John,
Far be it from me to doubt that the lift-fan was a good way to deal with the potential danger of hot air ingestion but I seem to remember that the X35 also had similar issues, most notably on one of its final proving flights right before the DoD decided in favour of the F35 when on the last vertical landing it also suffered an engine stall right before touch down.
I think it also happened on the hover tests initially executed over the specially constructed pit.
As far as the RR lift-fan goes, even up until today it is a very complicated and far from trouble free system with more than one part with limited life-expectancy performance, shaft, gears and bearings come to mind here, we're not even speaking about the 3,000Lbs of death weight it comes with and a life expectancy for the whole engine set up only half that for the normal engine ,4000 iso 8000, lift-fan only 200hrs.
The Boeing design also could use its simple 2D exhaust, coming from the VTOL version, on the entire range of models and use it as a 2D nozzle in flight, a simplified F22 system.
The hot air ingestion was somewhat of a design challenge, but nowhere near unsolvable within an acceptable time-frame.
Also the way I see it, and comment would be more than welcome, the X32 system would be a lot better than the 35 when used in slow forward speed regimes,no more barnyard sized doors, complicated rear swivelling nozzles and extra potential of engine/fan troubles when ingesting the inevitable bird(s) passing by, that lift-fan is basically just one extra oversized airsucking hoover.
I doubt that operating it in a similar fashion (improvised forward operating bases ) as the old Harrier will be such a good idea, something the MARINES ceratainly plan on doing, no?
All in all the X32 , in my (fairly worthless) opinion, is a typical example of 'a future lost through a lack of vision'.