Why does apple slow down old devices?

mattman2005 wrote:

Trust me when I say that I have been looking for barebone updates with just bug fixes and security patches. I don't care about the latest iOS version and any new features.

Then why do you install them if you don't want them.?

mattman2005 wrote:

You do realize that same guy went on a rant saying most Apple users have ADHD,

That is not what MIchelPM said at all. This is the exact quote:

Users' iDevices are slowing because they do stupid things with them or don't know how to use these devices to get optimal operation and performance.

The major one is these people/users have some ADHD issues and can't wait or research, in advance, to upgrade/update their devices to make sure that the upgrade/update doesn't contain any detrimental operational/features issues.

The emphasis is mine. It doesn't require to much in the way of knowledge of English to understand that "these people" does not refer to most Apple users but to people don't bother to do their research.

And John Galt has been participating in this thread longer than you have. Despite what you may think, making a statement that you don't agree with is not "trolling". Trolling is making a deliberately offensive of provocative online post with the aim of upsetting someone or eliciting an angry response from them. I think it's pretty clear John doesn't care whether you reply or not.

Csound1 wrote:

mattman2005 wrote:

Trust me when I say that I have been looking for barebone updates with just bug fixes and security patches. I don't care about the latest iOS version and any new features.

Then why do you install them if you don't want them.?

You're being all logical again.

mattman2005 wrote:

You do realize that same guy went on a rant saying most Apple users have ADHD, I guess you can just ignore that one. Another guy went straight to the troll response with pink unicorns.

Just because the features are supported by new models doesn't mean they scaled back the update at all. What that means is that the hardware in the older models is incapable of supporting the new features. Teams of testers go through and figure out what works, what doesn't work, and what doesn't work well. The architects and directors decide if it's worth investing more time and efforts into getting older models to handle the feature or just add logic to bypass the new feature.

This sounds a lot like iOS feature scaling to me!

Some devices get certain features while others don't!

Since iOS 8, iPad 2, 3 4 and 1st gen iPad Mini get waaaay less iOS features than any newer year/model iPads.

You'd be surprise how many iDevice users do not know how to properly maintain and troubleshoot their iDevices when these devices aren't functioning well.

Been active on these forums for years, like many of the "regulars" here.

Seen and read it all!

Some users don't even know how to use many of the iOS features on their iDevices.

They never download the iOS user guides.

And Apple never forces you to update!

Since iOS 8, which I completely hated in its entirety,

I skipped the entire run of iOS 8 and waited for iOS 9, but then would wait months inbetween updating to iOS 9 update versions.

I have never felt forced or compelled to ALWAYS Install the latest and greatest iOS upgrades/updates. EVER!

I had always waited out iOS upgrades/updates.

AND with iOS 10 being pretty lacklustre with NO real compelling productivity features, I was was perfectly willing to skip or really wait for more months to upgrade/update iOS 10.

The only reason I ended up upgrading to iOS 10, about a month or so later after the initial release, that many of my drawing/design apps released major feature updates that I really wanted. So, with that eventuality, I was, pretty much "forced" to upgrade iOS to get these major feature updates of many of my installed apps.

However, at present, due to many more issues, I have NOT updated to iOS 10.2.

My iPad is still on iOS 10.1.1 after over two months and will stay on this release until Apple fixes both the new and "improved" (NOT) TV App and fixes the myriad of issues with the changes to the iOS Mail App.

And there is a way to delete an iOS upgrade/updates where the update reminders won't come back as often.

If you are as savvy as your think you are with your iDevices, you should have figure out how to do that, by now!

I only get the iOS update nags every 10-12 days, or so, and it's very easy to delete the iOS update off of my iDevices.

So, this has never been an issue for me.

I'm not having an issue with laptops and desktops for you can always do a clean install and reinstall any previous operating system you want (as long as it's compatible with the processor).

