Q: How is iPad 2 performance using iOS 9.1?

Have you even tried any of my earlier posted suggestions?

I have had many users report back to me that some or all of my suggested solutions have helped their iPad 2 performance.

Worst case scenario that has been reported to me is that my fix suggestions took a previously dead or highly unusable iPad 2 back to, at least, a functionally usable condition.

In many cases users reported that my suggested solutions have brought their iPad 2s back to an appreciable performance increase.

Cases vary, but many users tried all my recommended suggestions and have reported some level of improvement in performance and some have reported that almost previous performance has returned.

My older iPads ARE NOT some fluke or exceptions to Apple's iOS uogrades.

My BIG ADVICE TO EVERY IDEVICE USER IS TO FORGET UPGRADING/UPDATING YOUR DEVICES OVER THE AIR VIA WiFi.

I am convinced doing any iOS or OS X system upgrades/updates over WiFi are unreliable critical OS data CAN be lost or corrupted over WiFi.

I trust WiFi for other things, but NOT for major and needed device or computer uogrades.

I don't care what anyone else says about Wifi and what Apple claims about Over The Air updates.

I truly believe users choosing to do iOS and OS X system upgrades via WiFi are the ones who are experiencing the most issues with their iDevices.

My problem is that i did the update via itunes (imac) and have the same problems. As others. Plus if ios is corrupt the ipad wont even boot.

I am aware of every setting that helps performance and applied it. I already did this with ios7.

I am also not complaining about bugs or crashes. Everything somewhat works, albeit slow. I am angry and feeling cheated because at some point I remember apple was claiming ios9 would speed old devices and not cripple them. Furthermore it is impossible to go back to any older ios version. I just cannot see the benefit of ios9. For what reason is it so much slower? And how could any software engineer allow the keyboard to lag?! After completely loading a webpage it takes several seconds to pop up. Especially the first time after loading a new webpage. Even my old lumia 520 doe not let me wait that long. Same goes for zooming into pdfs. On ios7 a file I frequently use took 1 to2 seconds to load after zooming. On ios9 sometimes the same files takes 5 seconds or more. Did you ever use an ipad mini with ios7? The first big performance loss came with ios8. I think that is why some people believe ios9 is "snappy". They never experienced ios7. I believe Apple introduced too many new "features" in too little time. Right now you need 2gb ram in order run ios smoothly. It is becoming more and more like android.

Yes i agree, a backup is always a good idea. Unfortunately a lot of people don't think to do this first. However, we have noticed that the performance of the iPad 2 is still quite snappy, the biggest issue is with the Wifi dropping out at really short range.

Tried resets, re-installs, factory reset etc, the only other thing it could be is an issue with the wifi antenna itself, effected by the update?

Not sure on your experience of this, any suggestions?

DO NOT UPDATE!!! It's rendered my ipad 2 almost unusable! It their way of making you buy the latest iPad!

Never owned a mini iPad. I really do not like the smaller iPads ( I am a digital artist/illustrator).

My iPad 2 was previously running iOS 7 and it was running well on iOS 7

I avoided iOS 8 entirely as it seemed no matter what update Apple released for iOS 8,  many of the same iPad 2 users reporting into these forums were still NOT getting any resolutions to their iPad performance issues.

So, I updated my iPad 3 to iOS 8 with no appreciable issues and with little performance issues, but skipped upgrading my iPad 2 to iOS 8 for fear of any major performance issues.

iOS 9 has not presented any issues on either my iPad 2 or iPad 3.

Also, iOS 9 does NOT offer much for older iPad users that should be causing the types of serious performance problems that iPad 2 owners are having!

Here's my incomplete list of iOS 9 features that older iPad users receive.

It is, so far, a very short list of newer features.

Better and easier overall cut, paste, copy operations.

Transparency window effects have improved on older iPad models

The new UPPERcase/lowercase onboard software keyboard.

The new software keyboard trackpad feature by tapping two fingers once anywhere on the software keyboard to navigate the onscreen text cursor.

Home Sharing has returned in iOS 9 (This was sorely missed by all in iOS 8, myself included).

More app icons visible on single pane app folders.

The return to App feature (located at left in the iOS status bar.

Improvements to iOS Mail App

Improved App Switcher (some argue that this is not an improvement, but the new "Cover Flow" action of the App Switcher allows you to quit more than one application, simultaneously, by placing as many fingers as you can reach on each overlaying app, then slide your fingers up to quit the group of apps).

iCloud Drive

The new Apple "News" app.

Find Friends App (useless app?)

With iPad 3 and later with Siri, there is the new "Hey Siri" voice activation function.

These are, so far, the only items that older iOS devices receive from iOS 9

If you are on 9.0-9.0.2, there is a way to downgrade to iOS 6.1.3. Sadly though, I can't talk about it on Apple Support Forums as it "references jailbreaking".

same here, DO NOT UPDATE!!! It's rendered my once lightening quick iPad 2 virtually unusable overnigh!

Have YOU tried ALL of my previous suggestions for fixes for your iPad?

I am not sure if I posted this here, in the post, or not, but I'll repeat my statements here, anyways.

The amount of users reporting into these forums with iOS issues with their iDevices represents a very small, but growing minority.

There are tens of millions (or more) of iDevice users who aren't having issues with their devices and who don't post in user troubleshooting forums, like those provided by Apple.

Just because the small minority of users having issues, that post here, doesn't mean that Apple is at fault or that Apple is forcing users of older hardware to upgrade to newer hardware or Apple is "out to get your money" for a new device!

It just means that some older hardware has had some arbitrary issue that has caused problems with upgrading to new versions of iOS.

