I actually can't believe anybody would be stupid enough to think that Wi-Fi ever needed to be on a washing machine. That is literally a idea designed to milk extra money from sucker's.
I worked for an industrial tool manufacturer for a couple years. It's well known brand but not one you can just go to Home Depot and buy. Their tools are very specialized and very expensive.
Anyway, the last project I was on before I left was one where they tried to create smart tools. It wasn't a completely bad idea. Those things have specific maintenance requirements. Reminding the user that it's time for maintenance based on a cycle count, hour count, or severity of conditions was actually a good idea.
But, management wanted two things: Wireless charging, and the ability to feed data from the tool back to a dashboard that the user could log into. Then, they would charge a premium for the "smart tool" and get the customer to pay for access to the dashboard. At least that was the idea. The problem was that customers didn't give a shit about either of those "features." They just wanted their tools to work reliably. The division president refused to listen. I don't know how it worked out. For unrelated reasons, I didn't hang around long enough to find out.
Adding [unnecessary] electronics to tools and appliances is cheap. There's some engineering costs involved but once that's done, the components usually amount to a small fraction of the overall build cost. And the markup is insane, which is one reason why they add those "features".
I suspect that there's plenty of engineering teams out there questioning why a stove needs WiFi and then getting overridden by some SVP who has literally never used a stove in his entire life.
We bought an “analog” washer and dryer for my wife and I when we moved into our first home. Hasn’t failed us yet. Her parents have a fancy set and they’ve had to get it fixed a few times already. Seems like the simpler the better for home appliances
Our dryer wasn't working very well so we got a temporary one for $100 from Craigslist, but turns out it runs great and we have no desire to replace it.
Mainly GTG response time and latency. For watching movies it's generally not a problem, but when it comes to playing games with a mouse, latency can be a huge issue, and bad GTG response time leads to smearing.
I just bought a new set. We used to have a vertical stacked set but only the bottom washer was unrepairable. We had to rearrange a lot of stuff in our laundry room to get a side by side set in there but we found one that worked nicely. WAY bigger capacity than our last units and only $50 more than the cheapest set available. And yeah, it's not smart. No Internet.
