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Justins567

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jan 24, 2018
134
230
Colorado, USA
So, I've made a few posts in the IOS 13 beta 1 thread but i figured id kinda compile it all together in one place for the folks who dont want to read page after page to find things. :) I've also included all my screenshots from the other thread. As we get more beta updates, i will do my best to update this!

Test Hardware.
· iPhone XS MAX – Dual sim using VZW on both lines.
· Apple Watch series 4 Nike+ - cellular paired to one of my VZW lines.
· iPad Pro 11in - iPadOS notes to be updated later.
· 2015 Hyundai Sonata Sport W/ 8in screen – CarPlay
Note - Important thing to note. I dont do OTA updates, EVER.. I am of the belief that they cause more issues then good. Every update, Beta or Mainline release i use the ISPW and conduct a (control + click upgrade) upgrade via iTunes / or now Finder (MacOS 10.15) on my Mac.


Disclaimer: This write up is merely my personal experiences, by no means is the comprehensive or an indication of the compete experience you may have. Do not take the below information as a contributing factor to your decision to upgrade to ios 13 during the beta phase.


Broken things – Because lets just admit, this is all you really want to know!

  • Notifications.
    • Calls - randomly won’t notify on some calls on the phone or watch.
      • Beta 2 - This issue seems to be far less frequent for me. Most calls are coming through now.
      • Beta 3 - I have not continued to encounter an issue with calls.
      • Beta 4 - Remains the same, no more issues with call notifications.
    • Mail -- see below.
      • Beta 2 - Notifications in general seem to be rather erratic. My outlook notifications will randomly disappear off my lock screen.
      • Beta 3 - Mail for me is starting to get gradually better, Notifications are working, except for badges now. I do not get a badge count on the mail app at all.
      • Beta 4 - As of beta 4 mail notifications are now WORKING! (atleast for me)
  • Mail App
    • Notifications in the mail app are really broken. Most the time the badge count is not there or will randomly appear with some bizarre number.
    • Mail app is noticeably slow to open from closed.
    • Sometimes it won’t “refresh” new mail even after getting a notification.
    • Some messages deleted in Mail don’t sync delete across server.
    • Total and utter hot mess. Just don’t even try to use it if you can avoid it.
      • Beta 2 -- did not really improve any of this experience for me. Mail is still vastly unusable for me – apple did request logging though, so they are looking in to it.
      • Beta 3 - The overall experience of using Mail is starting to get better. I actually am starting to feel like i can use it again over outlook. Notification Badge issues aside, functionality has been fairly solid over the last 24 hours.
      • Beta 4 - Mail notifications now WORK! App Badge is present and updated count. Though actually receiving the mail item seems to be slightly delayed even if opening the mail app several minutes after the notification. This slight delay is annoying but not a show stopper
  • Settings App.
    • Trying to access certain – non critical settings will crash the settings app.
    • Push / Fetch settings per account crashes for me every time I attempt to access.
      • Beta 2 -- Still experience the exact same issue any time i go to Push settings.
        • WiFi has been rather flakey for me on Beta 2. Randomly it started telling me the password was incorrect. even after a reboot. Somehow turning WiFi on and off on my Macbook fixed it.. erp! Besides that it just drops randomly for no reason.
      • Beta 3 - Setting app crashes for me have been fixed as of this beta. I am now able to access previously inaccessible settings locations.
        • So far WiFi has now also been a lot better as of beta 3.
      • Beta 4 - no new crashes in settings and WiFi has been working better.

Everything else -- Here is the meat and potatoes.

