screen. With AMOLED technology, a 144Hz refresh rate, a large 3500mAh battery, and a professional 50MP dual-lens camera, the phone retain the beloved features of older versions, such as the large rear screen.

 

Simply put, the Razr 2022 is a flawless foldable phone that puts Motorola on the right track in competing with Samsung. Indeed, its presence in this list is not due to serious defects or disadvantages in its manufacturing, but rather as a result of the company's decision that imposed a limited distribution. The phone is successful, however, Motorola has not introduced it to the global market yet. Rather, it was initially released in China, then it appeared for the first time in the European market last October, and its sale is still expanding, but slowly. Therefore, it did not receive the same welcome as the first generation (Razr 2019), in addition to the emergence of new competitors, after Samsung was almost dominant, now competing with giants such as Oppo and Huawei in the vertically foldable phone market.

 

The other thing that sets the Razr 2022 apart from the rest of the devices on this list is that there is still a chance of it turning into a successful product with better reception in 2023 when it expands to more markets, including the Middle East. So it remains to be seen what Motorola's strategy will be - especially with regard to price adjustment - to try to capture what remains of the promising sector for foldable phones.

 

AMD Radeon RX 6400 graphics card

 

The Radeon RX 6000 series, based on the RDNA 2 architecture, put AMD back in the game after years of confinement in the cost-performance graphics card segment. Industry. Even with significantly limited ray tracing performance and the lack of leading and powerful graphic technologies such as DLSS, AMD has entered this series of high-level PC GPUs to compete with the green giant after a long absence from the field. Unfortunately, this series came at the worst period in the history of electronic devices in general and the computer industry, as the RX 6000 cards suffered from an insane increase in prices with a shortage of stock and the disappearance of components as a result of the Covid-19 virus, as well as mining issues, the semiconductor supply crisis, and so on. Therefore, it has become very difficult for users who are trying to build a computer on a budget to find an affordable graphics card.

 

In the midst of this chaos, AMD announced the RX 6400 economic class card, which appears in its simplest form, a card that offers basic and very ordinary specifications, with reliance on the same RDNA 2 architecture, but with a small design and the lowest possible price in the RX 6000 series. Despite the positive intent of AMD's Desiring to save the market and help users put together budget-friendly PCs with acceptable graphical performance, the sacrifices the company made to make the low-cost card were so sharp and tough that they made it the worst modern graphics card you could buy today.

 

First, the card sticks to PCIe 4.0 x4 interface support only, which dramatically limits transfer rates when used on computers with older-generation components. In fact, according to TechPowerUp tests, the RX 6400 loses 14% of performance when running on the old PCIe 3.0 connection interface, and since the card is already weak in performance, losing 14% of performance makes it unqualified mainly for the target segment, which are users who want to assemble a cheap computer and from Logically, its components are old and therefore will not fit the RX 6400 card.

 

It is true that the RX 6400 offers slightly better performance compared to older graphics cards, but at the same time, it carries 4 GB of video memory, which is a relatively small size for a graphics card in 2022. Moreover, the card does not contain any important Hardware Encoding technology in any tasks related to the industry. The content, whether broadcasting games online or in rendering operations, and so on, and therefore these operations depend mainly on the processor, even in the case of an external graphics card such as the RX 6400.

 

AMD has completed its mix at a price not in dreams! Despite the fact that the card is "economical", its official price was not as expected, but it starts from $ 160 (at the time of its launch), pricing that was very poorly received by users and was constantly criticized by reviewers and the media, especially in light of the presence of the GTX 1650 card. The competition is from NVIDIA, which outperforms the RX 6400 in performance at a similar price. Currently, the card can be found at cheaper prices but its image is still tarnished in the market.

 

Nvidia GeForce GTX 1630 graphics card

 

True, the GTX 1650 card was more than enough to compete with the RX 6400 from AMD, whether in terms of performance, features, or even price. But NVIDIA had another opinion, so it launched a new card that is the least expensive in its GTX 16 economic card series, namely the GTX 1630 so that it appears as if this is a direct response from NVIDIA to the same crisis for which the RX 6400 was developed so that users have two options of Nvidia versus only one option from AMD when wanting to assemble a computer at a limited cost in light of price conflicts and variations. However, the official price required for the GTX 1630 card is higher than AMD's pricing for the RX 6400 by about $ 10, while offering much lower performance than the RX 6400, which made the GTX 1630 an unexciting option if the goal was to assemble a computer that offers strong performance with games.

