iOS 5 Over-the-Air Update Video, Documents on iCloud, and Other Notes

[MacRumors]

InsanelyGreatMac posts the above video showing the new iOS 5 Beta 4 over the air (OTA) updating in action. As we noted the OTA update also saves bandwidth as it only sends changes rather than the entire OS image.

• @MuscleNerd reports that OTA update won't work on Jailbroken devices.

• We reported that iPhones must have 50% charge or be plugged into a power source to download the OTA update, but @johnheimkes reports this requirement is not enforced on the iPad which allowed the update to occur with only 12% charge.

• Settings app displays a badge when an over the air update is available.

• Apple has added a "Documents and Data" toggle for iCloud which allows you to turn on/off the ability for apps to save data and documents to the iCloud. There is also a way to chose whether these updates occur over 3G or only over Wi-Fi. This allows Apps to save their own data and user data to the iCloud so that it is available across devices, and backed up into the cloud.

• The OTA update downloads over Wi-Fi or 3G connections.

Article Link: iOS 5 Over-the-Air Update Video, Documents on iCloud, and Other Notes

 

[Prodo123]

The download for me went swimmingly, then at the "less than a minute" mark, the download froze. So I exited Settings.app and went back, but it stopped downloading. So in hopes of redoing the download, I rebooted and still there's no way to redownload the update from ground up.
Any ideas for updating OTA? I really wanna test it out, so I'm purposefully avoiding the IPSW as much as possible.

 

[crisss1205]

The download for me went swimmingly, then at the "less than a minute" mark, the download froze. So I exited Settings.app and went back, but it stopped downloading. So in hopes of redoing the download, I rebooted and still there's no way to redownload the update from ground up.
Any ideas for updating OTA? I really wanna test it out, so I'm purposefully avoiding the IPSW as much as possible.

For me I thought it froze on my iPad but I just left it and then when I came back about 10 minutes later it was just finishing up.

 

[skyhawkmatthew]

The download appeared to stall at "< 1 minute remaining", but after about 10 minutes it slowly completed the download and applied the update fine.

Re: Battery requirement: My iPhone 4 was on ~40% when I did the update, it downloaded and installed fine.

 

[Branskins]

It probably works on the iPad at 12% because the iPad has much longer battery doesn't it? Like the iPad only warns you at 10% whereas the iPhone warns you at 20% and 10%.

 

[JonoX]

The over the air updates are very slick and a marked improvement for sure..Too bad Apple blocked OTA updates for those jailbroken...haha.

 

[Blakjack]

I found it funny when the time lapsed and he mentioned that it was an hour vs 4 minutes

 

[klamse25]

Feels like a slap in the face for jailbreakers...
That really sucks.

 

[rtkane]

My iPad forced me to plug-in with 24%, so your mileage may vary being able to update without A/C power.

 

[rtkane]

Feels like a slap in the face for jailbreakers...
That really sucks.

I don't think Apple cares about jail breakers.

 

[mgcbp7]

Mine took nowhere near an hour. Really smooth though.

 

[arian19]

Is there a place I can see all the changes that beta 4 has done?

 

[Rocketman]

I think it was about a year ago that the US carriers said OTA Apple updates would not count against bandwidth. I would be curious if there is a way to see if that is true in practice on these tests.

It makes business sense to do that. You don't want to discourage OS and security updates for any reason by any user.

Rocketman

 

[mdriftmeyer]

I see a lot of I/O error by the host in this video.

 

[Minhthien]

Feels like a slap in the face for jailbreakers...
That really sucks.

This is just an option! I bet apple would still let you do the old fashion way too!

 

[$tevejob$]

is there not going to e a beta 4 itunes for windows?

how do you get wifi sync to work with windows?

 

[SuperMacMan]

"<1 Minute Remaining"

I, too, got the "<1 minute remaining" message and the "stuck" progress bar. I stuck with it, left Settings open, and went to do some other stuff. Came back after 20 minutes and it still said "<1 min", but the progress bar had moved. A minute later, it popped up a message saying that it was done & it would reboot in 5 seconds.

Basically, stick with it. It may appear stuck or broken, but it will work - eventually!

Aside from that, iOS 5 now feels more like iOS 4.3.4, but with all the new features. It's faster, more responsive, MUCH less buggy, Safari no longer crashes, and apps don't randomly crash anymore. It's really good, now

 

[Prodo123]

I, too, got the "<1 minute remaining" message and the "stuck" progress bar. I stuck with it, left Settings open, and went to do some other stuff. Came back after 20 minutes and it still said "<1 min", but the progress bar had moved. A minute later, it popped up a message saying that it was done & it would reboot in 5 seconds.

Basically, stick with it. It may appear stuck or broken, but it will work - eventually!

Aside from that, iOS 5 now feels more like iOS 4.3.4, but with all the new features. It's faster, more responsive, MUCH less buggy, Safari no longer crashes, and apps don't randomly crash anymore. It's really good, now

Yes, I had dinner and let the phone sit for 30 extra minutes. Finished before I even noticed it!

 

[S.Jobs]

good, i hate updating the whole thing for a couple megabytes

 

[SheepNutz]

Feels like a slap in the face for jailbreakers...
That really sucks.

Don't worry, the dev team will just figure out a way around that or a way to enable OTA updates for jailbreakers.

 

[wovel]

Feels like a slap in the face for jailbreakers...
That really sucks.

So now we should expect Apple to go out of there way to make things work for jail breakers? Maybe we should expect them to apply a delta update to something when they have no way of verifying what is actually there...

 

[Kutjara]

The download for me went swimmingly, then at the "less than a minute" mark, the download froze. So I exited Settings.app and went back, but it stopped downloading. So in hopes of redoing the download, I rebooted and still there's no way to redownload the update from ground up.
Any ideas for updating OTA? I really wanna test it out, so I'm purposefully avoiding the IPSW as much as possible.

I had the same problem and messed around trying to get it to work for an hour, doing all the usual soft and hard resets. Finally, I gave up and went the old tethered iTunes route. A bit disappointing.

 

[alectheking]

My iPad and iPhone both stopped me for being bellow 50% battery. My iPad in particular was at 32% and I expected it to work but it popped up the 50% warning and stopped me.

 

[pmz]

If any of you had any patience at all, you could have waited, and the OTA update would have eventually finished, even though it was going "slow".

I'm more concerned with beta 4's syncing with iTunes. Likes to reinstall installed apps during a sync?

 

[Prodo123]

If any of you had any patience at all, you could have waited, and the OTA update would have eventually finished, even though it was going "slow".

I'm more concerned with beta 4's syncing with iTunes. Likes to reinstall installed apps during a sync?

I wasn't impatient. I waited 10 minutes after it said "less than 1 minute."

No reinstallation of apps or songs. Just calendars, mail, everything in the "Info" section of iTunes and photos had to be re-synced for me.