Let's get one thing straight, Apple software quality is no where as good as it used to be!

[AgentElliot007]

i respect your right to your opinion. but i am thriving; my work mac (logic, final cut) is really happy, and am working without glitches, crashes, sluggishness, etc.

my 'everything else' macbook is good too; some random quirks, but no OS, at any stage of it's development, is bug-free.

remember, more features, complexity, can mean more bugs. but i wouldn't trade this moment for any previous one; i do not want to give up the enhancements and options i have now for less. am also not giving up my flatscreen tv for a picture tube one, or my iphone 12 for a 3gs...

My Mac experience has been rougher. I’m not on the newest, but I’m not on low-end Macs either. 2015 27” iMac maxed out with i7, 32 gigs of ram, best graphics. Pretty spec’d out 15” MBP from a few years ago as well. Lag and sluggishness has become the norm for me. Logic (most important program I use on Mac and the main reason I use a Mac for anything anymore) has been mostly solid though.

But that does speak to another truth in terms of my personal use: I generally only use a Mac when I have to now, and it’s largely because I’ve had so many issues on the latest OS releases. Lag, slowness, and full blown system crashes on the regular. And it’s not the hardware; I dual-boot the iMac to the last 32-bit-friendly OS (Mojave I believe) and it flies and I rarely hear the fans if I’m not really pushing the system. I literally get fans when I open Safari on the latest OS. I thought I had a major hardware issue on the 27” it was so bad, but everything is fine on older OSes. That I seriously can’t even remember the OS names right now speaks to how disillusioned I’ve become. I used to know because I cared because this stuff was great.

I think of the Mac almost like Windows now; I only use it when I have to.

 

[revz190]

Galaxy phones have no FaceID or any other reliable alternatives. They are using simple face photo unlock which is much less secure then even 4-digit pincode. Better stick with fingerprint sensor.
Some older Galaxy phones used Iris scanners, but this feature required you to hold your phone like 10-15 cm from the face which was not very usable.

Galaxy phones do have a very reliable and secure alternative to face id, which is, an under display fingerprint scanner. It is one of the most secure authentication method. Galaxy's Face scan has two levels, first one is basic for home use which is blazing fast and very helpful for home use. The other one is more secure so it takes time equal to an iPhone. No, it does not unlock the phone if the eyes are closed or a photograph is used.

 

[fisherking]

My Mac experience has been rougher. I’m not on the newest, but I’m not on low-end Macs either. 2015 27” iMac maxed out with i7, 32 gigs of ram, best graphics. Pretty spec’d out 15” MBP from a few years ago as well. Lag and sluggishness has become the norm for me. Logic (most important program I use on Mac and the main reason I use a Mac for anything anymore) has been mostly solid though.

But that does speak to another truth in terms of my personal use: I generally only use a Mac when I have to now, and it’s largely because I’ve had so many issues on the latest OS releases. Lag, slowness, and full blown system crashes on the regular. And it’s not the hardware; I dual-boot the iMac to the last 32-bit-friendly OS (Mojave I believe) and it flies and I rarely hear the fans if I’m not really pushing the system. I literally get fans when I open Safari on the latest OS. I thought I had a major hardware issue on the 27” it was so bad, but everything is fine on older OSes. That I seriously can’t even remember the OS names right now speaks to how disillusioned I’ve become. I used to know because I cared because this stuff was great.

I think of the Mac almost like Windows now; I only use it when I have to.

as long as you recognize that your experience speaks only for you; millions of people are running (for example), big sur, and working and living without issue (or without too many issues).

time for a new mac? or not. but every single person on these forums has their own unique experience, and anyone (not referring to you!, and i am including myself) who thinks they speak for everyone is sorely mistaken.

 

[w5jck]

Apple software/firmware development has been in gradual decline over the past several years, but it took a huge hit in the past two years. To be honest, I suspect the COVID-19 pandemic was at least one major influence on the down turn in quality in the past two releases. People working from home sounds doable, but in reality it has proven to be incorrect. Worker bees just don't have the discipline to get the work done from home as much as they do in the office where the bosses can keep track of them. Plus working from home with all the distractions from family, pets, noise, etc., well that is anything but productive, and quality suffers massively. There is a reason why Apple is trying to force its workforce to come back to the campus. I suspect the average hours worked by developers went way down during the pandemic, and the quality of work also went way down due to the many distractions. Hopefully Apple can get the correct management in place and ride heard over the developers in the next few years and get the quality up to where it should be. But I’m not holding my breath...

