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C DM

macrumors Sandy Bridge
Oct 17, 2011
51,392
19,461
I agree with most of the posters about poor performance on iOS 9. My iPad 3 is extremely slow compared to what it was (and I wasn't impressed with the speed in iOS 8 either). I know this is an "old" device at this point, but it's to where I don't even want to use my iPad anymore.

In reading the comments, I saw the notes about turning on the "reduce motion". What were the other settings the folks have disabled to help with speed? I'd love to want to use my iPad again.
In addition to reduce motion there's reduce transparency as well. Disabling background refresh and various location services that aren't needed can help some as well (more with battery than performance, but still something).
 

deany

macrumors 68030
Sep 16, 2012
2,873
2,086
North Wales
Our 4 1/2 year old ipad 2 is pretty much an unpleasant experience to use now.

Have done a full restore from backup.

My feeling is that these devices dont last for ever with software updates that make apps work. Safari is especially slow to load pages.

We have ordered a new ipad air 2 from JLP with 3 year gaurantee.

The ipad 2 has been used on average 2 hours a day from new (about 1600 hours). So its been good value and its a shame to retire it actually about 00.25p an hour plus what its worth now.
 
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bheathain

macrumors regular
Oct 5, 2015
173
80
In addition to reduce motion there's reduce transparency as well. Disabling background refresh and various location services that aren't needed can help some as well (more with battery than performance, but still something).

Thanks!
 

pat500000

Suspended
Jun 3, 2015
8,523
7,515
IOS 9 has made my user experience pretty bad. I regret upgrading from 8.4.1. Lags in every sense. Seriously considering getting a refurbed iPad Air 2 as a replacement. Shame though, as my iPad 2 is in mint condition.
Try turning transparent display off.
 

Mac Plus

macrumors newbie
Oct 27, 2015
4
2
Mississippi
Sorry, somehow my original post was posted again and I couldn't figure out how to delete it. So I shortened it. The original post was #38.

I upgraded my iPad 2 32GB to iOS 8 last July. I was really disappointed at how slow blah, blah, blah...see post #38.
 
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Mac Plus

macrumors newbie
Oct 27, 2015
4
2
Mississippi
Replying to my own earlier post...

My iPad 2 ios 9 started freezing and displaying other weird behavior so I decided I might as well upgrade from ios 9.0 to 9.1. The result is that the iPad is working better than it did with ios 9. it's definitely a keeper. Safari is pretty snappy as long as the web page doesn't have too many animations or popup ads (are you listening Amazon?). And by the way, none of the ad blockers for Safari will work on a 32 bit iPad :-( An additional benefit for me with ios 9.0 or 9.1 is that battery life is much improved, but that may have been the result of the hard reset to factory specs (see earlier post).

The biggest downside to ios 9.0 or 9.1 compared to ios 7 is the delay when switching between apps (sometimes). Switching from Safari to Mail can as many as 10 seconds but it's usually one second or less. However, the overall usability of my iPad with ios 9.1 is fine. And ios 9.0 and 9.1 both appear to be much faster than ios 8. Again, however, I'd say that if you're happy with ios 7 on an iPad 2, don't upgrade unless you really want one of the new features.
 
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nsomnac

macrumors newbie
Dec 5, 2015
2
0
If you use two iPad 2s side by side. One with 7.1.2 and the other with 9.1, the difference is shocking. Apps load 3-4X faster on 7.1.2. Scrolling is fluid, no keyboard lag. And this is with reduce motion turned on and reduce transparency turn on on the iPad 2 running 9.1, but left turned off on 7.1.2.
That may be true, however isn't quite a fair comparison. Are you running the same app versions on each. Unfortunately some of us need to run the latest Pages/Numbers/Keynote in order to actually open our existing documents; the app which doesn't work on 7.1.2
 

George Waseem

macrumors regular
Jul 2, 2015
230
107
Sorry. 9.1 is not better than 7.1.2. Not better in any way possible. I was clean restoring my iPad 2 weekly and only using it to browse. No music, videos, apps or photos. It would crash on macrumors every 2 minutes. Couldn't even reply to a post without crashing. My brother has the same experience.

