Class Action Lawsuit Accuses Apple of Crippling iPhone 4s With iOS 9 Update

[Radon87000]

No, I'm saying this is sue happy nation and it's easy to sue because you don't have to pay for it. Do you not think there are a bit of frivolous lawsuits filed every year? The last lawsuit was dismissed...we'll see about this lawsuit.

Whether they win the lawsuit or not is irrelevant .There is no way Apple is gonna lose in the US.What this class action law suit proves is that there are A LOT of unhappy people with iDevices out there and that planned obsolescence exists

Who said anything about typing? I can type fine on iPad 2 under iOS 9.2.

You can.Me,some guys on this forum and the parties involved in the class action lawsuit cannot

 

[Count Blah]

So now Apple gets punished for supporting iOS 9 on the 4s in the first place? I thought it was fortunate they decided to allow it in the first place. And as we know, no one forces you to upgrade. Perhaps it's slower, but my father has iOS 9 on his 4s and he's never complained.


Now I really believe Apple has a strong motivation to skip the iPhone 5 on iOS 10, and leave the non-64-bit processors behind. Will they do it? I say they should.

I agree that it's great as well. The only problem is that there is VERY mixed results. You just have to read this thread to see that some people are happy with their iOS upgraded older devices, and some are VERY unhappy.

There is a simple solution - Allow people to downgrade the iOS on their devices. With that, you make both parties happy. But we all know that Apple will not allow that. Why? Planned Obsolescence. Well, that and so Apple can produce that pretty graphs about iOS adoption rates, to shove it in the face of the Android community.

 

[kungpaaao]

What a joke. As if Craig Federighi tells his engineers to insert code that will intentionally slow down older devices. People sue for anything and everything these days. Only in America.



You're not forced to upgrade. Up until last October my sister was using an iPhone 5 with iOS 6. Her iPad 2 is still running iOS 6. I can't believe for one second that iOS 9 runs worse on the 4S than iOS 8 did so how far would you let people revert back?

Pick and choose which you choose to complain about. Very inconsistent.

 

[nviz22]

Many products are designed with planned obsolescence in general. Apple just happened to be sued for it. Not many class actions get the same coverage because it's a tech giant and not a middle of the road microwave manufacturer or something of the sorts.

 

[STidrvr]

Im not asking for money, admission of guilt, just let me go back to iOS 7 on my iPad Mini

 

[I7guy]

Whether they win the lawsuit or not is irrelevant .There is no way Apple is gonna lose in the US.What this class action law suit proves is that there are A LOT of unhappy people with iDevices out there and that planned obsolescence exists

You can.Me,some guys on this forum and the parties involved in the class action lawsuit cannot

The lawsuit proves you can sue, that's it.

 

[I7guy]

I don't know the number, but if there is class action law suit, one thing is certain these people aren't happy with iPhone 4S's performance with iOS 9.

Are memebr of class action lawsuit only people who aren't happy? Certainly not, there are fair share of people who aren't happy with iOS 9 but didn't say anything.

Now, what I don't get is why you so against choice? If people are happy with iOS, they certainly won't downgrade. If it is really small number of people aren't happy, then their downgrade won't cause a dent to iOS. If large number of people aren't happy, then Apple has problem. What Apple did is the most lazy way and most effective way to push people buy new hardware.

Now, with iOS's adoption rate slowing down, banning people downgrade won't help adoption rate, it will only deter people update.

Putting words in my mouth I didn't say. Im questioning the straw man hyperbole in the thread. Apple can do what it wants; I'll buy what I want and so should you.

If people are unhappy with Apple their finances would show it.

 

[peterdevries]

I forgot to stop arguing with people. It's a resolution for the new year for me.

Then practice with the others on my ignore list if you are not interested in discussing with people that mistakenly respond sincerely to your posts.

 

[Sprint_ak1]

Nobody forced you to move to iOS 7.

True you are sir BUT! Perhaps a warning of hey ya it will install, but is it the fastest os for your device? No, so we recommend you stay with current os or upgrade to one of our obvious superior productS. Just a warning is all not a generic list of "supported" products. I mean common sense is one thing but to expect us to know how many features a product can support before the keyboard can't keep up with Safari is up to them of letting the consumer know. just my 2 cents FYI big fan of Apple and no more than 2 yrs of updating is what I've learned.
(hard way).

 

[pika2000]

Although I think the lawsuit has frivolous nature, I do think Apple should spend more time into optimizing iOS. The Ive transition feels like iOS turning into a Windows Vista. Apple needs to look a bit back. Apple can get away by abandoning older hardware quickly in the past since they don't have such a huge market share. Not anymore (which is especially true with iPads). I think now Apple is facing the problem of Microsoft, supporting legacy hardware. Like it or not, once you have such huge userbase, there will be people relying on older hardware.

I personally have the 5, and although it is running 9.2 seemingly well, I can see that its life is getting to an end as it was the last iPhone with a 32bit SoC. Current iPhone lineup are all 64bit, and I can see Apple simply focussing on 64bit SoC for iOS 10 onward.

People bash Microsoft often, but it is amazing on what they did on Windows 10, and how well it can run on what you would call ancient hardware. It's amazing considering the kind of legacy support that Microsoft need to consider. Apple already have it easy with limited hardware.

On the other hand, I think Apple is solving this "issue" from the other side, which is more profitable and lock customers to their ecosystem. Ie. by offering the iPhone upgrade program. If that program is available in your country, I see no reason not to take advantage of it, and it nullifies the concern of having an older phone not being optimized for a newer iOS. (I personally wish Apple roll out the program worldwide).

For those thinking about allowing users to roll back to previous OS, although that might seem like a good idea, it is not great for the platform. The selling point for iOS as a platform is knowing that majority of users will be on the latest OS, with all the latest APIs and whatnot. Allowing older OS to linger around longer does not jive with that notion. I rather have people keep complaining to push Apple to optimize newer OS as it will benefit everyone.