 

[jb310]

Samsung's hardware is amazing, but their software experience is, uh... not the best. Whatever problems you may have with iOS, switching to Samsung will just make your software experience a little more unpleasant.

Well, at least their quad-HD screens are pretty. 😆

 

[Octavius8]

For me is not so much about the bugs, bit about the very, very, very questionable roadmap and design choices. Like removing the “up next” widget in iOS 14, or removing the “long press to call a favorite” from the call app, (long press in most stock apps is useless now, it was such a great idea, now is useless), or now way since iOS 14 to edit a miss-dialed number in the dial pad, and soooo many “wise” removals or the super old keyboard (some Android phones have resizable keyboards that grow or shrink), or the impossibility to use an iPhone with one hand, while many Android phones support even a kind of resizing the whole UI and IOS “accessibility” setting is a sad joke, half baked over several years, it just hides the lower parts of the UI and can’t scroll it??. Apple gives 1 feature and takes away another and the innovation died many years ago. Just small increments/removals year after year (writing this with my 13 pro).

 

[AgentElliot007]

as long as you recognize that your experience speaks only for you; millions of people are running (for example), big sur, and working and living without issue (or without too many issues).

time for a new mac? or not. but every single person on these forums has their own unique experience, and anyone (not referring to you!, and i am including myself) who thinks they speak for everyone is sorely mistaken.

as long as you recognize that your experience speaks only for you; millions of people are running (for example), big sur, and working and living without issue (or without too many issues).

time for a new mac? or not. but every single person on these forums has their own unique experience, and anyone (not referring to you!, and i am including myself) who thinks they speak for everyone is sorely mistaken.

Totally. But again, personally, all those I know that are serious longtime Apple users have been saying the same things. The amount of help I’ve had to provide and complaints in general coming from lower-level user friends over the last few years has also steadily increased. My dad is about ready to give up on Apple. You can say it’s all personal, but the amount of noise I’ve heard suggests that this isn’t unique to my experience.

 

[usagora]

A day doesn’t go by where I don’t have some burdensome and ongoing Apple-software headache.

I must be using software by another company called Apple, because I can’t relate to some of these comments at all.

 

[fisherking]

Totally. But again, personally, all those I know that are serious longtime Apple users have been saying the same things. The amount of help I’ve had to provide and complaints in general coming from lower-level user friends over the last few years has also steadily increased. My dad is about ready to give up on Apple. You can say it’s all personal, but the amount of noise I’ve heard suggests that this isn’t unique to my experience.

'serious longtime Apple users'; how many? 3? 30? 3 million? it's all relative, really. my mom's been on ios for years, loves her new one (despite adapting to some changes). and all my collaborators are on iphones, come to me for help, and are basically thriving... in 2021... on current machines.

i can't speak for everyone, only the handful of people i know. same for you, of course.

so, yes, as per your experience, it is indeed: personal.

 

[amaze1499]

You can’t expect a new OS to be optimized for a four year old device. If you are concerned about the performance on an older device, either upgrade the device or don’t upgrade the OS. I still have a 2014 iPad Air and 2016 iPhone running older iOS versions and they both perform like they should with no problems.

Any company that produces hardware will deal with some manufacturing defects, and any company that develops software will deal with bugs. Don’t be surprised by it — just expect it and try to mitigate the frustration.

Try running a current version of Android OS on a four year old Android device and let us know how it compares.

Of course you can. The devices are officially supported. By Apple. Quality standard applies across the product line.

 

[macOS Lynx]

I feel like people who say this never used iOS 6 at launch, Max OS X 10.0, 10.5, 10.6, or 10.7 at launch, or the third gen iPad, or iPhone OS 3 on the iPhone 3G…

Just like how every year everyone goes on and on about how the newest betas are so stable, and then at launch it’s the “most disastrous release yet!”. Happened last year with 14, happening this year with 15, and it’s happening next year with 16, just watch.

