iOS 12 and planned obsolescence

[soundslikeaudio]

This is a common misconception about software engineering. I suggest reading The Mythical Man Month. I'll give you the cliffs: more chefs does not always make your meal better.

Great recommendation and really true of any type of engineering and development. Intel and HP had “unlimited” resources in the late 90’s early 2000’s. Anyone here running an Itanium vs a chip based on (much tinier) AMD’s x86-64 platform? Sometimes scarcity can be a boon to ingenuity.

 

[duffman9000]

Great recommendation and really true of any type of engineering and development. Intel and HP had “unlimited” resources in the late 90’s early 2000’s. Anyone here running an Itanium vs a chip based on (much tinier) AMD’s x86-64 platform? Sometimes scarcity can be a boon to ingenuity.

I have much to complain about iOS (trust me lol). I think much of the blame can be placed on too many features too quickly. There was an article years ago on Anandtech discussing how Apple should change iOS to improve scrolling. Some bit of analysis that concluded that yes, it could be greatly improved. And it was. It just took a frustrating long time.

 

[Radon87000]

The scrolling in apps still isnt completely smooth. If you scroll in Tapatalk you still see minor pauses in the scroll animation. Also present in the Google app and many others. It used to be horrible but now its minor. Took almost half a decade for them to lower it to the level it is now.

Its almost like performance and stability is an after thought for Apple nowadays as it induces hardware upgrades. Having used the Pixel, stock Android has surpassed ios in smoothness.
[doublepost=1529469353][/doublepost]

IMO, IOS 9 was better. Better is subjective. Worse is subjective. Performance improvements, benchmarks of GM proves otherwise.


That's supposition. Nobody knows the exact timing of what transpired within apple.


ios 11.4.1 is quite good and more than bearable. Every release had it's thing and this release is no different.


All facts have been backed with some evidence, as opposed to the conjecture that's been thrown around as fact.

Your proof of ios 9 being faster is a synthetic benchmarks which did not reflect real life usage. I could pull out a similar benchmark which shows the RX Vega 64 on par with a 1080 Ti. That doesn’t make them equal in the real world.
[doublepost=1529470865][/doublepost]

IMO, IOS 9 was better. Better is subjective. Worse is subjective. Performance improvements, benchmarks of GM proves otherwise.


That's supposition. Nobody knows the exact timing of what transpired within apple.


ios 11.4.1 is quite good and more than bearable. Every release had it's thing and this release is no different.


All facts have been backed with some evidence, as opposed to the conjecture that's been thrown around as fact.

It's also a fact they didn't address Throttlegate till the news spread like wildfire worldwide and Samsung and Motorola came out with statements saying they don't throttle older phones.

 

[aevan]

For years people have been claiming that “new APIs” and “new features” are causing old phones to slowdown, I’d like to say that that theory is looking less and less believable. After the announcement of iOS 12, it’s more than possible to support older devices using their full potential.

Now that Apple has its PR backs against the wall with the battery throttle scandal, they magically created software capable of faster performance on older phones. This is the first time they have ever done this. Coincidence? I think not.

Apple loves when people update their devices, but they love their brand even more. Now that the brand is under attack, they are doing everything in their power to win over the trust of their consumers. iOS 12 is proof of this.

APIs and new features are the main reason why phones slow down. This is not a theory. For companies like Apple, it's all about priority. Even with huge resources, they are limited - this is why we get feature releases and polish releases of iOS, macOS, Windows, Android, etc. Usually it's a mix of two, but you can always notice what was a priority.

Apple does not intentionally slow down phones, however, we live in a world where people have higher and higher expectations and want to be amazed every year - so Apple, Google, Microsoft - they are all in a constant race to provide new, exciting features - and in this race, Apple put the emphasis on new devices and didn't put enough effort into older devices. It's not intentional obsolescence - it's not caring about obsolescence. And with the recent events, they were pushed by their users to care more.

