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Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
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According to data from internet research firm DeepField, Apple relied on its content delivery network along with Akamai and Limelight to handle the rollout of iOS 8 publicly this week (via The Wall Street Journal). The release of iOS 8 caused web traffic to more than double in some areas as millions of iOS users rushed to update their iOS devices.

appleios8-cdn.jpg
"It really was a significant coming out party for the Apple CDN," DeepField Chief Executive Craig Labovitz said. "This is definitely a realization that Apple is not just a software player. They're not just a maker of PCs. They have an Internet backbone and an international Internet presence."
Apple has not commented publicly on its content delivery network, but the company reportedly has been working on the network for several years. The CDN was believed to have gone live in the US and Europe in July of this year when Apple used the network to deliver smaller OS X updates.

In the future, the CDN likely will be used to delivery software updates, such as the upcoming OS X Yosemite release, to customers worldwide. Apple also is expected to gradually migrate its iTunes and App Store away from Akamai and other Level 3 CDNs as it strives to deliver data reliably to its customers by bringing this content delivery under its direct control.

Article Link: Apple Utilizing Own Content Delivery Network to Help Deliver iOS 8 Update
 

room237

macrumors 6502
Oct 20, 2008
322
1
Queens, NYC
Worked great for me. Downloaded in less than 20 minutes. In the past, trying to download on rollout day could take several hours.
 

0815

macrumors 68000
Jul 9, 2010
1,793
1,065
here and there but not over there
did not work for me very well - was as bad as the last few years - timed out twice, took many hours to download.

As much as I love Apples hardware and software - when it comes to services, they a just doing a horrible job.
 

flottenheimer

macrumors 68000
Jan 8, 2008
1,521
630
Up north
Apple has a lot of well earned trust in many, many areas.

But when it comes to managing data, I don't trust them much. Maybe it comes down to Messages and iMessage syncing being so inconsistent. Or iCloud/Photo-synicing still being very shaky. It probably hasn't got even the slightest thing to do with their ability to build and operate a CDN. But I simply don't trust them when it comes down to data delivery.

Hmm, something came to my mind: Live keynotes.

As far as I know, that disaster was completely outsourced.
 

Blorzoga

macrumors 68030
May 21, 2010
2,560
66
We'll, that would explain why I haven't been able to download it for two days now. Every time I start it, it says, like 20 hours.
 

2457282

Suspended
Dec 6, 2012
3,327
3,015
If there was a way for them to drop a line straight to my house, I would jump on that instantly. I hate comcrap and their unreliable, overpriced service. I which I had alternatives like FiOS (did you ever notice that without the F, Verizon has iOS in their offering? hmmm...). Anyway, I think that Apple building a backbone for content delivery is awesome, but I hope it is just a first step. If they ever deliver content to the AppleTV without a cable subscription and then run their network straight to your door - that would be the final link in the fence to completely control the entire user experience - hardware, OS, software, content, purchase, and delivery. Awesome in some sense, and scary in others.
 
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Razeus

macrumors 603
Jul 11, 2008
5,348
2,030
I noticed. I had my iOS 8 downloaded in 6 minutes each device (once in the afternoon, and once in the evening during peak hours).

I think the special payments Apple makes to Comcast helps too.
 

mic j

macrumors 68030
Mar 15, 2012
2,663
156
OTA vs iTunes Update

Yesterday, I tried to update my 5s twice through iTunes. Each time it showed 18 hours to download and it slowly downloaded at about 40kbps. First time I needed to leave and take my phone with my so I stopped the download. The second time a lightbulb went on in my head.

I have always updated my aTV over wifi with no problem but read about those trying to update over ethernet having issues. So I stopped the second try at the iOS 8 through iTunes download. Went to my 5s and tried to update through the phone over wifi. In about an hour (30m download, 30m preparing update) I was watching my phone boot into iOS 8.

Of course, I was lucky in that I had the 5GB free space on my phone that allowed me to do the update through the phone.

I have no explanation for why iTunes update and through the phone update should be different, but obviously they are.
 

ArtOfWarfare

macrumors G3
Nov 26, 2007
9,541
6,028
If there was a way for them to drop a line straight to my house, I would jump on that intantly. I hate comcrap an their unreliable overpriced service. I which I had alternatives like FiOS (did you ever notice that without the F, Verizon has iOS in their offering. hmmm...). Anyway, I think that Apple building a backbone for content delivery is awesome, but I hop it is just a first step. If they can ever deliver content to the AppleTV without a cable subscription and then run their network straight to your door - that would be the final link in the fence to completely control the entire user experience - hardware, OS, software, content, purchase, and delivery. Awesone in some sense, and scary in others.