 

[DHagan4755]

Apple's always had initial upgrade bugs. The OS gets better with time. Everyone raved about Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard when it launched, until they started losing data. But once it got to version 10.6.8, it was great, and is fondly remembered.

The real problem with software these days is the Internet. The Internet gives Apple et al the safety of releasing "good enough now, patch later."

Besides, look at all of the platforms Apple is supporting now:

• macOS
• iOS
• iPadOS
• watchOS
• tvOS
• audioOS

(What am I missing? )

To me it seems they've been spread thin for a few years at least. With Apple silicon taking over on the Mac, it would be great if Apple built one "core os" for the entire hardware product range, and added the "layer" of the operating system specific to the device — i.e. iPhone or Mac. They "kind of" have this happening now...

But I'm sure Apple is aware of this & it wouldn't surprise me if they're already working on some sort of "unification" here under the hood even if it's not the merger people keep thinking is going to happen.

 

[dannyyankou]

Software has always had bugs to some extent. But as you add more features, you add more opportunities for bugs. But that just means apple needs to double down, triple down, quadruple down on testing.

The only positive thing about this is that anytime apple comes out with a extremely buggy version of iOS, the next version goes in the polar opposite direction and it runs flawlessly lol. Looking forward to iOS 16.

 

[Freeangel1]

I tried using a Samsung galaxy note 10 + a couple of years ago, was going to throw it against the wall after using it for one day. 🤦‍♂️ Sold it straight away and went back to my xs max.

Worse bloatware and software experience of my life. 🤦‍♂️

Sometimes you have to experience how bad the other side is, before you appreciate what you have.

The Note 10 is OLD. They are up to Note 20 now.
Plus a new OS
Note 10 screen scratched real easy. like plastic.

The S21, S20 and Note 20 are MUCH better.

 

[macintoshmac]

iOS 15 is a very buggy release and animations are choppy on my iPhone 8.

Gone are the days of smooth apple software. I have ordered a samsung phone because I want something new and iOS has gotten boring
for me.

Let's not even talk about macOS, its buggy to point where a chromebook is more stable.

Blanket statements like these without any insight into your usage practices ... not a good combination when it comes to lending credibility to words.

Sure, iOS 15 is nowhere what it started out to be like on iPhone 8 (I have one), but to say that it is buggy and animations are choppy? There has to be a reason for that and it is most likely owing to updating and having loads of junk and gunk on the device.

The best way to understand if the software is genuinely buggy and the animations are choppy is to perform a total restore using DFU, install nothing, give the device a day of rest with at least one night plugged in overnight, and then restart the device and start using it - if the device underperforms, yes, we have a problem that is annoying. Otherwise, it is very much solvable.

 

[Kierkegaarden]

Of course you can. The devices are officially supported. By Apple. Quality standard applies across the product line.

Supported, yes. Optimized, no.

 

[macOS Lynx]

Apple's always had initial upgrade bugs. The OS gets better with time. Everyone raved about Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard when it launched, until they started losing data. But once it got to version 10.6.8, it was great, and is fondly remembered.

The real problem with software these days is the Internet. The Internet gives Apple et al the safety of releasing "good enough now, patch later."

Besides, look at all of the platforms Apple is supporting now:

• macOS
• iOS
• iPadOS
• watchOS
• tvOS
• audioOS

(What am I missing? )

To me it seems they've been spread thin for a few years at least. With Apple silicon taking over on the Mac, it would be great if Apple built one "core os" for the entire hardware product range, and added the "layer" of the operating system specific to the device — i.e. iPhone or Mac. They "kind of" have this happening now...

View attachment 1862464

But I'm sure Apple is aware of this & it wouldn't surprise me if they're already working on some sort of "unification" here under the hood even if it's not the merger people keep thinking is going to happen.

I mean, every year, all of Apple’s OSes have gotten closer and closer, and now with the hardware being the same across devices, it’s not exactly inaccurate to say Apple has one OS you experience in different ways. This is definitely Apple’s ultimate end-goal (just look at how they talk about their products). Eventually it’ll just be “Apple OS” and our Apple products are just different means of interacting. We’re already so close to that already.