Of course, there is a downside to everything - just look at all the "iOS 12 is more like iOS 11.5" kind of comments on this thread alone. Some people are let down by the lack of new and exciting - and it just proves the exact opposite of what you wrote in the post: yes, it's more than possible to support older devices, if you take the time to optimize and polish everything at the expense of exciting new features. Or, they could've made all the "I want new toys" crowd happy but made something that would probably make slow devices even slower. If you follow rumors, you know that the idea was to have a dramatic home screen redesign for iOS 12 which was pushed for next year - probably due to all the "slowing down" complaints.


So, again, what you call a 'theory' - is just how things are. In a perfect world we'd have optimizations and speed improvements alongside new features - but that's just not how it works. At that scale of deployment, even Apple has (relatively speaking) limited resources - it's either one or the other. I am glad they chose to make older devices run faster and optimize iOS 12 - if they succeed in this by the time it's out - I say it's worth it. And, no, it doesn't make the claim that new features are slowing down older phones less believable, if anything, it only reinforces it.


People - iOS 12 is a good move by Apple and a result of people saying they want them to put more effort into older devices. Which is something Apple brand should be (and usually is) known for - making things that last. Let's not be negative about everything - because this is exactly what we asked for.

 

[Radon87000]

APIs and new features are the main reason why phones slow down. This is not a theory. For companies like Apple, it's all about priority. Even with huge resources, they are limited - this is why we get feature releases and polish releases of iOS, macOS, Windows, Android, etc. Usually it's a mix of two, but you can always notice what was a priority.

Apple does not intentionally slow down phones, however, we live in a world where people have higher and higher expectations and want to be amazed every year - so Apple, Google, Microsoft - they are all in a constant race to provide new, exciting features - and in this race, Apple put the emphasis on new devices and didn't put enough effort into older devices. It's not intentional obsolescence - it's not caring about obsolescence. And with the recent events, they were pushed by their users to care more.

Of course, there is a downside to everything - just look at all the "iOS 12 is more like iOS 11.5" kind of comments on this thread alone. Some people are let down by the lack of new and exciting - and it just proves the exact opposite of what you wrote in the post: yes, it's more than possible to support older devices, if you take the time to optimize and polish everything at the expense of exciting new features. Or, they could've made all the "I want new toys" crowd happy but made something that would probably make slow devices even slower. If you follow rumors, you know that the idea was to have a dramatic home screen redesign for iOS 12 which was pushed for next year - probably due to all the "slowing down" complaints.


So, again, what you call a 'theory' - is just how things are. In a perfect world we'd have optimizations and speed improvements alongside new features - but that's just not how it works. At that scale of deployment, even Apple has (relatively speaking) limited resources - it's either one or the other. I am glad they chose to make older devices run faster and optimize iOS 12 - if they succeed in this by the time it's out - I say it's worth it. And, no, it doesn't make the claim that new features are slowing down older phones less believable, if anything, it only reinforces it.


People - iOS 12 is a good move by Apple and a result of people saying they want them to put more effort into older devices. Which is something Apple brand should be (and usually is) known for - making things that last. Let's not be negative about everything - because this is exactly what we asked for.

You don't need to be perfect to offer a downgrade option. Google offers downgrades for their devices dating back till 2012.

 

[_Refurbished_]

APIs and new features are the main reason why phones slow down. This is not a theory. For companies like Apple, it's all about priority. Even with huge resources, they are limited - this is why we get feature releases and polish releases of iOS, macOS, Windows, Android, etc. Usually it's a mix of two, but you can always notice what was a priority.

Apple does not intentionally slow down phones, however, we live in a world where people have higher and higher expectations and want to be amazed every year - so Apple, Google, Microsoft - they are all in a constant race to provide new, exciting features - and in this race, Apple put the emphasis on new devices and didn't put enough effort into older devices. It's not intentional obsolescence - it's not caring about obsolescence. And with the recent events, they were pushed by their users to care more.

