I'm rather sick of people saying "You should have waited until others test it". Well, it's not other people's job to test it, it is the developer who should be testing a release. That is why there is an alpha and beta test program.
Also, I support hundreds of devices in my line of work and my clients expect me to have answers first, so I am always an early adopter of whatever technology is there (or in this case, updates). My clients want to know if they are going to have problems if THEY update. I can't just say "dunno, haven't done it".
But, none-the-less, this is a huge huge problem for iPad owners. I can confirm 3 iPads have similar issues.
iPad 2 64GB w/Verizon cellular - Mine:
Upgraded to IOS 8 and immediately regretted doing so. Attempted every work-around known to man to fix some of the problems:
Hanging system - entire device locks up for milliseconds to SECONDS.
Hanging apps - where an app stops responding for milliseconds to SECONDS. Apple provided apps such as mail and safari.
Crashing apps - where an app just exits.
Very very very slow connectivity - wifi slower than broadband.
VERY slow response when typing.
VERY sluggish when opening an app or closing it... jerky... Long delays before displaying text when opening mail/safari. Several seconds.
Sketchy Cellular access - sometimes just has none - reboot fixes it, toggling off broadband and back on also gets it going, sometimes.
Copy/Paste all horked - clipboard remembers things and doesn't forget them, most recent copy not replacing old data.
IPad 3 16GB w/o cellular (backup that my wife uses):
Exact same issues as above, minus the cellular related problems.
Not quite as bad on the whole system hanging. Not quite as jerky when typing.
IPad 2 16GB w/Non activated verizon cellular (Our band's digital mixer controller):
Same problems as above, minus cellular issues
Seems to be the best of the bunch, but there is NOTHING loaded on it. One app that is not from Apple.
Still at least 2x slower than it was with IOS 7x
My iPad is the worst of the bunch, and I use it heavily for work. I can restore to IOS 7, but I cannot restore my backup from the desktop or the cloud.... It fails. My only choice has been to go back to IOS 8 and restore my data, which seems to be a LITTLE better than after the initial update. But still totally unacceptable. At the point I thought I had bricked it, apple told me that I should consider updating to the latest iPad as it has the power to run the latest IOS.
I'm sorry, but I am not upgrading to the latest because their IOS has all but made my current iPad useless. No way, if after this debacle I upgrade to something, it will likely be another platform.
Apple needs to get an update to their update out ASAP to help those of us who are screwed by their updates.
Stop defending them.. If this was Microsoft, you would be all over it. It doesn't matter WHO the company is that causes this much grief, they need to fix it, ASAP!
And in the interest of full disclosure, I have been working with computers since the early 80s. I am a developer, I have been alpha/beta tester for many products. I have supported many thousand machines/devices, and coordinated updates of hardware/software/firmware for large corporations as well as small/medium businesses, including updates to Windows 98, ME and Vista (as well as 7/8/8.1) and server updates. I have *NEVER*, not once, not ever, seen a fubar of this magnitude on any update.
I have never seen one so bad that the manufacturer tells me that I need to upgrade hardware, or that my hardware was dead due to an update!
I hope an update to the update is released quickly, because I know that many more thousand, or hundreds of thousands of people cannot enjoy a reliable iPad any longer.
BTW: here's something interesting... I tried searching for this thread and could not find it... I put in the exact name. No luck. The only way I was able to get back here was to follow the email link. Has Apple disabled searching for certain items in the discussions area?????????