iPad 2 Users! Is yours almost unusable with iOS 9.x?

[rui no onna]

This I do not understand. You will get Amazon Fire for less money than a new iPad, because the Fire will perform better than the old iPad, where you already got your moneys worth from? Should´t you compare the Fire with a new (refurbished) iPad? And will it then really be the better deal for the longer term?

He is comparing it to new iPads:

Sad thing is that I’ll probably buy them each an Amazon Fire Kids edition tablet ... since I can get one for each kid for less than the cheapest iPad.

As for being a better deal long term, will useful life of the iPad be 3-4x that of the Kindle's to justify the pricing difference (~$600 for 2x iPad 9.7 vs ~$150-200 for 2x Kindle Fire Kids Edition with 2-year worry-free guarantee)?

 

[960design]

Puffin is worth a look as Safari on a5 devices higher than ios7 is a poor choice.

I would recommend staying away from Puffin. It is a proxy viewer. They can see everything you do, bank accounts, passwords, email.
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Sad thing is that I’ll probably buy them each an Amazon Fire Kids edition tablet to replace the iPad 2 since I can get one for each kid for less than the cheapest iPad. And say what you want about the Fire, but it will seem like a huge improvement to the kids. That being said, I did get my moneys worth on the iPad 2. I got it before my oldest kid was born and she is now in first grade.

Nothing Sad about the Amazon Fire. They work very well and are a much better choice for specific use cases. The only weakness that keeps me from going to an Amazon Fire is the app store, and the lack of loopback addressing. For right now I'll stay with the iPP10.5.

I have a Fire in the drawer, for development testing.

 

[deviant]

I would recommend staying away from Puffin. It is a proxy viewer. They can see everything you do, bank accounts, passwords, email.
[doublepost=1515513254][/doublepost]Nothing Sad about the Amazon Fire. They work very well and are a much better choice for specific use cases. The only weakness that keeps me from going to an Amazon Fire is the app store, and the lack of loopback addressing. For right now I'll stay with the iPP10.5.

I have a Fire in the drawer, for development testing.

Hey, you can install google play on kindle. 5 minutes of work. i have done so and it's much better this way. it's the new 8inch kindle fire. works great, and i bought it for 80 euros. and since i mostly just watch plex and nba on it it seems crazy to pay 500 bucks for an ipad.
btw, it's MUCH faster than even my old ipad 3 and even 4.

 

[cehrshark]

Hi: The same situation is happening to me...Ipad2 unusable, except for reading ebooks. But I believe that appart all issues that you have mentioned, it wouldn't surprise me if Apple did this slowdown on purposely, the same way they slowed down iPhone with the excuse that it was to save battery life. They want just you and me to buy a new Ipad.

 

[cehrshark]

Short story, I am suspecting that Apple is slowing down on purpose -with every update- old devices compelling you to buy a new one. They admitted that on iPhone, and there is no reason for them to do the same with Ipads.

 

[aggourin]

Short story, I am suspecting that Apple is slowing down on purpose -with every update- old devices compelling you to buy a new one. They admitted that on iPhone, and there is no reason for them to do the same with Ipads.

Try to downgrade to ios 6.1.3. At the moment it is possible. This is old but maybe more usable.

 

[augustya]

I have an iPad 3 running iOS 9.3.5 and it is disgustingly slow. It is a pain to use it.

 

[tygger]

Try to downgrade to ios 6.1.3. At the moment it is possible. This is old but maybe more usable.

How is that possible?
Do you have a link or explanation how to perform this on ipad 2?

 

[aggourin]

How is that possible?
Do you have a link or explanation how to perform this on ipad 2?

Download this image and restore it using itunes , using shift and click method to attach the file.

 

[WinterWolf90]

Download this image and restore it using itunes , using shift and click method to attach the file.

Are there any old ones for iPad 3? I would love to convert mine back

 

[tygger]

Download this image and restore it using itunes , using shift and click method to attach the file.

First,

Thank you for the help.

However, I have a question. This verison of firmware is rather old.
Is there a more updated version that will be fast, but will still give me an option to use more recent apps maybe?

 

[neer1990]

I have been also having this same issue since quite long but didnt get the time to do something about it.
So i read some foums and they all suggested to downgrade the ipad2/3 which you can easily do through guides available on internet.
I am quite happy with my ipad 2 now. its performance has improved remarkably. no crashing of safari pages, no lagging games and all that without diabling any animations or whatever.

i downgraded ipad 2 to 8.4.1 from 9.3.5

 

[tygger]

@neer1990 Can you share a link to a guide that works?
I found a lot of guides but currently, they did not work and some are just complete BS.