I wouldn't expect Apple to get into having a physical network that goes to your house, but I can imagine them making a wireless/cellular network (at one point, they were planning on this before the US carriers started partnering with Apple for the iPhone). Sooner or later, I expect that cellular/wireless networks will become good enough that they displace the current ISPs and cable companies like Comcrap, whether or not Apple actually enters that market.

Within 10 years, I expect wide area wireless networks (such as cellular) will have higher bandwidth than current wired networks.
 

sshambles

macrumors 6502a
Oct 19, 2005
766
1,127
Australia
Worked great for me. Downloaded in less than 20 minutes. In the past, trying to download on rollout day could take several hours.
Same here. Best I've had in a few years, although the downloading was super fast 7minutes, the rest of it took a while. Restart normal time, but the getting ready part was a lot longer than normal.
 

henryhbk

macrumors regular
Jul 26, 2002
130
126
Boston
Utter failure in general

So this network was very spotty. I upgraded the first phone via iTunes and the update downloaded in 3 minutes (80mb connection via Fios). The next ones all failed with reporting 4k download rates with 30-90 hours reported ETA for 2 days (tried at all hours). Tried via iTunes and wifi with no difference. At the same time as a test, my wife had ~4GB of apps to update, which came down in a few minutes (no change to the 4k/sec). I took the same phone to work, and with the wifi was able to download the update in a few minutes... Seems like the CDN has some bad servers, and you get assigned the same one repeatedly based on your IP?
 

0098386

Suspended
Jan 18, 2005
21,574
2,908
They did? Because it was awful for me on my 80mbps connection. I gave up trying to download via the Settings panel and iTunes and downloaded it from a link via Safari. Every time I reloaded it it would pick a random time between 5 and 9 hours so I gave up and got it the next day (was desperate to see if it fixed a known bug in iOS or iTunes for over a year now (it didn't)).
 

Deelron

macrumors regular
Jan 30, 2009
235
113
Yesterday, I tried to update my 5s twice through iTunes. Each time it showed 18 hours to download and it slowly downloaded at about 40kbps. First time I needed to leave and take my phone with my so I stopped the download.

I have no explanation for why iTunes update and through the phone update should be different, but obviously they are.

I actually had a similar problem (I have no idea if it's actually related or not, but it sounds the same) with my previous ISP. If the default firewall was turned on medium (or even low), the update through iTunes would slow to a trickle, and I couldn't figure out why, but when I turned the firewall off it would download at an appropriate rate. Obviously your cause could be different but it sounded so similar I just wanted to throw it out there.
 

whooleytoo

macrumors 604
Aug 2, 2002
6,607
716
Cork, Ireland.
Hmm, something came to my mind: Live keynotes.

Glassed Silver:mac

Live events are a bit trickier. For CDNs, the package can be propagated out to all the various nodes well in advance of launch so they're ready to go and "independent". For Live events, all those nodes would be hammering the source node for the video stream. Even if you put in multiple levels to keep the numbers down, you're just adding more latency and more points of failure.

It's funny how a good, old-fashioned technology like a TV broadcast is still so much superior in many ways to the latest tech.
 

2457282

Suspended
Dec 6, 2012
3,327
3,015
I wouldn't expect Apple to get into having a physical network that goes to your house, but I can imagine them making a wireless/cellular network (at one point, they were planning on this before the US carriers started partnering with Apple for the iPhone). Sooner or later, I expect that cellular/wireless networks will become good enough that they displace the current ISPs and cable companies like Comcrap, whether or not Apple actually enters that market.

Within 10 years, I expect wide area wireless networks (such as cellular) will have higher bandwidth than current wired networks.

You may be right. Wired or wireless, Apple is now close to controlling everything in their ecosystem except the last mile. My guess would be that the finish the content issue first to unleash the Apple TV. Then to your point they will solve the last mile through a new technology that would not require laying physical cable or fiber down. Still, one can only dream about these thing at this point. I for one am a dreamer. :D
 

ouimetnick

macrumors 68040
Aug 28, 2008
3,552
6,341
Beverly, Massachusetts
I tried today and was able to download in 2 hours. I have DSL, so it's faster than dialup, yet slower than cable. On iOS 8 release day and yesterday, I was getting 140 hours to download. Over night, it only downloaded 2.3MB, so while I could use faster connection, Apple should shell out a bit more money and purchase more servers.
 
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