Of course, there is a downside to everything - just look at all the "iOS 12 is more like iOS 11.5" kind of comments on this thread alone. Some people are let down by the lack of new and exciting - and it just proves the exact opposite of what you wrote in the post: yes, it's more than possible to support older devices, if you take the time to optimize and polish everything at the expense of exciting new features. Or, they could've made all the "I want new toys" crowd happy but made something that would probably make slow devices even slower. If you follow rumors, you know that the idea was to have a dramatic home screen redesign for iOS 12 which was pushed for next year - probably due to all the "slowing down" complaints.


So, again, what you call a 'theory' - is just how things are. In a perfect world we'd have optimizations and speed improvements alongside new features - but that's just not how it works. At that scale of deployment, even Apple has (relatively speaking) limited resources - it's either one or the other. I am glad they chose to make older devices run faster and optimize iOS 12 - if they succeed in this by the time it's out - I say it's worth it. And, no, it doesn't make the claim that new features are slowing down older phones less believable, if anything, it only reinforces it.


People - iOS 12 is a good move by Apple and a result of people saying they want them to put more effort into older devices. Which is something Apple brand should be (and usually is) known for - making things that last. Let's not be negative about everything - because this is exactly what we asked for.

TL;DR, I’ll keep it short. Skimmed through.

- New features haven’t slowed down Windows over the last few major software versions.
- iOS 11 was called iOS 10.5.
- Plenty of new features in iOS 12.
- I am happy they are finally being forced to focus on older devices.

Your theory isn’t backed up by evidence, rather the contrary. Neither theory can be fully proven, but I’ll take my bet to the house. You take yours.

 

[robbietop]

I really don't understand the level of emotion attached to a device.
It's a chunk of metal and glass that makes phone calls and uses the Internet.

Who cares what logo is on the back so long as it does those things? Sluggishness is ok for someone like me who grew up on an 8086, when booting up took five-six minutes and some tasks took half an hour.

This MOREMOREMOREMORE attitude is just obsessive and compulsive.

Who cares if they plan for it to be obsolete? You're just jealous you got used. I get a new iPhone whenever I feel like it. Some years it's like....meh....not very different. Other years it's like YOWZA hey iPhone X baby where you goin?

From an engineer's perspective, planned obsolescence is wonderful as it allows me to retread and revisit old designs and fix issues I've noticed much quicker. Most other companies release a product and it doesn't change for ten years. How dull as an engineer to make tiny nitpicking changes every year when at Apple they redesign the internals every 12 months.

Planned Obsolescence is the sign of an engineering company. That's the company I want to buy from, that never rests on its laurels.

 

[aevan]

Your theory isn’t backed up by evidence, rather the contrary. Neither theory can be fully proven, but I’ll take my bet to the house. You take yours.

Fair enough.

 

[I7guy]

The scrolling in apps still isnt completely smooth. If you scroll in Tapatalk you still see minor pauses in the scroll animation. Also present in the Google app and many others. It used to be horrible but now its minor. Took almost half a decade for them to lower it to the level it is now.

Its almost like performance and stability is an after thought for Apple nowadays as it induces hardware upgrades. Having used the Pixel, stock Android has surpassed ios in smoothness.

Been a pattern for a long while now. The latest releases in the year are always smooth.

Your proof of ios 9 being faster is a synthetic benchmarks which did not reflect real life usage. I could pull out a similar benchmark which shows the RX Vega 64 on par with a 1080 Ti. That doesn’t make them equal in the real world.

These benchmarks are the very definition of how the operating system will respond in real world usage. Been over this so many times now in the last 5 years. Youtube videos aren't the definition of real world usage either.

It's also a fact they didn't address Throttlegate till the news spread like wildfire worldwide and Samsung and Motorola came out with statements saying they don't throttle older phones.

Yes, it's the sequence of events is a fact and it is a fact apple introduced power management to prevent shutdowns similar to Android, but the decisions behind the sequence of events are unknown. And therefore any commentary as to why is pure speculation.
[doublepost=1529496853][/doublepost]

You don't need to be perfect to offer a downgrade option. Google offers downgrades for their devices dating back till 2012.

Android should be your main squeeze, if you value this that much.