Anyone that has an iPad 2 or 3 on 7.1.2 should not upgrade..ever.

The safari crash is so awful on A5 devices, I sometimes use my brothers iPad mini 1 to go to the Macrumors website and it crashes every single minute, the keyboard is way slow in typing in Safari. My iPad 4 doesn't have these issues at all.
 

I7guy

macrumors Nehalem
Nov 30, 2013
35,155
25,261
Gotta be in it to win it
The safari crash is so awful on A5 devices, I sometimes use my brothers iPad mini 1 to go to the Macrumors website and it crashes every single minute, the keyboard is way slow in typing in Safari. My iPad 4 doesn't have these issues at all.
On iOS 8 my iPad 2 crashed regularly on macrumors; in fact I stopped using it for browsing. I went back to my iPhone 4 on 7.1.2 opened up macrumors and crash. Crashes still happen in iOS 9 but much less frequently and I'm now back to using my iPad 2 as my go to consumption device...even before the surface pro 4.
 

George Waseem

macrumors regular
Jul 2, 2015
230
107
On iOS 8 my iPad 2 crashed regularly on macrumors; in fact I stopped using it for browsing. I went back to my iPhone 4 on 7.1.2 opened up macrumors and crash. Crashes still happen in iOS 9 but much less frequently and I'm now back to using my iPad 2 as my go to consumption device...even before the surface pro 4.
Don't worry, iOS 9.2 has big improvements to A5 devices, I think it will improve the user experience and make it better. Don't give up on iPad 2, it's amazing that an iPad that old would get iOS 9 or even 8 but I'm glad they at least support it, the iPad mini has the same problems and I think apple won't like having 48% of their customers sad, the iPad 2 is still has the highest market share over all iPads (20%) and the iPad mini 1 has also the second highest market share (18%). Just don't worry about it.
 

Watermann

macrumors member
Dec 12, 2014
61
7
Don't worry, iOS 9.2 has big improvements to A5 devices, I think it will improve the user experience and make it better. Don't give up on iPad 2, it's amazing that an iPad that old would get iOS 9 or even 8 but I'm glad they at least support it, the iPad mini has the same problems and I think apple won't like having 48% of their customers sad, the iPad 2 is still has the highest market share over all iPads (20%) and the iPad mini 1 has also the second highest market share (18%). Just don't worry about it.

It's been more than one year since ios8 made the ipad2/mini a worst device, and no news on improvement with ios9.

More than a year and still no solution. I do think there are reasons to worry about...
 

hanser

macrumors 6502
Aug 29, 2013
373
325
My wife has an ipAD mini 1 on iOS 8.3 and it is very usable. Not as fast as my Air, but fully functional
 

I7guy

macrumors Nehalem
Nov 30, 2013
35,155
25,261
Gotta be in it to win it
It's been more than one year since ios8 made the ipad2/mini a worst device, and no news on improvement with ios9.

More than a year and still no solution. I do think there are reasons to worry about...
My iPad 2 on iOS 9 is usable after iOS 8. Safari stopped the dramatic frequent web page reloads and thankfully those are infrequent.
 

honeycombz

macrumors 6502a
Jul 6, 2013
588
154
I'm still on 7.1.2 on my iPad 2... been scared to upgrade. Wondering what people think about iOS 9.2 and the iPad 2. Worth the upgrade?
 

MacManiac1953

macrumors newbie
Jun 5, 2009
18
0
East Sussex, England
I waited and waited before moving to IOS 9 and finally went directly to 9.2, and I've been very pleasantly surprised given all the doom and gloom on this forum. I don't use it for very demanding tasks, just web-surfing, email, games and the like. Apart from the fact that Candy Crush occasionally crashes, then it was a good move. But I am glad I waited ...
 

BittenApple

macrumors 65816
Nov 29, 2008
1,030
595
I waited and waited before moving to IOS 9 and finally went directly to 9.2, and I've been very pleasantly surprised given all the doom and gloom on this forum. I don't use it for very demanding tasks, just web-surfing, email, games and the like. Apart from the fact that Candy Crush occasionally crashes, then it was a good move. But I am glad I waited ...
iPad 2 or iPad mini first gen ?
 
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