Apple Explains Why Stage Manager is Limited to M1 iPads in New Statement

[landi.erik]

It’s funny this is all moot point’s after Max put out his video, iPad OS16 had internal dev flags with older iPad support (10:20 in video). Not to mention the Developer Transition Kit can run Ventura with SM on… To me Apple got caught with it’s fly down again, a la battery gate. UI/OS features such as proper external display support and a FUNCTIONAL multitasking mode should have been addressed in iOS 15. Now I’m told I need to upgrade so they can fix this halfbaked mess is really a business decision.

I’ve already submitted DEV feedback to Apple on this blatant fragmenting of iPad Pro feature set across 1 generation of product. I suggest any A series Pro users do the same as Apple will look at the feedback from their beta feedback tool.

 

[Shanghaichica]

"Again. Sigh. There is no m1 mini."

Again sigh, I've never disputed that. Why you continue to state the obvious is bewildering. Nice obfuscation, though.

That you're not strong enough to work with an iPad Pro is on you. I don't have that problem (along with millions of others using an iPad Pro). And will soon be using Stage Manager.

While you continue to whine and stomp your feet about purchasing the wrong tablet for using Stage Manager. Embarrassing.

I do have an iPad Pro but I won’t be using stage manager.

 

[rui no onna]

With this move apple pissed of 50% if not 80% of the iPad users. I think there may will be someone with enough will power to develop the jailbreak for iOS 16 eventually to enable stage manager. Just like Opencore Legacy Patcher

Maybe 50-80% of iPad Pro users.

I’m betting most buyers who get the regular iPad (over 50% of iPad sales) don’t care.

 

[locksmack]

Not exactly, just the Mini is not meant as what people like the iPP to be.

No, but it’s long been comparable to the Air, which has Stage Manager.

 

[joelhinch]

I’m imagining an iPhone 15 Pro with USBC and M3 chips running Stage Manager and external monitor support. Add Bluetooth keyboard and mouse and that’s a truly portable workstation.

 

[Funny Apple Man]

I don't know who would be stupid enough "upgrading" for just this feature. An iPad is something you upgrade every 5 years or so. Anyone with a 2018/2020 iPad Pro being conned into an upgrade because of this deserves to keep wasting their money quite frankly.

Yeah, as much as I love Stage Manager on the Mac, I'm not coughing up a grand just to try it out on the iPad. I love using my 2018 iPP but I use my Mac more so no point in wasting money on the M1 model.

 

[ikir]

To sell more iPads. Let’s be real. It’s Siri all over again.

You forget we get free updates, so everything is a bonus.very few users will indeed use iPad as a Mac, all other changes are coming to all iPads too

 

[CraigJDuffy]

Which had more than 4gb RAM.

16gb IIRC.

No reason why with virtual memory support they couldn’t allow this on other devices. Or limit it to 2-3 apps rather than 8.

 

[CraigJDuffy]

No reason why with virtual memory support they couldn’t allow this on other devices. Or limit it to 2-3 apps rather than 8.

Macs have had free form window support on less than 4GB of ram for decades.

 

[yabeweb]

Can’t believe people are falling for this BS explanation from Apple. LOL

Can’t believe there are people who think they know more than the manufacturer…

 

[Mimiron]

To sell more iPads. The reason is super obvious as usual.

 

[Mainsail]

Some early reviews of Stage Manager have been kind of critical. Perhaps it will shine or be most useful when used in conjunction with an external monitor.

 

[CraigJDuffy]

Can’t believe there are people who think they know more than the manufacturer…

Apple knows older iPads could support this. They decide to not support it.

See my 2011 iMac which is running Big Sur and even Monterey despite Apple limiting it to El Capitan.

See jailbreaks to engage night mode on iPhone X / XS (which Apple supported during betas then removed).

Apple makes choices to sell devices. Not based on the actual capabilities of devices.

 

[Wildkraut]

I’m imagining an iPhone 15 Pro with USBC and M3 chips running Stage Manager and external monitor support. Add Bluetooth keyboard and mouse and that’s a truly portable workstation.