 

[Radon87000]

I really don't understand the level of emotion attached to a device.
It's a chunk of metal and glass that makes phone calls and uses the Internet.

Who cares what logo is on the back so long as it does those things? Sluggishness is ok for someone like me who grew up on an 8086, when booting up took five-six minutes and some tasks took half an hour.

This MOREMOREMOREMORE attitude is just obsessive and compulsive.

Who cares if they plan for it to be obsolete? You're just jealous you got used. I get a new iPhone whenever I feel like it. Some years it's like....meh....not very different. Other years it's like YOWZA hey iPhone X baby where you goin?

From an engineer's perspective, planned obsolescence is wonderful as it allows me to retread and revisit old designs and fix issues I've noticed much quicker. Most other companies release a product and it doesn't change for ten years. How dull as an engineer to make tiny nitpicking changes every year when at Apple they redesign the internals every 12 months.

Planned Obsolescence is the sign of an engineering company. That's the company I want to buy from, that never rests on its laurels.

The planned obsolescence we are talking about is the intentional slowdown by Apple of older devices. I do not like buying from companies which engage in this practice but the list of companies who don't is getting shorter by the day.

 

[FeliApple]

APIs and new features are the main reason why phones slow down. This is not a theory. For companies like Apple, it's all about priority. Even with huge resources, they are limited - this is why we get feature releases and polish releases of iOS, macOS, Windows, Android, etc. Usually it's a mix of two, but you can always notice what was a priority.

Apple does not intentionally slow down phones, however, we live in a world where people have higher and higher expectations and want to be amazed every year - so Apple, Google, Microsoft - they are all in a constant race to provide new, exciting features - and in this race, Apple put the emphasis on new devices and didn't put enough effort into older devices. It's not intentional obsolescence - it's not caring about obsolescence. And with the recent events, they were pushed by their users to care more.

Of course, there is a downside to everything - just look at all the "iOS 12 is more like iOS 11.5" kind of comments on this thread alone. Some people are let down by the lack of new and exciting - and it just proves the exact opposite of what you wrote in the post: yes, it's more than possible to support older devices, if you take the time to optimize and polish everything at the expense of exciting new features. Or, they could've made all the "I want new toys" crowd happy but made something that would probably make slow devices even slower. If you follow rumors, you know that the idea was to have a dramatic home screen redesign for iOS 12 which was pushed for next year - probably due to all the "slowing down" complaints.


So, again, what you call a 'theory' - is just how things are. In a perfect world we'd have optimizations and speed improvements alongside new features - but that's just not how it works. At that scale of deployment, even Apple has (relatively speaking) limited resources - it's either one or the other. I am glad they chose to make older devices run faster and optimize iOS 12 - if they succeed in this by the time it's out - I say it's worth it. And, no, it doesn't make the claim that new features are slowing down older phones less believable, if anything, it only reinforces it.


People - iOS 12 is a good move by Apple and a result of people saying they want them to put more effort into older devices. Which is something Apple brand should be (and usually is) known for - making things that last. Let's not be negative about everything - because this is exactly what we asked for.

This is exactly what I'm saying. I don't think Apple did it on purpose. They just didn't care and/or didn't pay enough attention to older devices. I have a huge issue with the ones that ask for more, and more, and more features. Because they are then the first to complain that their devices are slow. Oh, but they if Apple focuses on improving performance and doesn't add too many features you complain, too?
I ask for performance improvements and don't care about features... You can't have everything perfectly, and when they add features at a massive rate, it will not work as it did. People asking for everything but for features first and foremost don't have the 'right' to complain about performance, because their approach made it happen in the first place.

 

[maflynn]

I purposely stayed out of this thread and with 17 pages of posts, I'm sure I'll echo other member's sentiment.

I'm typically not a conspiracy minded person, but I do go by the notion of where there is smoke, there is fire. In this case, I think there's too much circumstantial and anecdotal evidence supporting a supposition that Apple had in place planned obsolesce. Don't forget there were lawsuits alledging that apple was purposely slowing down older iphones (I think it was the iphone 4). I'm not talking about the battery slowdown that just occureda few months ago. People have long complained about how the latest OS is performing very slowly on some not too old iPhones and iPads. Apple always stated it was because of new features that the older phones have trouble handling.

