Consumer Electronics | featured news

Apple Inc stunned Wall Street by reporting results that missed expectations for the first time in years, blaming rumors of the new iPhone for hurting demand in the September quarter.

The Flip video camera had been one of the great hardware-start-up successes of the previous decade, but it lost traction as the smartphone came on the scene.

After retiring the floppy disk in March, Sony has halted the manufacture and distribution of another now-obsolete technology: the cassette Walkman, the first low-cost, portable music player. The final batch was shipped to Japanese retailers in April, according to IT Media. Once these units are sold, new cassette Walkmans will no longer be available through the manufacturer.The first generation Walkman (which was called the Soundabout in the U.S., and the Stowaway in the UK) was released on July 1, 1979 in Japan.

All the surveys agree; one of the top consumer electronic gift categories is digital cameras. Surprised? Me neither.