iOS 5 Comparison Video: iPhone 3GS vs iPhone 4

[MacRumors]

While it seems most iOS 5 features will work just fine on the iPhone 3GS, the proof is in the pudding. Here's a video from AppleRumors.it (translated), an aptly named Italian Apple blog.

They do a side-by-side comparison between the iPhone 3GS and the iPhone 4 and it gives a good sense of the speed differences between the two.

It seems 3GS owners (including myself) have nothing to fear from iOS5.

Article Link: iOS 5 Comparison Video: iPhone 3GS vs iPhone 4

 

[colmaclean]

Good to know and thank crud there's a mute button for that soundtrack!

 

[grantrobarts]

Is that a soundtrack from Age of Empires III or something?

 

[Hellhammer]

Well, none of the iOS 5's features is exactly CPU, GPU or RAM intensive, so if iOS 5 ran poorly in 3GS, it would have been another of those Apple's moves to force people to upgrade. Besides, 3GS's and iP4's hardware is almost identical, 4 has twice the RAM and couple hundred MHz faster CPU, that is all.

 

[asuter]

Demos well.

My 3GS has a neat trick where after launching an app like Echofon or Facebook it's unresponsive for a significant amount of time after the UI was updated. Does anyone know if this was addressed? Is my much-used phone giving up the ghost?

My camera app, for example, doesn't launch nearly that fast.

 

[DerfBWH]

Something's not right here. I upgraded my iPhone 3GS to iOS 5 last night and while it was pleasantly zippy on 4.3, it performs generally crummy and sluggishly on 5.0. I'm getting keyboard lag and animation stutters, as well as slow launch times.

 

[mobzilla]

The betas will be a lot slower than the final releases, there will be a lot of debugging enabled for Apple engineers to take a look at, to make sure everything is running correctly. My iP4 was running slow after first setting up the device, try giving it a reboot, runs a lot smoother after that. This has been by far the best first beta of iOS Apple has ever released.

 

[2 Replies]

Well, none of the iOS 5's features is exactly CPU, GPU or RAM intensive, so if iOS 5 ran poorly in 3GS, it would have been another of those Apple's moves to force people to upgrade. Besides, 3GS's and iP4's hardware is almost identical, 4 has twice the RAM and couple hundred MHz faster CPU, that is all.

I think people were mostly unduley worried for the 3GS because of how the last major update pretty much crippled 3G users.
But I agree, in terms of chip speed there's not too much difference (like there was when it came to 3G vs 3GS), and you're right.. there also aren't that many CPU intensive changes (as opposed to the multi-tasking change that was the main crippler for 3G handsets).

 

[KayOhDiWhy]

Aside from the looped ungodly soundtrack, their inability to do the same operations on two devices at once, and second-class imitation of Apple's pan-over-device-zoomed-in, I love the look of iOS 5. As a 3GS owner, I'm happy to know performance is zippy and in some cases (at least with this release) mine outperforms an iPhone 4. -jaw falls to the floor-

Though I can't say I'm thrilled for the final release. If iOS 5 follows iOS 4's release pattern, 4.0 beta was incredible, and by 4.0 beta 3 or 4 sending a text was a daunting task, let alone boot up. Hopefully Apple focuses on legacy performance a little more, even though it's technically a goal of theirs to encourage upgrades.

 

[JonneyGee]

Photo Editing

It looks like the only thing missing from 3GS is some of the photo editing features - crop, etc. Good to know that's all I'll be missing out on until iPhone 5 comes out!

 

[hayhay]

You suck at side by side comparisons...at least tap the items at the same time...or swipe at the same time...it's not an accurate comparison when you can't do it in unison.

 

[acslater017]

Is that a soundtrack from Age of Empires III or something?

I don't know whether to down a pint of guinness or have a bowl of curry. Aw heck, I'll have both.

God help my stomach.

 

[holidaypf]

Upgrade? No Thanks

I'm not falling for another gee whiz software upgrade that turns my otherwise zippy iPhone 4 into a dog. Nope. Gonna have to wait for the next hardware upgrade, which for me, will not be until iPhone 6.

 

[jonnysods]

I have a few friends that are going to be pumped to hear this.

 

[DerfBWH]

Just for the sake of being 100% sure I first rebooted my phone - twice - and found that it was no faster than before I rebooted. I then Restored my phone using the iOS 5 Beta image again and still found the same annoying slowness.
Unless my 3GS is somehow slower than other 3GS's, iOS 5 does have an adverse effect on a 3GS's speed, at least at this early beta stage. I'd chalk this video up to being a poor demo.

 

[jonnysods]

This also gives me hope for the iPad vs iPad 2 issue for this update, I'm an old fart still on the original iPad!

 

[caspersoong]

Waiting for one for iPod touch 4g.

 

[Core5i]

Wow, that certainly looks good.

Another reason to wait for the iPhone 4S / 5 or whatever it will be called