OR there was some unforeseen iOS bug or software glitch or anomaly that has affected a small minority of users devices.

This has always been a common issue across all major iOS AND OS X upgrades/updates.

It a pervasive issue when dealing with OS upgrades/updates with so many users with so many different configurations.

WIth an ever growing iDevice user base, there will be users that will, invariably and inevitably, run into problems.

Yes, it is a small consolation for those who have iDevices that either aren't working properly or not at all, but the issues ARE NOT RAMPANT across the entire user base of iOS devices!

Apple can't test for every device configuration contingency.

Everyone uses these devices differently and have different apps and data on them and older devices cannot use some features of a new iOS upgrade due to older hardware limitations.

There are just too many variables that are out of Apple's control and can't be tested or accounted for.

The retort from those having these issues is that " Apple controls the hardware and software".

That is true for their hardware and their own software, but they do not fully control third party developed software and how those apps interact with the iPad hardware and iOS and if those apps could have any effect on iOS upgrades/updates.

For those iDevice users who have devices that are, basically, non-functional or dead, my recommendation is to bring your iDevice into an Apple Store and see if they can diagnose the issues and perform the upgrade in the store for you.

If you have never backed up the data that is on your iDevice, be prepared for Apple to do a restore as new device and try to install the iOS 9 upgrade on an empty iDevice.

If you want Apple to REALLY hear all of your issues and complaints the only way to do this is to post your feedback here.

http://www.apple.com/feedback/ipad.html

Apple DOES read the feedback, but they still do not respond with any personal replies.

I will look for a way to downgrade ios9. Sadly my last post was deleted because it did violate the support forum rules.

Anyway, I would like to stress that a lot of people would rather use 2 years or more older versions of ios than the current ios9 on "old" apple devices. Apple ruined the perfomance of the ipad 2/mini update by update without delivering noticeably new feature except cosmetic changes that many users in this thread advice to deactivate.

tldr: ios9 on ipad 2/mini is much slower than ios7. There are no benefits that justify the loss of performance.

Yes. I still have iOS 4.3.5 on my iPad 2 (no joke), and it is really fast and reliable. Where as, iOS 9 would be really slow and glitchy.

A hint is OdysseusOTA

iOS 9.1 is running better than ever on my iPad 2.

I am MORE THAN SURE that I am NOT alone that other iPad 2 users are NOT having issues with iOS 9.

Why don't you just try my erase and restore procedures for your iPad 2 to see if performance changes on your iPad?

At, this point, according to you, you would have nothing to lose, but everything to gain if this works and brings your iPad 2 back to better performance.

You need to backup your iPad 2 to iTunes (make sure you are using the latest version of iTunes)

Disconnect/eject your iPad from iTunes and your computer, then completely erase and reset your iPad 2 and set it up from the iPad as a new iPad.

This gives your iPad 2 a clean slate with no corrupt data or data "detritus on it!

After you set it up like factory new "out of the box" then reconnect your iPad to your computer and sync up with iTunes and do a Restore from your recent backup.

Once the backup is restored and your iPad is, again, resetup, do one hard reset of your iPad 2.

Once all of this is done, you still need to turn off background app refresh and turn on reduced motion of all of iOS 9’s motion graphics eye candy.

Reply back here and let us know if your iPad 2 performance has significantly improved or not.

My iPad 2 is working REALLY well and is even MORE snappy on iOS 9 since I did an initial new iPad setup before restore my previous data backup from iTunes.

Listen, I already did what you call a "resetup". That was one of the first things I did after updating to 9.1. I reseted my ipad completely and afterwards restored from my backup. According to your instruction I am supposed to hard reset again, right? I agree that my first reset did help to some degree but the overall laggy performance is still noticeably.

Don't get me wrong. The ipad is usuable. I don't experience more crashes or bugs than with ios7. But in my opinion performance wise ios7 was a better experience than ios9 to such a degree that I am looking to replace my ipad mini. Maybe I would be content with ios9 if i had not used ios7 for such a long time. I would gladly go back to ios7 and continue to use my ipad. But apple won't let me. It's not solely the slow performance of ios9 that makes me angry. It's the fact that there are no big new features that can excuse the loss of performance. It feels like they really did make it slower on purpose in order to make me buy a new ipad. And I am afraid they might have succeded. They tricked me. That is just how I feel.

I do COMPLETELY understand your frustrations!

That is why I am trying to help you as best I can with your continued issues with your iPad 2.

I am, also, in complete agreement that what little feature set older iPad users got with iOS 9 isn't worth all of the issues that older iPad users, especially older iPad 2 users are having with iOS 9.

I am at a real loss at trying to figure out what is causing a growing minority of iPad 2 users to have such difficult performance issues and why all or most of these issues cannot seem to be resolved.

I am sorry none of my advice has brought your iPad back to better performance.

I really thought a complete clean erase and restore as new, then restore from backup would make your iPad perform a lot better.

It really made a HUGE inprovement in performance response of my iPad 2!

I wish someone soon can just nail down the real cause of these vexing issues on the many iPad 2s being affected.

It's a really stumper!

Sorry things aren't better with your iPad.

Some things to double check for.

In the Settings App.

Have you just checked out all of the iCloud settings just to make sure NOTHING about iCloud is affecting web browsing and other performance issues?

Also, check out the Spotlight settings to make sure you have apps turned off that do not need to be searched by Spotlight.'

Also, check the Notifications settings to make sure you have notifications turned off for apps that you do not wish to get notifications for OR if you do not use Notifications, at all, you can turn this off Globally for all apps.

See if ANY or ALL of this helps.

This is al I have for you.

IF still a fail, I am sorry.

Nothing else I can come up with.