Apple Products that failed

Apple Products that failed 

Everyone knows Apple excels at innovation and thinking differently.

It's the company that gave us iPods and iPhones, iPads and MacBooks...

(and the list goes on and on and on).

But not every Apple invention was a grand slam.

Here's a look at 10 old Apple products that just didn't hit their intended mark.

The Apple III (1980-1981)

Apple 2 History

The Apple III was the first Apple computer not designed by Steve Wozniak.

The result? A super buggy machine, a motherboard that got too hot too fast, and frequent crashes. Chips would pop out of their sockets, resulting in severe problems with the entire system.

The Apple Lisa (1983-1985)

Apple

The Lisa was a personal computer designed by Apple during the 80s.

It was slow and hard to use. It also cost $9,995 at launch. 

In 1986, Apple gave up and offered to let Lisa owners trade them in and buy a normally $4,100 Mac Plus for $1,500.

The Apple Macintosh Portable (1989-1991)

eBay

Here's a not so fun problem to have: The Mac Portable sometimes failed to turn on even when plugged in due to its battery design.

Plus, it was 16 lbs. What's so portable about that?

Apple Newton (1993-1998)
Flickr

This tablet failed because of its shoddy battery life and hard-to-read screen.

It was also so infamous for its terrible handwriting recognition that it inspired a mocking from The Simpsons. 

But it also inspired aspects of future OS designs. Plus, we all know how we feel about tablets now.

Apple Pippin (1995-1996)

Wikipedia

PlayStation, Nintendo, and Sega consoles were already out and more popular, so game developers and users ignored the Pippin when it hit the market.

Priced at $600, the console was predicted to sell 300,000 units in its first year. Estimates put actual sales at somewhere between 12,000 and 42,000. 

20th Anniversary Mac (1996-1997)

eBay

Apple's Twentieth Anniversary Macintosh is a limited-edition personal computer that was released in celebration of the company's 20th birthday.

It cost almost $8,000.

Despite its poor sales, the TAM remains a popular item amongst dedicated Macintosh collectors. As of 2010, complete working machines with boxes were selling for $1,000.

Apple eMate (1997-1998)

Screenshot

The eMate was actually a good machine and went on to inspire the PowerBook series.

But Apple never made the Emate available for anyone outside educational purposes, which limited the machine from spreading across the entire spread of Apple users.

Interesting fact: To this day, Apple has never released the sales figures from the Emate.

The "Hockey Puck" Mouse (1998-2000)

eBay

Often referred to as the "hockey puck mouse",  the disc design got attention...but for all of the wrong reasons.

Its small size made it awkward to grasp, and its round shape made it tricky to orient.

It only lasted for two years, and was discontinued in 2000.

The Power Mac g4 Cube (2000-2001)

Photograph: Peter Morgan/Reuters

Despite its innovative design, critics complained the G4 was too expensive. It didn't even come with a monitor!

Plus, early models suffered from a manufacturing issue that led to cracks in the clear plastic case. 

The U2 iPod (2004-2004)