Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Does storage really differ between the LTE and the wifi version on Series 3?

Alvi

Alvi

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Oct 31, 2008
1,210
311
Mars
I just saw an article on CNET that says that the LTE version carries 16 GB of storage while the normal version has only 8 GB's.

Is the GPS version really just a re-branded series 2?

I'm really upset because availability of the LTE version is kind of scarce in some European countries and LTE probably won't work on them for a while, if ever in some countries where the demand for such things is minimal.
 
Alvi said:
I just saw an article on CNET that says that the LTE version carries 16 GB of storage while the normal version has only 8 GB's.

Is the GPS version really just a re-branded series 2?

I'm really upset because availability of the LTE version is kind of scarce in some European countries and LTE probably won't work on them for a while, if ever in some countries where the demand for such things is minimal.
Click to expand...

Yes, the LTE version has 16GB of storage, presumably to prepare it for Apple Music over LTE, which needs more storage to buffer tracks before playing them. The GPS Series 3 is not a re-branded Series 2. All internal components are essentially upgraded.
 
https://www.apple.com/watch/compare/

Yep, Apple has confirmed that the LTE version has 16GB while non-LTE has 8GB. Also, ceramic backing for all LTE versions. IMO, this makes the LTE version worth the extra money even if you have no plans to use the LTE functionality - if you don’t enable the cellular, it functions the same as a GPS version.

I will add that, despite the extra 8 GB of storage on the LTE version, Apple is continuing to limit the amount of music downloadable to the LTE AW to 2 GB. Maybe that will change is Apple Music rolls out not the AW.
 
I'm able to have more then 2gb of music on my LTE series 3.
Initially when it was syncing my new watch there was an error message next to my music saying to delete some songs to allow for new songs to be added.
I'm not seeing that now. It may have had to do w/ the fact that my series 2 watch is still paired.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Arran
nippyjun said:
I'm able to have more then 2gb of music on my LTE series 3.
Initially when it was syncing my new watch there was an error message next to my music saying to delete some songs to allow for new songs to be added.
I'm not seeing that now. It may have had to do w/ the fact that my series 2 watch is still paired.
Click to expand...

That’s interesting. I added 3 playlists to my LTE series 3 watch - they’re pretty long, a total of about 250 songs. If I try to add Chill Mix, New Music Mix, Favorites Mix, or a 4th playlist from my library, I get an error message saying that my Apple Watch is out of space for music and that I need to remove other music before adding more. Isn’t 250 songs about 2 GB? I guess it depends how high the audio quality is. If the 2 GB limit has increased, it isn’t by much.

Edit: I just checked the settings on my AW for storage. Currently says I have 9.3 GB available, 2.6 GB used, and Music is using 466 MB of that 2.6 GB. Seems weird that I can’t add any more music. I’m legitimately perplexed now.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: Arran
airjay75 said:
That’s interesting. I added 3 playlists to my LTE series 3 watch - they’re pretty long, a total of about 250 songs. If I try to add Chill Mix, New Music Mix, Favorites Mix, or a 4th playlist from my library, I get an error message saying that my Apple Watch is out of space for music and that I need to remove other music before adding more. Isn’t 250 songs about 2 GB? I guess it depends how high the audio quality is. If the 2 GB limit has increased, it isn’t by much.

Edit: I just checked the settings on my AW for storage. Currently says I have 9.3 GB available, 2.6 GB used, and Music is using 466 MB of that 2.6 GB. Seems weird that I can’t add any more music. I’m legitimately perplexed now.
Click to expand...

Somehow I have 900+ songs on there taking up 2.1 GB.

Oddly it shows I am using 10 GB out of 13 available (I guess 3 are reserved for system?). But I have no idea what is taking up all that space. Maybe it's a streaming cache? (for apple music...)
 
airjay75 said:
That’s interesting. I added 3 playlists to my LTE series 3 watch - they’re pretty long, a total of about 250 songs. If I try to add Chill Mix, New Music Mix, Favorites Mix, or a 4th playlist from my library, I get an error message saying that my Apple Watch is out of space for music and that I need to remove other music before adding more. Isn’t 250 songs about 2 GB? I guess it depends how high the audio quality is. If the 2 GB limit has increased, it isn’t by much.

Edit: I just checked the settings on my AW for storage. Currently says I have 9.3 GB available, 2.6 GB used, and Music is using 466 MB of that 2.6 GB. Seems weird that I can’t add any more music. I’m legitimately perplexed now.
Click to expand...
The Music app hasn't been updated yet. It will be with the lunch of Apple Music on the Watch sometime in Oct.
[doublepost=1506438933][/doublepost]
anticipate said:
Somehow I have 900+ songs on there taking up 2.1 GB.

Oddly it shows I am using 10 GB out of 13 available (I guess 3 are reserved for system?). But I have no idea what is taking up all that space. Maybe it's a streaming cache? (for apple music...)
Click to expand...
Did you setup as new or restore from backup on your Watch?
 
Mabus51 said:
The Music app hasn't been updated yet. It will be with the lunch of Apple Music on the Watch sometime in Oct.
Click to expand...

I understand that, but that doesn’t explain why I can’t add any more music to my AW. As I said in my post above, stats on my AW say I have 495 MB of music (243 songs) on there. If I try to add one more playlist or album, it says I’m out of space and need to remove other music before I can add it. I guess I could try doing a full restore of my AW and see what happens.
 
Yes there seems to be an issue with the software not allowing to sync much over 2GB on the 16GB aw3 Hopefully this will be fixed soon. I don't want to have to set it u as new.
 
My AW3 w/LTE is my first AW. From my brief online research, it sounds like the Music app on the AW used to be defaulted a lower limit, but ther was an option to increase that limit on your locally stored music up to 2 GB. I can’t find any such option in Watch OS 4. I wonder if the new default is 250 songs OR 2 GB, whichever comes first. I can’t find any other explanation for the watch not allowing me to add more music when I only have a half GB worth of music on there.
 
Mabus51 said:
The Music app hasn't been updated yet. It will be with the lunch of Apple Music on the Watch sometime in Oct.
[doublepost=1506438933][/doublepost]
Did you setup as new or restore from backup on your Watch?
Click to expand...

Restore, a few times.
 
Yesterday, I tried to add virtually all my music collection to my watch and it reported that i had reached my limit at just 2gb but this evening I removed all music from my watch, rebooted and added more than 30 playlists and albums which seemed to sync ok with no issues.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Arran
So? How's the maximum music limit on the 4GB vs the 8GB one?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back