You forgot to name side-loading! 😁

 

[ediks]

I got the iPad Mini 6th gen last fall thinking Apple would support the A15 in a subsequent update like iPadOS 16... Guess I played myself lol.

the mini still has 4gb of ram like a 2018 iPad Pro, ram is needed for this type of multitasking and 4gb is not enough, anyways it wouldnt be ideal for it either, look how crowded it looks on a smaller ipad pro

they could bring the external display support for other ipads though

 

[CraigJDuffy]

the mini still has 4gb of ram like a 2018 iPad Pro, ram is needed for this type of multitasking and 4gb is not enough, anyways it wouldnt be ideal for it either, look how crowded it looks on a smaller ipad pro

they could bring the external display support for other ipads though

macOS Cheetah had multi-window multitasking and could run on 64mb of RAM.

4GB is plenty and should be able to do this.

 

[alien3dx]

macOS Cheetah had multi-window multitasking and could run on 64mb of RAM.

4GB is plenty and should be able to do this.

hehe.. can't fight with microsoft surface go tablet 4gb

 

[Shanghaichica]

I don't know who would be stupid enough "upgrading" for just this feature. An iPad is something you upgrade every 5 years or so. Anyone with a 2018/2020 iPad Pro being conned into an upgrade because of this deserves to keep wasting their money quite frankly.

Not upgrading my iPad Pro for at least another 2 years. Not doing it. I’ve got an iPad mini 6 and iPad Pro 2018 and I’m not spending anymore money on iPads in the next 2 years.

 

[Wildkraut]

Btw. just did a disk benchmark, 2x faster Storage is also a lame excuse. The 2020 iPad has nearly 1.6GB/s write speed, that’s more than enough for all kind of crap.

 

[Wahlstrm]

All they really had to do was to remove the black bars on the older iPad PROs and 99% would be happy.
There is no way any of the older iPad Pros aren’t powerful enough since there are multiple apps utilising a second screen without black bars already. (LumaFusion, Netflix, iMovie etc).

There is no good reason for not letting safari, notes, mail etc do the same..

 

[Yebubbleman]

The notion that an M1 is needed to drive 8 apps and an external 6K display (as though you couldn't do more than that on an M1 inside of a Macintosh) is ridonculous.

We had an A12Z running in a developer kit and the A12X being more performant than literally every Intel MacBook Air and every Intel 13" MacBook Pro.

Surely, even a standard A12 iPad (be it 8th Gen iPad, 5th Gen mini, or 3rd Gen Air) could do basic multi-tasking. I know Apple was starving these devices at 3GB and 4GB of RAM, but you can't tell me they can't do 8 freakin' apps at once!

Hell, even a first gen iPad Pro with an A9X and 4GB of RAM ought to have been able to handle Center Stage!

 

[hans1972]

That right there is the big puzzle? Where is the consistency with the followup examples: A15 6.7" iPhone 13 Pro Max vs a A15 iPad Mini 6 vs a M1 12.9" iPad Pro, as far as multitasking, even side by side. You've more or less implied the consistency doesn't apply across devices with this Stage Manager. iPadOS 15 wasn't exactly stellar for working with multiple apps easily. IPadOS 16 now makes this happen better with a finite set of devices. I guess its progress of a sorts, but each device varies more on what it can and cannot do.

I was talking consistency within same device groups which are running iOS or iPad OS.

You can divide their devices into three groups:

1. iPhones
2. (Regular) iPads
3. iPads Pro

So Apple wants consistency for a particular feature between different iPhones and they want consistency between different iPads. They aren't that concern by difference between iPhones and iPads since people think of them as different types of devices.

Also by consistency I mean that the feature itself is consistent when implemented.

If a feature only exist for a few devices but it works the same on all the devices it's implemented on, that's consistency for that feature. I don't consider a lack of feature for certain devices as inconsistency in this context.

 

[hans1972]

We don't live in a world where we can throw away perfectly functioning tech because a company can't be bothered to support it anymore.

We do live in a world where perfectly functioning tech can be turned in for recycling. And even thrown away.

I certainly live in such a world.

I would not want to live in your world where companies are forced to open source their intellectual property to support old stuff.

 

[hans1972]

Still weird to see macOS able to do far more than iPadOS in terms of multitasking. Hardware limitation could be a factor but far from the full story.

I think the main reasons is that Apple don't want an iPad to become slow while multitasking under any circumstances.

It's quite easy to make a Mac slow.

 

[Steve121178]

I’m imagining an iPhone 15 Pro with USBC and M3 chips running Stage Manager and external monitor support. Add Bluetooth keyboard and mouse and that’s a truly portable workstation.

Keep dreaming. Apple would never allow one device to cannibalise another product category. It's why the iPad is still as useless today as it was when it launched.