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

iPad 2 to Match iPhone 4's 512 MB of RAM?

lshaner said:
Depends on what you do... But based on iOS 4.3 numbers, 256 MB leaves only about 68-93 MB available for apps, so it definitely limits the size of the documents you can work with and how many complex Safari pages you can have open, while listening to music, etc.

As a general rule, I think it's a bad thing if the underlying OS overhead takes more memory than is left available for apps. With iOS 4.3 overhead at between 163 - 188 MB, the numbers are on the users side if the device has 512 MB. At only 256 MB, the OS is taking most of it.
Click to expand...

it's not a full blown computer. it's a tablet you carry around for email, light work, data presentation from da cloud, and showing/consuming media

haven't you ever seen star trek? they all have computers in their offices and quarters, but they always carry around their padd's to read books, show status reports, light data entry, etc
 
Also let's not forget in this debate one big advantage Apple has over both Microsoft and Google: They already know the hardware the OS is going to be using! If you know the architecture you can design an OS that works at optimum efficiency for it. While the others get the advantage of having their products on multiple formats, that comes at the cost of being painted (or coded) into a corner.
 
Full of Win said:
SHAMEFUL it is not 1GB

Is Apple wanting Android Tablets to roll over them? In 1 year, 1GB and 2GB will be STANDARD. :mad:
Click to expand...

Who cares how much RAM is in there? Can it do what I want it to do? If the answer is yes, I couldn't care less about the specs of the internals.

Ever look up how much RAM is in a PS3 or Xbox 360?* Not very much compared to a fast PC, but it's used very efficiently.

More isn't always better. More RAM than you need means more power drain, board space, and cost.

* - 512MB (PS3 has 256MB system memory, 256MB GPU memory, Xbox 360 has 512MB shared)
 
sochet said:
Also let's not forget in this debate one big advantage Apple has over both Microsoft and Google: They already know the hardware the OS is going to be using! If you know the architecture you can design an OS that works at optimum efficiency for it. While the others get the advantage of having their products on multiple formats, that comes at the cost of being painted (or coded) into a corner.
Click to expand...

the internal hardware is pretty much the same on all mobile devices. ARM CPU, an open GL GPU, qualcomm and broadcom network chips
 
alent1234 said:
it's not a full blown computer. it's a tablet you carry around for email, light work, data presentation from da cloud, and showing/consuming media

haven't you ever seen star trek? they all have computers in their offices and quarters, but they always carry around their padd's to read books, show status reports, light data entry, etc
Click to expand...

There is NO good reason that it should be ARTIFICIALLY limited as such. When the limiting factor is primarily RAM, then put more RAM in it. Don't skimp on the RAM so that it CANNOT be used to the fullest potential of the form-factor.
 
The amount of RAM is not important. If you can prove it is important, then please tell all. But I suspect you can not.
Click to expand...

"Who in their right mind would ever need more than 640k of ram!?" - Bill Gates, 1981.

RAM is important. iPad2 should be able to handle future iOS upgrades, future modern web as it matures, future more complex and demanding apps, to a point in the future which is deemed reasonable, perhaps 3 years.
 
512MB is kinda what I expected.

I would love to see an explanation of SOC RAM versus traditional RAM. As far as speed, cost, and performance was concerned.
 
alent1234 said:
the internal hardware is pretty much the same on all mobile devices. ARM CPU, an open GL GPU, qualcomm and broadcom network chips
Click to expand...

errrrr you may want to go check that again. The xoom uses a Nvidia and the new HP uses a qualcomm
 
lshaner said:
There is NO good reason that it should be ARTIFICIALLY limited as such. When the limiting factor is primarily RAM, then put more RAM in it. Don't skimp on the RAM so that it CANNOT be used to the fullest potential of the form-factor.
Click to expand...


and there is a reason android devices have more RAM. all the processing goes through a VM called dalvik that adds a bit of overhead and they all have skins on top for the GUI. HTC Sense, MotoBlur, Dell Stage, etc. there is no standard android GUI because the OEM's add their own and that adds to the resource needs. and the widgets on android need more resources than iOS because they are always running.
 
Shuntros said:
Nonsense. These aren't Windows desktops young man.
Click to expand...

And Macs don't use memory?

Shuntros said:
Only seriously media-rich apps like iMovie will even put a dent in 512MB.
Click to expand...
Not true. Memory is used for storing data. Period. Whether it's an app that is running a large calculation/sum/aggregation or "copying" things to the clipboard, memory is there for apps and the OS to use. It is never bad too have too much memory and reduce the risk of running out and/or "swapping" to the drive. 512MB, in your example, would be the total system memory...which means iOS would eat some of that...and then the apps get whatever is left over. What if I want to have an iPad 2.0 that can hold 5 or 10 web browser windows open at once without dumping the cache and reloading? Can't be done on iPad 1 or 2 today. What if I wanted to have a few apps open and running in the background today? Not very easy. All apps use different amounts of data. It is widely accepted that as computer technology evolves (as it has been for decades), memory will increase to support the richer OSes and apps. iPad 2.0 landed with a big goose egg coming in (if true) with only 256MB of RAM which is the same as 1.0 and LESS than the iPhone 4 that has been out for almost a year. Joe Public may not be aware of the limitation, but anyone halfway technical will know it's not good. I would also guess that 95% of the people on this forum are technical so you're not going to find average Joe Public here.

