Earlier quoted context omitted.
It works well only in theory. Almost no apps works on ios9 anymore, so you can't run netflix, hbo, even browsers are useless because certificates aren't updated - that's why i wanted to just use it as a homekit server, but you can't do this either. ie, the processor is just fine for doing all of the above, but slowly all functionality has been lost.
Right, the argument is that the hardware is still functional, but due to the walled garden nature of the ecosystem, it can no longer be used. They are more like appliances and less like general purpose computing devices.
This has been Apple's vision for quite sometime. They want to control the full lifecycle of their devices. Yes they are exactly more like "consoles" or "appliances" and less like full personal computers.