Now we find out that apple is making incredible performance strides to allow older devices to run like new again, sorry but there's more to them streamlinng APIs or suddenly discovering some old ineffecient code. They were already caught purposely slowing down iPhones and their excuse was because older batteries they needed too.

 

[MEJHarrison]

This is a common misconception about software engineering. I suggest reading The Mythical Man Month. I'll give you the cliffs: more chefs does not always make your meal better.

The best example I've ever heard is it takes 9 months for 1 woman to make a baby. But you can't just hire 8 more women to get the job done in a month. Additional workers isn't always the right answer to solve an issue.

 

[Radon87000]

The software always works perfectly on their latest device while it doesn't on their older devices because of more features I never asked for. I do not find it a coincidence that Apple slowed down the iPhone 7 home button the moment the iPhone X was released so as to give the X an artificial advantage.

 

[duffman9000]

The software always works perfectly on their latest device while it doesn't on their older devices because of more features I never asked for. I do not find it a coincidence that Apple slowed down the iPhone 7 home button the moment the iPhone X was released so as to give the X an artificial advantage.

Ugh, no it doesn’t lol. The iPhone X has been riddled with bugs and even the latest release isn’t perfect.

 

[C DM]

The software always works perfectly on their latest device while it doesn't on their older devices because of more features I never asked for. I do not find it a coincidence that Apple slowed down the iPhone 7 home button the moment the iPhone X was released so as to give the X an artificial advantage.

Apple just did that to the home button simply to troll a few people.

 

[I7guy]

The software always works perfectly on their latest device while it doesn't on their older devices because of more features I never asked for. I do not find it a coincidence that Apple slowed down the iPhone 7 home button the moment the iPhone X was released so as to give the X an artificial advantage.

There may be various grades of “perfectly”.

 

[cmaier]

Anyone here running an Itanium vs a chip based on (much tinier) AMD’s x86-64 platform? Sometimes scarcity can be a boon to ingenuity.

Thanks. It was nothing.

 

[FeliApple]

There may be various grades of “perfectly”.

Acceptably perfect, then? It won't be absolutely perfect, but a little bug once per month won't bother me. (It has happened with my iPad Pro on iOS 9. For example, I had a few out-of-the-blue resprings. Maybe... Two, in two years). I had slight lag a few times when accessing the multitasking panel, but they were so few and so far in between that I don't care.

 

[I7guy]

I purposely stayed out of this thread and with 17 pages of posts, I'm sure I'll echo other member's sentiment.

I'm typically not a conspiracy minded person, but I do go by the notion of where there is smoke, there is fire. In this case, I think there's too much circumstantial and anecdotal evidence supporting a supposition that Apple had in place planned obsolesce. Don't forget there were lawsuits alledging that apple was purposely slowing down older iphones (I think it was the iphone 4). I'm not talking about the battery slowdown that just occureda few months ago. People have long complained about how the latest OS is performing very slowly on some not too old iPhones and iPads. Apple always stated it was because of new features that the older phones have trouble handling.

Now we find out that apple is making incredible performance strides to allow older devices to run like new again, sorry but there's more to them streamlinng APIs or suddenly discovering some old ineffecient code. They were already caught purposely slowing down iPhones and their excuse was because older batteries they needed too.

Focusing on the word “purposely”, intent matters. Did Apple purposely slow down the phone to sell more units or better the user experience? (One could debate which of perceived slowness or unexpected shutdowns is actually better, however) but intent matters although I suppose those who go with conspiracy theories would likely say Apple wanted to sell more units.

 

[aevan]

I purposely stayed out of this thread and with 17 pages of posts, I'm sure I'll echo other member's sentiment.