I do have a beef with Apple and their mobile devices for once you decide to upgrade, there's no going back. You can't simply do a clean install on your iTouch/iPhone or iPad to a previous OS unless you maybe jailbreak your device. And yes, mobile devices do slow down considerably with updates. Apple should have a disclaimer that states that updating to the latest OS might slow your device down.

I stayed with the original iOS 5.x on my iPad 3 for years, before I updated to iOS 7. After about 2 years I finally decided to update the iPad 3 (which is now 5 years old) to iOS 9.3.5. I read all the reviews and feedback on the "slowness" of the iPad 3 after upgrading to iOS 9, but I made the plunge. The device is old and I'm not planning to buy another apple device any more, so just out of curiosity I've upgraded the iPad. And yes, iOS 9.3.5 made the iPad 3 considerably slower. Since I don't have anything important on the iPad, I've completely reset the device and set it up as a brand new device - twice so far. Yet, the slowness stays. So the OS does slow the device down.

But the good news is, I have no intention wasting any more money on Apple. For me a phone is just what it is. A phone. Not a TV channel, a police scanner, a wash machine, or a rocket launcher. I'm happy with my 9 year old flip phone and it still works for what it's intended for: I can make and receive phone calls.

Thanks MichelPM, but believe me, I have already researched and found pretty much all the suggestions out there. As I mentioned, I have completely reset my iPad twice so far and set it up as a new device. You can't clean things out better than that :-) Little things like transparency and and such doesn't really add anything to the picture. The device is just SLOW without having any app, photos, or content on it.

As an example, when I just simply tap the AppStore icon to open the app store it takes about 20 seconds to have the app store content appear on the screen. My connection speed is not the issue. It's spot on 29-31Gb down. When I open up apps like Notepad, Safari, Contacts, Reminders, Clock, Calculator, then double press the home button to open up the list of background apps, it takes about 4-5 seconds until they show up. With iOS 7.1.2 it was nearly instantaneous.

Thanks for your help but the list of items you sent the link to doesn't help. As I mentioned I've seen those on many different places on the net and tried those. It's something really tasking the device on a fundamental level to get this slow even after a complete and total reset. But no worries, I accepted this "faith". I noticed similar issues with my iTouch 2G, 4G and 5G devices as well.

Interesting that your iPad doesn't exhibit this issue. Mine is only an 8GB wi-fi only model, but doesn't have anything on it. No data, no photos, no apps, etc after a complete reset. Still slow.

But I do have a custom built Windows 10 machine and that's pretty speedy :-)

Not to beat a dead horse, but Apple DOES NOT slow down older devices. All devices simply get slower over time as their components age. Think of it this way, Apple makes a concerted effort to "innovate and add new features" with every version of iOS, especially in the visual department. As a result, it's only natural for older hardware to run slower with newer software that is optimized for newer hardware, it's just the circle of technological life. I tend to agree that their products are not worth the premium or price point, but your assertion that they intentionally slow down older devices is simply false.

You haven't seen it all in my list since this is a list of performance tips and items I created myself from my own 7 years of experiences of owning iPads.

Look over my list, again, to see if you missed anything that may help the performance of your iPad 3.

Don't just gloss over this list.

Check my list, again!

Also, iPads only came in 16, 32, 64, 128 and now 256 GBs storage models.

iPads never came in an 8 GBs storage models.

I use an iPad 2 and when I dbl click the home button to bring up the iOS App Switcher, it is a near instantaneous.

Perhaps only a slight, 1 sec, delay on that's on an older iPad 2.

I have a fairly new large iPad Pro and the App Store takes time, sometimes to appear.

Not as long as it may take on your iPad, but it still takes between 3-10 secs sometimes depending on Apple server activity and I have a slightly slower broadband connection at only 25 Mbps speeds.

My iPad 2 loads the iOS App Store as I scroll.

Accessing the Apple Apps store is not a good indicator of iPad performance as there could be issues on Apple's end, like busy servers.

Is the access to the iOS App Store fine once it comes up?

If you are having noticeable performance delays, there is something causing it.

