The saying used to be that something was designed for obsolescence. I no longer believe that's the case, I believe new devices are programmed for obsolescence. That is to say, the device used to work, but with new "updates," the device becomes more decrepit, and less useful, not better and more useful. I've had Apple devices that worked fine until the "update" (which was mainly targeted at the latest and greatest, not my 1 to 2 year old model) came out, at which point the device that was still quite useable, becomes almost unusable. I don't recall which software update it was, but my iPhone 3g was a great example of this. I've recently noticed the same thing (rather my completely non-technical mother has) on her 2 year old iPad and iOS 8.
The joys of software. They can now be used to artificially shorten a products life cycle, without having to even design in obsolescence from the get go.
For me, latest iOS+older iPad completely killed it. It was the last major upgrade, which added the animations. My iPad was the first gen with retina, and the animations were slow and jerky. I eventually enabled some accessibility mode which killed them, but other aspects of the user experience are less than stellar. Wifi is now intermittent.
My Nexus 4 is growing a little decrepit, but not nearly as bad. I was considering a Sony, but they seem to lag on support for newer OSes as well, so now I'm thinking about a newer Nexus, but I'm really not sure.
My new litmus test is to look at 2-5 year old devices from the brand, and see how they work before buying a new one.
Yes, this is exactly what is occurring with my mothers iPad (and I think her's is the same first gen retina). And frankly I can't do anything about it. But ever since she's installed iOS 8, wifi has been incredibly flakey. Of course, it's not Apple's fault, she just needs to buy a new iPad.
I'm not a gadget geek at all. I'm more of a cheap bastard/ "if it ain't broke.." and basically buy and use technology until it breaks or it won't do the job anymore. My Linksys WRT-54G I've had for at least 8 years just died the other day. For me it was good enough, no reason to change. My iPhone was good enough (until the updates made it unpleasant, I still used it, and eventually the hardware itself did die).
I really don't recall, but I'm guessing it was a major update. I believe this because I think I remember it being for the newer phones (iphones 4/5?) and that the update didn't include certain features on the 3g (this was a while ago for me, so I don't recall many details, sorry)
But at the same time, there was no "Warning: This will actually slow down your phone and make the user experience suck." I'm okay if a phone can't support certain features that the latest model includes. But the fact that an update actually made my older phone worse off, was quite the disappointment.
The joys of software. They can now be used to artificially shorten a products life cycle, without having to even design in obsolescence from the get go.