I'm typically not a conspiracy minded person, but I do go by the notion of where there is smoke, there is fire. In this case, I think there's too much circumstantial and anecdotal evidence supporting a supposition that Apple had in place planned obsolesce. Don't forget there were lawsuits alledging that apple was purposely slowing down older iphones (I think it was the iphone 4). I'm not talking about the battery slowdown that just occureda few months ago. People have long complained about how the latest OS is performing very slowly on some not too old iPhones and iPads. Apple always stated it was because of new features that the older phones have trouble handling.

Now we find out that apple is making incredible performance strides to allow older devices to run like new again, sorry but there's more to them streamlinng APIs or suddenly discovering some old ineffecient code. They were already caught purposely slowing down iPhones and their excuse was because older batteries they needed too.

More like, now they decided to dedicate resources to making it work better instead of partaking in a feature race wirh Google. This is why iOS 12 is feature-light.

As I already said, I don’t think it was planned obsolescence, more like not caring about obsolescence. Now they are forced to care. I am glad they changed their way, but I seriously doubt anyone put some slow-down code intentionally (other than that battery feature). As for smoke? There is smoke because that’s human perception for you. This “planned obsolescence” is easier to comprehend and accept than a more complex reason of design politics, limited resources (especially for a company like Apple where people wrongly assume these resources are near limitless), etc. Also, it is in human nature to be sceptical, and we’re also very cynical about technology.

The truth, however, is that they didn’t intentionally make older devices slower, they just didn’t care enough that they were getting slower as a side result. Now they have to care - yay!

 

[Radon87000]

These benchmarks are the very definition of how the operating system will respond in real world usage. Been over this so many times now in the last 5 years. Youtube videos aren't the definition of real world usage either.

But those benchmarks don't reflect real word usage. Safari on the iPhone X scores higher than Safari on my iPad Pro but practically there is zero difference while using them. The RX Vega 64 ties with the 1080ti in some synthetic benchmarks but its laughable to even compare the 2. Google Chrome on Windows laptops scores higher in almost all benchmarks than Microsoft Edge but anyone with a Precision trackpad will tell you Edge runs much smoother than chrome. Geekbench, 3DMark are all useful to find out raw hardware performance but they do not reflect real world smoothness and stability.

Yes, it's the sequence of events is a fact and it is a fact apple introduced power management to prevent shutdowns similar to Android, but the decisions behind the sequence of events are unknown. And therefore any commentary as to why is pure speculation.

There was no throttling on Android and if there is it can easily be detected and reversed by overclocking. Regardless Samsung and Motorola have specifically stated they don't throttle their phones.

Apple shipping a throttle in my phone which slows it down without telling me is akin to shipping malware inside the system. My iPad Air 2 is slow for instance on iOS 11. I am blaming iOS 11 for it. Is it possible there is some component inside which is faulty? I am not an engineer to know all this stuff. The shutdown would in fact be beneficial as it would at least let me know something is wrong with my battery and I can go to the store to get it fixed.
Unfortunately this results in $100 revenue for Apple as opposed to $999 which was no doubt factored into the decision to keep it a secret.

Apple just did that to the home button simply to troll a few people.

Apple did it intentionally to induce upgrades to the iPhone X as having both side by side its clear the iPhone X smokes the home button iPhone in any action. After using the iOS 10 home button the new one is literally unusable to me. Its the main reason why my iPad Pro is still on 10.

Anyone who uses Android or has used iOS 10 will detest the new home button.

 

[C DM]

Apple did it intentionally to induce upgrades to the iPhone X as having both side by side its clear the iPhone X smokes the home button iPhone in any action. After using the iOS 10 home button the new one is literally unusable to me. Its the main reason why my iPad Pro is still on 10.

An interesting supposition, although perhaps not as interesting as the one of them doing it just to troll some people.

 

[Radon87000]

It was just done to troll some people.

No it wasn't. Any decision taken by multinational giants is always based on financial considerations.

 

[C DM]

No it wasn't. Any decision taken by multinational giants is always based on financial considerations.

So then a malicious conspiracy to specifically make things worse for customers wouldn't logically follow that as alienating customers isn't financially sound. Glad we got that logic finally sorted out.