Keep active App Switcher Apps to a minimum. 10-12 or less active apps. Ideally, 6 or less active background running apps is even better with iPad 2,3, 4 or 1st gen iPad Mini models running iOS 9.3.5.

Turn on Reduced Motion.

Turn Background App Refresh to OFF

Try turning ON Reduced Transparency. (I don't turn this on on any of my iPads, but my iPad 2. My wife iPad 3 works just fine witn normal transparency effects, but maybe your iPad 3 can benefit with it turned off)

Safari will only tolerate 4-5 active website tabs.

Make sure your iPad 3 maintains a free data storage space of 3 GBs of RAM or greater! 2 GBs is an absolutely minimum free data storage space.

The isssues with any of Apple's 16 GBs storage iDevices is that the effective physical storage is only between 8-10 GBs.

A 32 GBs storage iDevice model has an effective physical storage that is 2-1/2-3 times as much free data storage space.

The 16 GB iDevice storage models are a poor price to storage ratio.

Go through my list, again, to see if there is anything you may have missed.

This is my own created and constantly edited list of things I find that CAN help with performance of ANY iPad model, but is a more customised list for older iPad models.

I had the exact same issue with my iPad 2. It was working just fine and then all of a sudden it started running so slow to the point that it was useless. It happened around the time that the newer iPad was being released. I can see if it occurred gradually but it happened basically overnight. Something fishy going on.

Same, I have an IPhone 4 that's iOS 7.1.2 and it just complete slowed down with the years, I've had this phone since the first time they came out, that's why I'm looking for alternatives because apple just slows down older products for customers to get newer ones for money

TheIranian02 wrote:

Same, I have an IPhone 4 that's iOS 7.1.2 and it just complete slowed down with the years, I've had this phone since the first time they came out, that's why I'm looking for alternatives because apple just slows down older products for customers to get newer ones for money

Are you suggesting that your phone has gotten slower in the three years since iOS 7.1.2 was released? If so, the problem isn't the system software but simple aging hardware.

Uh, no they don't.

Just like regular computers, new operating systems are, by design, made to run on the latest computing hardware.

Older computers and devices will always run less optimally on newer software and this scenario may get worse over time and even newer OSes and they fix is to modify the software/OS feature to help better optimise the OS/software on older computers and mobile computing devices.

Apple DOES NOT PURPOSELY slowdown any of its devices.

This is an absolute MYTH!

Get real!

With some feature reconfigurations, my iPad 2 runs just peachy.

AND if every single older iDevice user were having performance from newer iOS versions, these forums would be inundated with tens of thousnds or hundreds of thousands of whiney, angry, irate users instead of just a seeing a couple of thousand of users or less coming to these forums complaining and whining of device slowdowns.

FYI, this won't be any different in Androidland.

As time goes on, newer systems that may still be compatible with older hardware

usually do not support all features of the software in older hardware; other times

several features that used to work in the original configuration (as shipped) may

not continue as they once did, as later systems were built to facilitate later models.

For an older iOS Device to seemingly run slower, there likely are several things that

are happening, for that to act that way. ~ If the storage drive is small (as early ones

were) a functional free-space or unused capacity is essential for the iOS to run well.

And the now-old early models did not have very much storage capacity. This may

be the reason why the device you have does in fact act slow, it's fuller than optimal.

While a small percentage of electronic degradation may occur over time, to a degree

performance would suffer without major product failure, could be difficult to measure.

Another item may be the kind and type of internet connection, as early iDevices that

used an early 2G, etc cellular connection, may find those are not fully supported now.

In any event...

Good luck & happy trails! 🙂

This is how apple stays in business, by forcing us to buy new devices every two years, even though with todays processors, there really is no need for it. All they're adding at this point are bells and whistles that nobody except teenagers enjoy.

No one is forcing you to do anything. All updates, however annoying their prompts may be, are optional. Just like buying the products in the first place is. Apple's business model is what it is, if it doesn't meet your needs or you don't care for it, you don't have to support and you could very easily buy other products if you so choose.