[kjuulh]

If you want something on the more application side, I.e. utilization of low-level techniques, I can highly recommend looking into game engine development, even if you aren't interested in games per say.

I've recently enjoyed Game Engine Architecture, mostly because there is an interesting mix using low level techniques to solve problems a normal application wouldn't be required to fix.

Game development in general is case for tuning yourself to when you should utilize high level programming techniques, and when required dropping into low level optimization to solve local problems.