@aggourin , I tried to downgrade by when I select the file it states that the version is not compatible.
Should I try to get a lower version of iTunes?

 

[neer1990]

I am not sure if you are allowed to post links here
either google this 'downgrade ipad 2 to 6.1.3 using 3utools' or click this http://www.3u.com/news/articles/4207/downgrade-iphone-4s-ipad-2-to-ios-613-with-3utools to jailbreak your ipad 2.

after your ipad is jailbroke follow this guide http://www.redmondpie.com/downgrade...-on-any-32-bit-device-and-untether-jailbreak/

 

[aggourin]

Are there any old ones for iPad 3? I would love to convert mine back

There is no way for ipad 3 if you don't have shsh blobs , but you can downgrade to ios 8.4.1 unofficially with odysseusOTA2
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@neer1990 Can you share a link to a guide that works?
I found a lot of guides but currently, they did not work and some are just complete BS.

@aggourin , I tried to downgrade by when I select the file it states that the version is not compatible.
Should I try to get a lower version of iTunes?

Sorry for late response.
I use Itunes 10.7 for that on osx lion and it work a while ago. And now It work i check it out. Download the Ipsw for ios 6.1.3 from ipsw me > I have the very first model of ipad 2. Check what version of ipad 2 you have.

 

[MrAverigeUser]

Are there any old ones for iPad 3? I would love to convert mine back

I Own an iPad 3,3 64GB from 2012 - installed is IOS 9.3.5
unable to run with IOS 10 either...

No problems at home with daily use for emails, watching TV using wiFi or Internet so far, although its WiFi runs only on
802.11 a/b/g/n protocol. In the first 3 years it was often used in cellular mode either, no problems then so far.

regarding the use since now exactly 6 full years, I really can´t complain about it. It still runs fluently.

Will buy a newer iPad for other (professional) reasons soon. The "old" iPad will stay in use at home.
so -at least the iPad 3 (IIRC technically mostly just the same as the iPad2, but with the first retina screen) runs still fine and fluent. Maybe because only about 36GB of 64 are in use and memory can transfer data easily by "outsourcing" them if not in use?

Perhaps you should reduce the used space a little bit and look if it runs better then?
Many people don´t switch between WiFi and cellular - so their iPhone or iPad is running both at the same time. This is consuming resources of both energy and CPU....

Battery capacity of mine has dropped during the 6 years to about 82% of the capacity when new. But it is still sufficient for watching TV or surfing for some hours.

 

[EugW]

Is Apple still signing iOS 6.1.3 with the iPad 2? If so, is there a non-jailbreak way to update from 6.1.3 to 8.4.1?

Is there any point going from 9.3.5 to 8.4.1?

 

[aggourin]

Is Apple still signing iOS 6.1.3 with the iPad 2? If so, is there a non-jailbreak way to update from 6.1.3 to 8.4.1?

Is there any point going from 9.3.5 to 8.4.1?

Yes, First downgrade to ios 6.1.3 and then the next OTA wireless update is the 8.4.1 and do it.I check it and working.

 

[EugW]

Yes, First downgrade to ios 6.1.3 and then the next OTA wireless update is the 8.4.1 and do it.I check it and working.

Excellent. How’s Netflix on iOS 8.4.1 these days?

The current version requires 10.0. I don’t remember the differences of Netflix on 9.3.5 vs 8.4.1.

 

[EugW]

I was on 9.3.5 on the iPad 2. I tried downgrading to 6.1.3 three times. It would let me try, but it failed each time.

I also tried downgrading to 8.4.1 but that didn't work either. It would not allow me to do that directly from 9.3.5.

Eventually I just restored back to 9.3.5.

 

[Farrgazer]

I have a general rule of thumb that has helped me predict whether a new version of iOS would render my devices useless.

Version out of the box: fine
Box version + 1: fine, if not better

This is where things slightly diverge depending on the device. It might be because the iPad has the X variant of the A-chip:

Box version + 2: iPhone - toss-up; iPad - fine, if not better
Box version + 3: iPhone slows down, iPad - toss-up
Box version + 4 and onwards: all-around slowdown

I don’t know whether this still applies today; my last iPad was an iPad 4, and I stopped using it at iOS 9 simply because it no longer fit my workflow at that time. There was some slowdown and more website reloads on Safari at iOS 9. Meanwhile, my SO has an iPad 4 that’s still on iOS 8, and it performs marvelously.