 

[hestroy]

Give me a break

It's really interesting this stupid comment get so many votes.

IOS 9 is the worst OS ever.

 

[Radon87000]

The lawsuit proves you can sue, that's it.

And people sue for a reason

 

[hestroy]

Agreed.

You buy a license to use their software on their terms.

So if everything would be bad, it's still ok, right?

 

[hestroy]

No, they did not literally destroy the device. But they did not come to your house and break it. It still functions, just not how you prefer. That is the opposite of literal. You mean they figuratively destroyed the device.

When Apple's update bricked my first gen iPod, that would be closer to a literal destruction of the device, but still not correct.

Thx gosh for people like you!

 

[matthewhuk]

Good! About time apple was held to account for this, every iPhone I have had they have eventually made barely usable with their updates over time, I have learnt not to install the latest updates after a set time, especially as I don't have £500 to spend on a sodding phone every year!

 

[Wando64]

Apple could also continue to support iOS 8 with security updates just as they do with OS X Yosemite on the Mac, but that would probably be asking too much.

I don't think this would be asking too much.
This is in fact the source of all problems. Apple have decided that it is too expensive to maintain a support infrastructure that ensure the security of older iOS versions (as they do with OS-X)
Once that decision has been taken there are only two options:
- admit that older devices are outdated and no longer supported, or
- offer OS updates for those devices, even though the OS has moved beyond their hardware capability.

Apple will never allow us to downgrade to an unsupported and unsecured iOS version.
THAT, would be reckless.

 

[ATMB]

Just let us downgrade both our iphones and ipads.

I'm ok with going back to ios 6 with my ipad 3rd gen and getting it usable again.
Right now it's just UNUSABLE. I can't even surf web!

Come on.

 

[asiga]

I'm not affected by this because I've never "updated" an iPhone to a newer (major number) iOS version. My iPhones are always blazingly fast but it's because I'm very strict with this policy.

The App Store is not fair with users. It's designed for the Apple income, not for the users benefit. You cannot go back to previous versions if you find your device won't run current versions in an optimal way. App developers are discouraged from supporting older OS versions, etc, etc...

Everything is designed so that you consider buying new toys that can run at decent speed and that can install apps that developers no longer release for older iOS versions because of Apple policies. I suppose all is done for the funding of Timmy's lobbying/political career.

 

[Wando64]

Actually it's quite plausible. The code doesn't have to be instructed to slow down the device like you're hypothesizing (even though that's also easy to do). The usage and structure of code or API could very well slow down certain devices i.e. methods placed on the main thread that wouldn't affect newer devices but would cause havoc on older devices. Methods and functions that perform differently on different devices are a reality. And it doesn't even have to be written code. It could even be class-size layout issues that bring UI transitions to a grinding halt. Any developer could cloak and dagger older devices.

Technically feasible? - Yes
"Plausible"? - No

 

[baryon]

To prevent security vulnerabilities obviously. They have partner contracts to enforce. Namely the carriers.

I don't know, are you sure about this or is it just a guess? Because if it's about security vulnerabilities, then they're doing it wrong as I and many people still have iOS 7 running on my iPhone 4S despite it not being signed anymore. It doesn't prevent you from running iOS 7, it only prevents you from downgrading once you've upgraded. It's also still being signed for the iPhone 4 as it's the last iOS it supports.

Also I'd guess partner contracts would only apply to certain carriers, not all carriers. Once you'd unlock your phone when your contract runs out, or if you bought an unlocked phone at full price, then in that case you should be able to downgrade iOS at will should you wish to, with no carriers involved, just like when your phone is SIM unlocked.

Something's still missing, I still don't see a clear reason for Apple to keep doing this so strictly without any kind of other option.

 

[Rekan_]

You really want me to differentiate between open and closed source and each benefits?

Really? Are you trying to say that closed source is better than open source. Either way, on iOS and Android, there are bugs and holes, nothing is completely secure.

 

[Johnick]

My iPad 3 retina is completly unusable with the new iOS. Even trying to type anything is slow and tedious, they pretty much ruined it, and I can't roll it back. Pretty much sealed the deal on me to stop purchasing apple products.

If iOS 9 is going to ruin an iPad 2 it will most likely ruin an iPad 3 as well, despite having twice as much ram and a faster processor and GPU, it benchmarks around the same (sometimes worse) then the iPad 2. I dunno what Apple was thinking, "here, lets give it a retina display with 4 times the resolution of the previous model, and a GPU that's .... twice as powerful ?". There's a reason they released the iPad 4 less then a year later, I'm running iOS 9.2 on an iPad 4 and its fine, slightly better then 8 but noticeably slower then 7.

 

[j0ester]

uhhh, doesn't this always happen? Isn't it a good idea to backup and then start fresh for the device? I know this always happens with my Samsung Galaxy S3, S5, and S6 phones. I just backup and start fresh. And then it works 10x better.

When my mom complains about her iPad Air 2, I just start fresh on that too!

 

[I7guy]

And people sue for a reason

Right, and the reason doesn't have to be a just or good reason. And like the prior suit this will be tossed.

 

[alexgowers]

While i agree the case sounds stupid, the idea of planned obsolesce in tech needs to be pushed back. It's not ok to release new software for a device to slow it down. I really believe apple are on the edge of criminal with this idea.

Sure hardware can't run new software as fast in some cases but where "basic functionality" is slowed significantly the company should be held responsible in someway to prevent the practice.

No tech company should be able to get away with it, there should be minimum number of years old products are supported and speed from initial release should be within an acceptable tolerance.

The case should not be slagged off, it should be praised, as a consumer you all benefit.