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iOS 4.2 to Bring More Performance Improvements to iPhone 3G?

The absolute reckless deployment of iOS4 on the iPhone 3G was ‘the straw that broke the camels back’. This was really ‘the perfect storm’ for Apple following soon after the iPhone-4 debacle. This update appears to be a marked improvement but at this point, it may well be too little – too late.
 
What makes things awkward for Apple (and other smartphone manufacturers) is how the phone market is changing.

Not that long ago, people just used phones for talk and txting; and new phone models were being released every few months; often with few new features other than a new design/colour, and perhaps improved battery life. It was an incredibly fast-moving market.

Now, as the phone is more a computer/PDA than a simple phone, things are changing. People have a lot of information, and a lot of money invested in applications on their phones. Users don't want to buy a new model, and have it not supported a few months later. As a computer, backward compatibility becomes far more important.

And with the phone as a gaming device, the new phones being constantly released must make life very complex for games developers; it's such a segmented market now.

So Apple needs to launch new models quicker, to satisfy consumers and stave off competition. But Apple also needs to slow down the speed of upgrades, to avoid having a huge performance difference between its old and new models and struggling to release a new OS that works well across them all. A rock and a hard place.
 
4.2 on the 3G IS a huge improvement. I would say it performs as well as the phone ever did now. Don't expect it to be a 3GS or 4 but it returns it to it's original speed.
 
LAS.mac said:
My fear is that iOS 4.xx will be the death of iPad. My shiny new iPad really rocks as fastness, as well as battery life. My iPhone 3G never had such performance with iOS 3.1. And I tried iOS 4.0 on my 3G iPhone, which became unusable. I had to downgrade to 3.1 again. I wonder if 4.xx on iPad won't do the same, reducing speed and responsiveness, as well as battery life, sensibly. Hope not, but I'll remain waiting at the window, once released, hopefully I'll resist for a couple of weeks this time...:rolleyes:
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Running 4.2 on my iPad and it is flawless. The speed is there, features are there, no worries! You will love the multitasking.
 
I just read through most of the posts here and it dawned on me how much we take for granted. Apple is on the cutting edge with the technology it offers to Joe Public. We all want to be early adopters of anything new and "cool" yet we don't recognize that there is some risk involved. If you want to play it safe, get a cheesy ole flip phone or Windows Mobile phone and watch from the sidelines. Me , I love this stuff. Yes it's just a phone, but it's a toy, a gadget and to some a hobby. Let's keep it real people. If you want the thrill and bragging rights to a Porsche, you gotta take the pain that comes with it. :)

Thank you Apple for jumping out there and giving us cool toys to bitch about. Without you we would all still have Windows 98 and flip phones.
 
I wanna be an apple monkey!

Thank you apple for making a phone than given three years won't work as before! thanks!
i should go and work like a monkey to buy the 4g!

i lick the floor apple products fall on.

and all of those who complain on iOS4 should buy a new phone or remain quiet!

BUY BUY BUY or shudap!
 
I still am rockin' an iPhone 3G and I upgraded with the 4.2 GM and I'd have to say it's miles ahead of the functionality of 4.0 and a little better than 4.1. What I still hate is the lag I receive even in the Apple stock apps when I'm playing music from the iPod and writing emails or surfing Safari. It could be that I'm streaming through Bluetooth headphones and although it's a pain, I deal with it.

Some folks on this forum must recognize that some people may not be as eager to upgrade than others or they may not have the means. I got my original 3G on Christmas '08 and it lasted until it broke on the subway in Buenos Aires this past summer when I was studying abroad. Upon coming back to the states, a good friend of mine sold me her 3G for a mere $50. I've been rockin' with it ever since because I'm a college student on a limited budget. However, I do plan to upgrade in the new year and am in limbo as to what phone to get.

With that said, a 2 year old phone should still be usable for basic functionality. I think we can all agree on that.

Additionally, I was able to modify how my Windows PC works with iTunes to allow it to permanently allow me to downgrade at my choosing. It had something to do with me modifying a system32 driver by adding an Apple IP address or something to end of the file in NotePad that allows my computer and iPhone to automatically sign with Apple's servers to run any iOS version. I don't remember exactly what I did as it was a while ago, but there's a way to do it. The instructions are all over the net, including at http://www.gadgetsdna.com/how-to-downgrade-iphone-firmware-from-ios-4-0-to-3-1-3/4168/#disqus_thread and http://techie-buzz.com/mobile-news/downgrade-ios-41-to-ios4-ios313-ios312.html

The IPSWs for all iDevices are everywhere, too. I hope that helps some of you who'd love to downgrade at your heart's desire.
 