 

[themadattic]

Dear John,

I was just looking at your post today as I have also been having problems with my iPad2. I bought it in 2011 (refurbished) from Apple and it has stood me in good stead for many a year. Interestingly, the performance has been getting gradually worse as I have moved up the IOS versions. Laterally it has been running IOS 9.3.5, however, this was almost unusable. I have tried on a number occasions, as many have suggested, to put it back to factory settings. I have tried this several times with the current IOS at the time but to no avail. The device was still very very slow.

I was all but ready to get rid of the device for a newer model, however, decided as a last resort to revert it back to IOS 6.1.3, which you can still do by downloading this from IPSW Downloads website and reinstalling it through iTunes. Having done this the change in performance is night and day. It is like the iPad has a new lease of life. As such, I have come to the conclusion that the iPad2 is un likely to be able to cope with anything much above IOS7 where I started having problems, with IOS 6 probably being the optimum operating system for it.

There are a few downsides to this. Most of the apps do have earlier versions from the App Store, but a few don't, such as the BBC iPlayer app and some of the other tv ones. That said Netflix is okay but Amazon Prime will not work. So although in general, this is good there are a few issues so if you are doing this make sure you have done a back-up first in case you want to go back. However for me, as the iPad is now mainly used by the kids this is not really a problem. I can also type on it without that delayed response issue, which is very good news for a seven-year-old device.

I would suggest that if anyone is looking to get a bit more out of their iPad2 then they should revert it back to IOS 6.1.3. It certainly worked well for me.

I've religiously followed every Apple iOS recommended update for my device, bought in 2011, and think we've come to the end of the road with iOS 10, which isn't available for the iPad 2.

However, since iOS 7 or 8, performance has been getting progressively worse. I'm not saying this is all down to iOS, as web-pages and applications have no doubt become considerably more bloated and complex since 2011, but I expect a considerable amount of the problem is due to iOS 9 requiring much better hardware than the older iPads have.

I have now decided that performance and stability of many apps, most notably Safari, has moved from "slow, but tolerable" to "unacceptable".

In many cases, web-pages take tens of seconds to load completely (with a fast, strong wi-fi signal), and I often can't scroll while this happening. Page reloads are frequent, particularly after waking from a temporary screen lock and it can't sustain more than a couple of tabs with small web pages without re-loading.

Application crashes and restarts are common - I imagine the 512MB memory is just too limited to work reliably with many modern apps.

Last year, I realised I also needed a small computer, but I was off-put by the price of the MacBook, so I bought a Surface 3 (not the Pro, the 10.8" quad-core Atom version). This is also pretty sluggish and the MS Edge browser seems not much better than the crippled iPad Safari! It does have some advantages over an iPad for light use, being able to run a desktop OS, but I wish Apple made something like this (and no, an iPad Pro still doesn't replace a real laptop for my use - I need to run specialist software).

So, I realise I probably need a better iPad, or a better lightweight laptop (let's see what new Macs appear later this year).

In the meantime, two questions:

1) Is there anything I can do to improve the performance of my iPad 2 - e.g. lightweight browsers, downgrade OS etc.

2) When I do find an upgrade, what are good uses for a "semi-retired" iPad? It's not really good enough to give away (I wouldn't want others to suffer my frustration), but I'd hate to throw it in the trash while it still works. e-book reader or music control station maybe? Would the merciful thing be to take it to the woods and put a bullet through it?

 

[RestoringTally]

I was on 9.3.5 on the iPad 2. I tried downgrading to 6.1.3 three times. It would let me try, but it failed each time.

I also tried downgrading to 8.4.1 but that didn't work either. It would not allow me to do that directly from 9.3.5.

Eventually I just restored back to 9.3.5.

I followed the instructions on the web to downgrade from iOs 9.3.5 to 8.4.1 on my iPad 2. The change is amazing.

The basic procedure is to jailbreak so you can modify a plist file. After rebooting, the iPad will allow you to download and install iOS 8.4.1. Be sure to read the comments when you follow the downgrade instructions for hints on overcoming problems. I had to use build number 10A403 instead of 12H321 to get it to work.