  • CarPlay. It works. And it works well.
    • New widget screen is nice.
    • New calendar app is super helpful to have that little reminder.
    • Album art loading slow is really the only issue ive had.
    • Navigation DOES appear in the Overview Screen, and quite nicely too
    • I do agree, I wish the “widgets” were customizable. I think id prefer weather over the top favorites for nav widget.
    • Message notifications now appear from the bottom of the screen instead of the top. Subtle change.
      • Beta 2 – I had a weird map glitch for a while, where it just wouldn’t keep up on the dashboard. After a few days this resolved itself.
        • Found that CarPlay now contains a rather pleasant “light” mode as well, instead of just dark mode all the time.
      • Beta 3- CarPlay is still working well. A few quirks with Maps here and there, but nothing that has bothered, or affected my ability to use CarPlay. Several people reported B3 broke it for them, no issues for me yet.
      • Beta 4 - CarPlay is still working really good, i use it multiple times daily.
  • Most 3rd party apps work.
    • Have not had any critical app issues. Everything again just kind of works.
    • Feedback app did crash once for me in the middle of filling out a report.
    • FaceID worked right away from me, and no issues with it in apps that use it either. Not only that is seriously fast. Most the time its already done before I can realize it.
    • Apple Wallet works fine
    • Safari is FAST now. And really smooth.
    • New Photos app is really nice. I like the new setup a lot more.
    • Also, the App store got an update and it moved App Updates. I particularly like the new location.
    • No issues using things like Apple Pay or sending money to people.
  • Dual Sim
    • iMessage/Facetime on both lines now is nice. Simple setting to activate.
    • No other major enhancements to dual sim yet.
    • Additionally – iOS 13 seems to update the Verizon PRL’s and I have significantly better service in most places.
    • I have not experienced any call/text issues on either line.
      • Beta 2 – No significant changes.
      • Beta 3 - The new setting added in beta 2 for iMessage "start new conversation from" has caused me some complications. The fact that it overrides chosen line when creating a message has exposed my other number to other folks who should not of had it.
  • New Health + Activity apps
  • I really like the look of the new health app.
  • I don’t like that you can’t really sort the summery to your liking yet. You can only set what you want to see.
  • Trending sheet in Activity is nice too. The insights are nice, though limited for now.
  • I’ve started to notice some UI issues in the Health app. Random jitters mostly.
  • I have health records synced with my provider (Kaiser) and every time I open Health it says there is an update, but there is not.
  • Activity card in the Health app does not update properly. It will be off sync.
    • Beta 2 – Health and Activity seem to be starting to become more stable as of now. The jitters, and slow refreshes I had in beta 1 are gone.
    • Beta 3 - Despite being ever more stable, Health seems to take a really long time to update data especially each morning for me.
    • Beta 4 - this is still a very noticeable delay in data sync for me when i open the health app. it is worst first time i open it for the day, as it will display the previous day for up to a minute before updating