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NATO said:
I understand what you're saying but it's not like a normal computer where software gets more demanding so you have to upgrade your hardware or be left behind. With the iPhone 3G, it was sold with iOS 3 which was perfectly usuable on the device but with iOS 4 the device is mind-numbingly slow and you can't easily roll back to the previous version. As such, what was once a usuable device under iOS 3 is now essentially unusuable in iOS 4. The fact Apple cut back on the functionality of iOS 4 on the 3G they should have ensured that the basic speed of the device didn't degrade significantly.

Apple should either provide an easy way for 3G owners to roll back to iOS 3 or speed up iOS 4 to bring the 3G back to it's original speed.

I don't think it's fair since iOS 4 doesn't really offer that much extra compared to iOS 3 on an iPhone 3G and it really isn't nice for a phone to go from acceptable to unacceptable with one software 'upgrade'. I think Apple should have included the iPhone 3G with the Original iPhone as devices which are unsupported on iOS 4.
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I so agree with this. There's a point from the previous post that old hardware wont be able to catch up as improved software arrives. But Apple could have just added the features they want for 3G (like threaded email, SMS character count, new icon dock style, etc) and not change the entire OS build. I saw the code of 3G iOS, and features like wallpaper and multitasking are there but just disabled. If I understand it right, those two features are loaded on the phone but just hidden. So why not just completely remove it from the OS, instead of just hiding it. It will probably make the 3G faster.

One more thing, some apps are being republished for iOS4 compatibility and sometimes removing its compatibility with old iOS version which forces you to upgrade if that app is impt for you. I think developers should also make two versions just for "some" apps: one for 2G and 3G, and another version for 3GS and 4.
 
koobcamuk said:
Apple rendered a phone basically inoperable; with no way to go back to previous firmware.

Apple should do things properly.
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exactly. it's either they put a "restore from previous iOS" button after installation, or a disclaimer on the new iOS "Warning: this version will turn your iPhone 3G into a touchscreen brick" before installation.
 
mbolinao said:
exactly. it's either they put a "restore from previous iOS" button after installation, or a disclaimer on the new iOS "Warning: this version will turn your iPhone 3G into a touchscreen brick" before installation.
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agreed. And it's not just the typical slowness associated with old hardware, there's the battery problem( draining completely within hours), wifi refusing to connect..etc. For many of us (I am on 3GS), upgrading to 4.0 costed me workable wifi, and upgrading to 4.1 (in hope of resovling the wifi issue) took my battery away. when a phone can be carried around without being pugged in only when you put it in airplane mode, it's no longer a phone, it's a brick..
 
Sky Blue said:
upgrade to a newer phone, people
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Better yet, upgrade to a different smartphone.
There are now many out there that are as good or better than the iphone.
Only sheep will blindly upgrade to an iphone 4 after getting screwed by apple's neglect of their iphone 3g.
 
I've been following the LLVM development; hopefully soon, maybe in the next major release of iOS there will be a shift from GCC to LLVM and from the GCC/GNU libstdc++ to the new one they're developing - hopefully all that will lead to better over all performance in the long run.

With that being said, give how feature rich iOS is at 4.2 how many more features can they add before they start getting to the point of diminishing returns? when adding a new feature becomes less and less attractive to end users to upgrade the hardware and software? As iOS matures are we going to see it appear in more devices?

The future looks pretty bright if you ignore the razel dazel and focus on what Apple is doing behind the scenes in the various open source projects they're involved with :)
 
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/532.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0.5 Mobile/8B117 Safari/6531.22.7)

I have a 3G and I can say the way that 4.0 ran on it was unacceptable. Until 4.1 came out I pretty much just had to use the phone part only because how bad it ran. I really don't care if the lady wins.
 
Not expecting any noticeable performance improvements with iOS4.2 over 4.1 on iPhone 3G. Will be happy if it runs the same.

I'd expect the person filing the suit to win, but surely the payoff will be rather small excepting covering legal costs, since surely Apple's liability couldn't be possibly bigger than a new iPhone and as it is the problem was fixed with iOS 4.1 anyway.

There's probably some back play reason why there's a suit in the first place - some corporate strategy-monger at work......publicity for Apple or competitor looking for damage.
 
If you’re an iPhone 3G user and worried about performance issues in the upcoming iOS 4.2 update then you should checkout the video after the jump.

Folks at TiPB have tested iOS 4.2 GM on an iPhone 3G to find out if the performance is better.
 
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