Shuntros said:
If any bog standard app starts eating memory in a major capacity on an iPad the developer should throw himself off a tall building. Developers have become lazy with the abundance of RAM available these days; it's typical for desktop apps to use many times the amount they actually need purely out of laziness.
Click to expand...

I agree that developers have gotten lazy...and it's not just the past few years...they (in my view) got lazy in the mid 90s when RAM prices plunged...so it's been about 15 years of laziness.
 
BuffyzDead said:
What part of

"Twice as Fast"

and

"Nine times better graphics performance"

is 99.9999% of the End-User market for the iPad2, NOT GETTING??? :confused:
Click to expand...

Well, with more RAM they might not have to watch their Safari "tabs" reload each time they switch to another tab. They might not encounter as many application crashes. They might not endure a gradual slowdown while using their device for a prolonged period of time, as more and more application API's are running in the background.

Yeah, those are just a few things that even the most average iPad user would notice with more RAM. And they're not covered by "up to twice as fast" and "up to nine times better graphics performance".
 
Surely said:
Why is this such a secret? I don't get why Apple is being so weird about this.....
Click to expand...

Because they want people to focus on what the product can do, not what the spec sheet says. Do you think the autistic kid cares if there are 512MB of 1T1C DRAM cells storing 30fC of charge or a bunch of magic elves in there? The point is that it doesn't matter.
 
sochet said:
errrrr you may want to go check that again. The xoom uses a Nvidia and the new HP uses a qualcomm
Click to expand...


and the tegra is just another ARM SoC with an OpenGL GPU as well. it's a good one and ARM CPU's have their differences, but it's like Intel and AMD. nothing drastic
 
Why do you need more RAM? It has up to 64GB on Flash Memory. Flash Memory is the new RAM.
 
PlipPlop said:
Apple have hidden the memory because its lower than the 1GB the new Android tablets have. Then did the same thing not announcing the iphone 4 cpu speed because there were faster android ones.
Click to expand...

Apple does not hide the specs because they are less than competitors. Sometimes their specs are better than competitors and sometimes they are not. What they don't want to do is get caught in a war of specs, because when you do that its like saying your product is a commodity that can be compared to these others based on specifications. Apple lost that fight when they were using the PowerPC chip years ago in Macs -- when they started using RISC chips the general public did not understand that a RISC chip could do more per clock cycle than a CISC chip. All the public new was that PC's had "faster" processors because they were clocked higher (more Mhz or Ghz). Nobody looked at number of instructions per second or any sort of benchmark (except for the folks like us on this forum).

If Apple reduced their products to numbers then so would their audience. They are trying to sell a complete product experience and trying to keep their potential customers focused on that as well. There are many things in the product experience you cannot quantify in specs. And invariably another product will come out that beats you on some spec or several of them, even it fails in less tangible areas or in measurable areas that a customer won't realize until after using it for a month. Additionally, new products with higher technical specs may make some of your would-be customers hold off till the next version even if they don't buy the competing product.

This is a brilliant marketing strategy that Apple uses. The folks like us will always find out the real specs, but the general public will buy it based on how it makes them feel when using it. Apple is betting that the feel of their device will out-class all the competition -- and they are often right about that.

Personally, I would like a full 1GB on the iPad-2 because my usage patterns tend to require it. Some apps I use like LogMeIn require a large amount of memory to virtualize high-resolution remote displays. I'm sure iMovie is going to require quite a bit of RAM as well since it is probably one of the biggest RAM users on my iMac. These kind of apps do much better with more memory.
 
Full of Win said:
SHAMEFUL it is not 1GB

Is Apple wanting Android Tablets to roll over them? In 1 year, 1GB and 2GB will be STANDARD. :mad:
Click to expand...

If the iPad is anything like the Mac, I'm not embarrassed to admit that my friends Mac, with slighly worse specs that my laptop, tends to do everyday tasks slightly faster than mine.

I'd imagine iOS to outperform Android on fewer resources.
 
One Ohm said:
Why do you need more RAM? It has up to 64GB on Flash Memory. Flash Memory is the new RAM.
Click to expand...

If I am not mistaken, iOS does not have a virtual memory system. So the 64GB of SSD does not double as RAM - but I could be wrong.
 
lshaner said:
There is NO good reason that it should be ARTIFICIALLY limited as such. When the limiting factor is primarily RAM, then put more RAM in it. Don't skimp on the RAM so that it CANNOT be used to the fullest potential of the form-factor.
Click to expand...

So in engineering there are these things called trade-offs ... :rolleyes:

They could have put more RAM in, but the question is what is the cost for what benefit. More RAM means more board space, more cost, and more power (shorter battery life). If that extra RAM is only useful in rare circumstances for a few users, it might not be the right thing to do.
 
foodle said:
Who cares how much RAM is in there? Can it do what I want it to do? If the answer is yes, I couldn't care less about the specs of the internals.

Ever look up how much RAM is in a PS3 or Xbox 360?* Not very much compared to a fast PC, but it's used very efficiently.

More isn't always better. More RAM than you need means more power drain, board space, and cost.

* - 512MB (PS3 has 256MB system memory, 256MB GPU memory, Xbox 360 has 512MB shared)
Click to expand...

You cannot compare a PS3 or Xbox to a personal computer...they are COMPLETELY different in function and architecture and purpose.

More RAM simply gives you the OPPORTUNITY to run a device like an iPad, smoother. It does not guarantee anything other than opportunity.

So when we get to the iPad 7 and it's still using 256MB you won't be complaining...right?
 
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