The Note 10 is OLD. They are up to Note 20 now.
Plus a new OS
Note 10 screen scratched real easy. like plastic.

The S21, S20 and Note 20 are MUCH better.

What does an easily scratched screen have to do with software experience? Also “up to 20” frames it like there were a bunch in between the 10 and 20. The difference is only a year (and they heavily nerfed the Note 20 to sell more Note 20 Ultras).

 

[Jayson A]

I sort of disagree. I remember having loads of issues with almost every major iOS update. iOS 8 had a ton of glitches, iOS 9 as a whole was terrible how you couldn't do anything until every animation stopped, iOS 10 had animation problems on the iPhone 7, iOS 11 wasn't great at first, iOS 12 was DECENT, but that's about it, iOS 13 had a bunch of glitches at first and iOS 14 I'm not sure about since it was already matured by the time I bought my iPhone SE2.

 

[bluecoast]

Would you buy a car from Apple?

Based on the constant bugginess of their software - with iOS 11, 13 and now 15 being especially bad - the answer has to be 'no'.

They seem to prioritise having big yearly marketing splashes - WWDC and the new iPhones - which (almost certainly) means that they are running a constant catch-up with their software quality.

Again - imagine buying a car where splashy new features are prioritised over quality and reliability.

I'm hopeful that they will learn from this, but their financial success - and the no-doubt, resulting hubris - means that they probably won't.

 

[LFC2020]

My backup phone is a pixel 3a. Simply a good solid experience.

might need a backup phone soon, if apple doesn't get iOS 15 working properly. 🤦‍♂️

 

[fisherking]

Would you buy a car from Apple?

Based on the constant bugginess of their software - with iOS 11, 13 and now 15 being especially bad - the answer has to be 'no'.

They seem to prioritise having big yearly marketing splashes - WWDC and the new iPhones - which (almost certainly) means that they are running a constant catch-up with their software quality.

Again - imagine buying a car where splashy new features are prioritised over quality and reliability.

I'm hopeful that they will learn from this, but their financial success - and the no-doubt, resulting hubris - means that they probably won't.

zzzzzz. that makes no sense. would you buy a vaccine from toyota, or a computer from KFC? (and, if/when apple makes a car, they'll have to get it right.)

but for now, we're talking OSes, aren't we? ios 15 is pretty great for most people, so if you're having a problem, get some help with it; far more useful than ranting...

 

[Apple_Robert]

The only thing we need to get straight, OP, is that you spend a lot of time on the forum bashing Apple and their products.

 

[CTHarrryH]

Could they do better - yes. However, the complexity of writing and test software of this size and requirement to run on a bunch of devices with all those apps and every user doing something different is unbelievable. I also suspect that some of these errors are caused by apps that don't really code exactly s they should and thus their errors cause others. Yes, I was in the computer development end of things since the days of punch cards.
Also, not sure why some of these weren't found during beta test periods

 

[macOS Lynx]

Again - imagine buying a car where splashy new features are prioritised over quality and reliability.

No need to imagine when you can do that already! 🤣

 

[bluecoast]

zzzzzz. that makes no sense. would you buy a vaccine from toyota, or a computer from KFC? (and, if/when apple makes a car, they'll have to get it right.)

but for now, we're talking OSes, aren't we? ios 15 is pretty great for most people, so if you're having a problem, get some help with it; far more useful than ranting...

It makes sense when the big 'secret' projects at apple are AVR glasses...

...And a car.

The point I'm trying to make is that Apple is really shooting itself in the foot if it wants to move away from the personal computers category (a smartphone is a touch-based personal computer, of course) to categories where reliability and high quality is absolutely critical.

You want your brakes to always work, for example - not to crash occasionally.

I'd just like them to really start to prioritise stability over everything else.

Are the features that were launched in 15 for non 13 iPhones really worth rushing a release so that we could all have it in September? Has Focus modes and the Safari redesign really changed our lives?

Wouldn't it had been better if the software support for the 13 hardware had been decoupled from 15 so that 15 could've been launched when it was good and ready?