iPad Should I replace battery of 1st gen IPad Air?

[MBAir2010]

if you like that iPad, sure!
i wish i saved G4 stuff like that PowerBook and Imac.

I was going to open up the 2007 Ipod nano G3 silver to check the slot, instead the cable and iTunes were at fault.
that iPod works and can last a long time.

 

[Digitalguy]

Electronic waste. It's unfortunate that IOS updates don't take this into account. This may be controversial, but if I buy my ipad with IOS 14 and it runs 'fast', Apple should support IOS 14 for at least 5 years and give me the option NOT to upgrade.

The only reason devices run slower over time is moving to the next IOS release and so on. Creating electronic waste.

As I have said previously this was mainly a thing of the past, essentially due to limited RAM. Current models should stay as fast as they are over their full lifecycle

 

[Digitalguy]

I would if I were you. But go to a 3rd party to replace it cheaper.

Besides, old batteries tend to swell and make the entire unit unusable if it happens.

No what I would suggest. iPad swelling with original battery is pretty rare (and I mean iPad specifically, not iPhones). 3rd party batteries tend to wear out faster than genuine, high quality, batteries and to suffer more from issues like swelling

 

[rui no onna]

As I have said previously this was mainly a thing of the past, essentially due to limited RAM. Current models should stay as fast as they are over their full lifecycle

Not just the RAM though. The iPad 4 aged much better than the iPad 3 despite having the same amount of RAM.

We pretty much had Pentium to 11th gen Intel Core-level improvement in a very short span of time. From iPad 3 to iPad 5th gen was ~8x speed in single and multi-core (GB4). Meanwhile, iPad 5th gen to iPad Pro 11 was just ~2x single-core and ~4x multi-core. The gains in graphics performance is even more exponential.

I remember back in the older days, upgrading from Windows 98 to XP pretty much required replacing the PC, too. Nowadays, 8-year old mid-range desktops (Haswell i5 4C/4T, 8-16GB RAM, SSD) running Windows 7 actually run decent on Windows 10. Granted no 4K HEVC since the chip doesn't have HEVC HW acceleration.

With that said, the Air's too old and not even receiving major iOS version upgrades anymore (albeit it has gotten some security ones). Even the Air 2, I probably won't bother replacing the battery either. A9 and newer, sure.

 

[Arctic Moose]

This may be controversial, but if I buy my ipad with IOS 14 and it runs 'fast', Apple should support IOS 14 for at least 5 years and give me the option NOT to upgrade.

Nobody is forcing you to upgrade. I have an iPhone still successfully running iOS 6.

 

[Digitalguy]

Not just the RAM though. The iPad 4 aged much better than the iPad 3 despite having the same amount of RAM.

We pretty much had Pentium to 11th gen Intel Core-level improvement in a very short span of time. From iPad 3 to iPad 5th gen was ~8x speed in single and multi-core (GB4). Meanwhile, iPad 5th gen to iPad Pro 11 was just ~2x single-core and ~4x multi-core. The gains in graphics performance is even more exponential.

I remember back in the older days, upgrading from Windows 98 to XP pretty much required replacing the PC, too. Nowadays, 8-year old mid-range desktops (Haswell i5 4C/4T, 8-16GB RAM, SSD) running Windows 7 actually run decent on Windows 10. Granted no 4K HEVC since the chip doesn't have HEVC HW acceleration.

With that said, the Air's too old and not even receiving major iOS version upgrades anymore (albeit it has gotten some security ones). Even the Air 2, I probably won't bother replacing the battery either. A9 and newer, sure.

You are right, as usual ? Yeah CPU (and GPU) improvement are also part of the story... The evolution from the first iPad to the 2018 iPad pro has been equivalent, in 8 years, to that of almost 20 years of Intel laptop CPUs. The iPad started at the level of 2002-2004 laptops, moved to 2006-2009 core 2 duo ones with the iPad Air, jumped to 2nd-3rd gen dual core core i7 with the first iPad pro to better than most quad core laptops with 2018 iPad pro, to better than basically any Intel laptop with the upcoming A14X (=M1). Which again highlights that things have changed dramatically. And current iPads will stay extremely fast over their full lifecycle, so slowdowns due to updates are a thing of the past...

 

[rui no onna]

You are right, as usual ? Yeah CPU (and GPU) improvement are also part of the story... The evolution from the first iPad to the 2018 iPad pro has been equivalent, in 8 years, to that of almost 20 years of Intel laptop CPUs. The iPad started at the level of 2002-2004 laptops, moved (barely) to 2006-2009 core 2 duo ones with the iPad 2, jumped to 2nd-3rd gen dual core core i7 with the first iPad pro to better than most quad core laptops with 2018 iPad pro, to better than basically any Intel laptop with the upcoming A14X (=M1). Which again highlights that things have changed dramatically. And current iPads will stay extremely fast over their full lifecycle, so slowdowns due to updates are a thing of the past...

Iirc, Air 2 is when they reached Core 2 Duo level. The Apple A7 on the OG Air was Atom-level at best. I remember reading a deep-dive on AnandTech regarding that and it was really impressive to see what Apple has accomplished back then.

I know we like to gripe about the OG Air but realistically, I expect none of the Android tablets from that era are anywhere near as usable right now as the OG Air is on iOS 12.

You're right. The chipsets are plenty fast nowadays. Now if only Apple would just give us more RAM. I can't trust the iPad not to lose inputted data on webforms when switching tabs or apps for reference so I usually use a separate device to look things up. ?

 

[rui no onna]

Nobody is forcing you to upgrade. I have an iPhone still successfully running iOS 6.