  • Battery Life:
    • battery life - it’s actually been really good. I had a random steep drop off between 85% and 75% but then it normalized again. By 10pm I was still around 50ish%
    • Funny random note on this – I installed iOS 13 previously on an old spare iPhone 7+ we have before my XS MAX, and weirdly enough its been sitting on my desk on – on WiFi only (no sim card in) and its only down to like 85% battery. so apparently standby is on steroids now. Though I think the lack of cellular is contributing massively to that, because LTE is known to just suck batteries down like apple juice
      • Beta 2 – Battery life is still solid for me. I can manage a full working day without any issues.
  • Random Notes.
    • Most of the time something was randomly using my location nearly all day. I couldn’t for the life of me figure out what after flipping location on/off in every app in privacy. It has now stopped. It didn’t seem to have an impact on battery life either. I seem to recall experiencing something like this with iOS 12.0 beta’s too.
    • 1 weird thing I did run in to this morning is my screen randomly stopped auto locking (my setting is 30 seconds) quick reboot seemed to have fixed it. I may just commit to rebooting every night just to clear up anything it may try to bug out.
    • I have not experienced any further issues with my S4 Cellular Apple Watch. Everything is rather par for the course there for me.
    • OOO and I think I recall seeing somewhere that wireless charging was not working. Mine seems to be doing just fine. My iOttie stand hasn't had an issue yet.
    • Also the new Bluetooth controls in privacy are nice. I have a Withings Sleep pad, and in IOS 12 i had to actually open the app for the Pad to sync, now with IOS 13 i granted the Health Mate app permission, and when I open the app.. its already synced over 95% of the time.. subtle but really nice change.
      • Beta 2 – I now get a note in my Messages app all the time that the icloud sync has been paused until I'm on WiFi and power. Never seen that in the past.
      • Since my restore - playing videos i took with my phone, stored in icloud seems to stagger the video now. Mostly happens with 4k videos, almost like it cant download them fast enough to keep up with playback.
      • Beta 4 - as many have stated, the "open in new tab" option is safari is gone. not a huge end all, but annoying. Use a two finger tap to open in new tab works fine.
Apple Watch – WatchOS 6
  • So far it works rather smoothly. No issues after update with pairing.
  • A few hiccups with customization settings on the iPhone app directly. They don’t seem to load right and won’t show in the app. Adjusting on the watch works just fine.
    • Beta 2 - This was resolved for me after installing beta 2. I can set my complications via phone app just fine.
  • Lots of new really helpful settings – like the ability to turn off Siri on digital crown press. Helpful in turning off the random Siri nags from your wrist being bent.
  • All the complications shown at the keynote are present and working. Sound, calculator, cycles...etc.
    • Beta 2 – Watch is as solid as ever functional wise.
      • I do seem to be seeing some more battery drain then normal.
    • Beta 4 - so interestingly when i updated the ios on my phone to beta 4, my watch "repaired"(?) as many have commented. except mine failed and i had to unpair. lucky it made a new backup and after a restore and update everything was fine. just an annoying extra 20 minutes.



iPadOS - I will update this more later, have not had much of a chance to play with it.



Edit - 6/6 -- re formatted write up. Added more CarPlay screenshots.
Edit - 6/24 -- Added Beta 2 Notes.
Edit 7/3 --- added Beta 3 Notes.
edit 7/19 -- added Beta 4 notes


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Last edited:
Sorry for the delay all, I was in Mexico for vacation when Beta 2 came out. I've had enough time to play around with it now to give some thoughts.

Side note - i ended up doing a full DFU restore with Beta 2. some really erratic behaviors were going on with my phone. I'm fairly certain my previous backup had some weird bug, so i for the most part started clean.
 
I noticed on Car Play for Beta 2 now supports a means of multitasking. You can display something on CarPlay, and using your device separately without changing what app CarPlay is focusing on. In other words, you can display Google Maps, and still be able to use a different app on the phone without taking down the app on the CarPlay display. This is perfect for users who are passengers and are using their app for guidance without having to sacrifice all their screen time with something else.

CarPlay on iOS 12 definitely doesn't support this.
 
I have a question for you re:car play. Will the system also show you on the split screen if you are listening to a radio station meaning not music on your iPhone?
 
FaceID worked right away from me, and no issues with it in apps that use it either. Not only that is seriously fast. Most the time its already done before I can realize it.
For me it works like, I thunk, 60% of the time, in particular iPad landscape mode. iPhone seems to be ok. I am still not sold on this Face ID thing though I find it gives me a bit more interesting experience when using Apple Pay.
I may just commit to rebooting every night just to clear up anything it may try to bug out.
My iPad will reboot itself when I am not actively using it every night since beta 2 lol.
 
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I have a question for you re:car play. Will the system also show you on the split screen if you are listening to a radio station meaning not music on your iPhone?
Not from what I remember. I use Google Maps so much, that I'm normally not on the home "split screen". It only keeps tabs on what the phone is doing, and not the car's audio.

Now if you mean an app that plays radio, then I wouldn't know.
 
Stupid question, but just out of curiosity, is the appearance button on one of your CarPlay screenshots to enable and disable dark mode?
 
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