 

On paper, the GTX 1630 has a few of the best of the GTX 16 cards and specifically the GTX 1650 such as "Turing" architecture (the same used in the RTX 2000 range), lower power consumption, and support for NVIDIA Encoder technologies. But the card remains accompanied by only 4GB of video memory, and when looking closely, we find that it comes with fewer CUDA cores by 512 cores only, as well as a 64-bit memory bus for bandwidth compared to 128-bit in the GTX 1650, as well as 96 GB / sec as a limit maximum theoretical bandwidth.

 

These specs make the GTX 1630 disappointing compared to its peers, even if it manages to be faster than the GTX 1050 with the ability to run some games running at 1080p at 30fps, the GTX 1630 is slower than any other card using a more modern architecture - Including the same Realtek RX 6400. But if we look at the glass half full, we find that the card still carries some important advantages compared to its competitor AMD, such as support for the PCIe 4.0 x8 interface, which maintains the performance of the card relatively when used on old devices that still use PCIe 3.0, as we indicated, these were among the weaknesses RX 6400. The presence of NVENC technology is also more useful for content creators or even those planning to use the card as a secondary GPU.

 

In any case, as a result of the poor performance of the GTX 1630, the card did not attract the attention of many when it was launched in mid-2022 and is currently being completely avoided as an option within the graphics cards in the gaming category, even after it was offered in some electronic stores at a price cheaper than the official price, especially with the improvement in the price situation. Hardware, in general, these days is almost non-existent, making it easy to find much better budget-friendly cards like the RTX 3050 or RX 6600.

 

Logitech G Cloud gaming platform

 

The Logitech G Cloud is a Nintendo Switch-style portable gaming device from Swiss peripheral giant Logitech, developed in partnership with China's Tencent, also a gaming giant known for its collaborations with prestigious studios such as Ubisoft. As the name of the device suggests, it focuses on playing games in the cloud, relying on well-known platforms in this field such as GeForce NOW, Xbox Cloud Streaming, and even services that simulate the experience, such as Steam Link. Simply put, Logitech G Cloud is a platform to access online gaming services from anywhere with just one device.

 

Logitech has used its high-level experience in manufacturing mice, keyboards, and other peripheral accessories to bring us a simple and comfortable design, so this is the most important feature of the Logitech G Cloud, with the testimony of all those who reviewed it, from YouTubers to the media, as the materials the device is made of are excellent. At the same time, the device runs Android with access to the Play Store and can switch between two user interface modes, one that makes the OG Cloud work as if it were a regular Android tablet and another interface that is optimized to easily move between games with two side joysticks, which is It is very similar to Steam's Big Picture interface.

 

On the other hand, the Logitech G Cloud does not carry as many advantages as the flaws that were discovered during the review. Perhaps the biggest disadvantage of the device is its almost total reliance on playing cloud games, instead of working as a hybrid device like other competing devices, G Cloud focuses on cloud games only, as a result, its specifications are very weak. We are talking about the Snapdragon 720G processor, which is a weak processor to the point that it is used in mid-range phones such as the A52 from Samsung, as well as the size of the RAM is only 4 GB and the basic storage capacity is 64 GB, expandable.

 

These specifications do not make the device, as a gaming unit, reach even acceptable performance when running some games locally, and if we assume that this will only happen when the Internet connection is disconnected, for example, then it is completely illogical. Logitech G Cloud relies heavily on the Internet connection to play cloud games, which in turn does not depend on the capabilities of the device itself, but this does not mean ignoring the technical specifications of this level.

 

In addition, the price of the device is high, if it reaches $ 350, which is only $ 50 less than the more powerful Steam Deck device, which, by the way, provides the same ability as G Cloud to run cloud games in addition to containing professional technical specifications that enable it to work with the Arch Linux distribution with the ability to Install Windows 11 on it if the user wants, without affecting the performance of the games!

 

The Logitech G Cloud situation has become more complicated with the emergence of another new competitor, the Razer Edge, which offers the same principle but with high technical specifications such as the Snapdragon G3x Gen 1 gaming processor, a high refresh rate OLED screen, two removable and connected joysticks, in addition to the ability to Connecting to the 5G network. These factors led to the failure of G Cloud. Sales of the device could have boomed had it been launched at a lower price point so that the public viewed it as an affordable option for playing games in front of smartphones. But it remains to be seen whether the company will listen to the criticism and launch an improved version at a lower price, or just reduce the price of the current G Cloud.