Later iOS versions are a lot more nagging when it comes to updates compared to iOS 6. I kept an iPad 4 on iOS 6 for the longest time and I actually can't recall it nagging me to update. Meanwhile, back when I was avoiding iOS 11 on A7/1GB devices, seems like I'd get an update nag practically every week.

 

[Digitalguy]

Iirc, Air 2 is when they reached Core 2 Duo level. The Apple A7 on the OG Air was Atom-level at best. I remember reading a deep-dive on AnandTech regarding that and it was really impressive to see what Apple has accomplished back then.

I know we like to gripe about the OG Air but realistically, I expect none of the Android tablets from that era are anywhere near as usable right now as the OG Air is on iOS 12.

You're right. The chipsets are plenty fast nowadays. Now if only Apple would just give us more RAM. I can't trust the iPad not to lose inputted data on webforms when switching tabs or apps for reference so I usually use a separate device to look things up. ?

I went and checked the benchmark chart of my past devices. Well to be honest Air 2 was better than even desktop Core 2 Duo, but only in multicore... Single core was pretty close to Air 1. And the real day-to-day difference between the 2 was made more by the RAM than by the multi-core power... I had several core 2 duo laptops and they could be very different (like twice more powerful) depending on the clock speed.... Those that were clocked close to 1GHZ were more in line with older iPads, while those that were 2GHZ were much faster and closer to something like the air 1. And Atom could be in line or better than core 2 duo....
Just to talk number the GB4 of my air 1 was 1363-2316, that of my Thinkpad X301 (core 2 duo 1.4GHZ, competitor of the OG Macbook Air) was 1090-1728 and that of my 2009 core duo quad was 1503-3868, while the air 2 was 1821-4481.
For reference Atom Bay Trail was 870-2200 so similar to the air 1 and in line or better than some core 2 duo, cherry trail (surface 3) was 1131-3276, better than most core duo laptops. The air 2 multi-core is actually in line with my Thinkpad X220 (2500-4491), which is a 3rd gen core i5 iirc, but again just the multicore...
PS I corrected my post above changing iPad 2 to iPad Air, I had overestimated the iPad 2...

 

[rui no onna]

I went and checked the benchmark chart of my past devices. Well to be honest Air 2 was better than even desktop Core 2 Duo, but only in multicore... Single core was pretty close to Air 1. And the real day-to-day difference between the 2 was made more by the RAM than by the multi-core power... I had several core 2 duo laptops and they could be very different (like twice more powerful) depending on the clock speed.... Those that were clocked close to 1GHZ were more in line with older iPads, while those that were 2GHZ were much faster and closer to something like the air 1. And Atom could be in line or better than core 2 duo....
Just to talk number the GB4 of my air 1 was 1363-2316, that of my Thinkpad X301 (core 2 duo 1.4GHZ, competitor of the OG Macbook Air) was 1090-1728 and that of my 2009 core duo quad was 1503-3868, while the air 2 was 1821-4481.
For reference Atom Bay Trail was 870-2200 so similar to the air 1 and in line or better than some core 2 duo, cherry trail (surface 3) was 1131-3276, better than most core duo laptops. The air 2 multi-core is actually in line with my Thinkpad X220 (2500-4491), which is a 3rd gen core i5 iirc, but again just the multicore...
PS I corrected my post above changing iPad 2 to iPad Air, I had overestimated the iPad 2...

My basis for comparison tends to be mid-range desktop chips since those are what I'm most familiar with building PCs. By Core 2 Duo, I meant the E8400 3GHz which should get around 2000-3500 at stock with decent cooling.

I believe AnandTech used Bay Trail as comparison for the Apple A7. The Pentium N35xx Bay Trails (I still consider these Atom based on architecture) are comparable to A7, I believe.

I find for "snappiness", single-core and graphics are usually the more relevant statistics.

 

[Digitalguy]

My basis for comparison tends to be mid-range desktop chips since those are what I'm most familiar with building PCs. By Core 2 Duo, I meant the E8400 3GHz which should get around 2000-3500 at stock with decent cooling.

I believe AnandTech used Bay Trail as comparison for the Apple A7. The Pentium N35xx Bay Trails (I still consider these Atom based on architecture) are comparable to A7, I believe.

I find for "snappiness", single-core and graphics are usually the more relevant statistics.

Absolutely, single core is what makes the difference in most situations on iPads, that's why on iPadOS 14 the air 2 is laggy and the 9.7 pro is still snappy, while the multicore is not that much different....
As for Core 2 Duo, I pointed it out because I had mentioned Intel laptops in my post (and also because I had no desktop between my 1999 pentium 3 and my current 2014 4th gen desktop), but many laptops.... but I guessed you were referring to desktops and to single core...
Again in terms of laptops we can say that in this past decade iPad started at the very low level of 10 year older laptops, started to catch up with current gen laptops half way with the first pro (Intel laptops improved very little between the 2nd and 7th gen...), stayed competitive with the jump to quad core of the 8th gen thanks to A10X in 2017, started outperforming most current laptops with A12X and will soon be as good or better than even some big 8 core i9 laptops with A14X, which is pretty amazing, especially for the small 11in pro...

 

[adib]

No what I would suggest. iPad swelling with original battery is pretty rare (and I mean iPad specifically, not iPhones). 3rd party batteries tend to wear out faster than genuine, high quality, batteries and to suffer more from issues like swelling

Late last year my iPad 4 just had its battery burst and made the entire unit useless — even Apple don't want to take it back for recycling since the screen was in pieces.

 

[Digitalguy]

Late last year my iPad 4 just had its battery burst and made the entire unit useless — even Apple don't want to take it back for recycling since the screen was in pieces.

that doesn't change what I said....

 

[adib]

that doesn't change what I said....

Citations, please.