iPad 3: How Does iCloud Work On It?

[TrentS]

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Ok, I bought the iPad 3, and have been syncing it to my MBP. If I start syncing it with iCloud I have a few questions before I do so:

1) Once I sync it using iCloud, can I later go back and sync to my MBP?

2) Do I always have to have an internet connection, whether it be wifi or 4G, to be able to access/retrieve my storage in iCloud?

3) With the initial 5 Gigs of free storage, and my iPad 3 being a 32 Gig, does it look like I will have to buy more space to be able to back up my iPad 3?

4) Does saving photos and movies to the cloud also take up space on my 32 Gig of on board memory?

Any help will be appreciated, thank you.

 

[EthanMiller]

1) You can sync with both - some things sync through iCloud, but your music and videos can only be transferred by the Pro.

2) Depends on the thing. Most of it is stored locally, so you're good without wifi, but to use things like Messages, you'll need a connection (though recent messages will still be visible).

3) Not everything is backed up to iCloud. Only app data, settings, and the like are stored, not your music. Apps are a bit more complicated - iCloud stores a list of all the apps you buy/download, but not the app itself. To redownload something (always free once you've bought it), it goes through the App Store.

Photostream is a little more complicated - 30 days of photos (and videos? I'm not sure) are kept in the cloud and pushed to your Mac. Any photo you take will be backed up instantly like that.

4) Yeah. All content is kept locally, so you can use it when not online. And, as per (3), videos (that you don't take) aren't backed up.

So, if you back up to iCloud, and it wipes and you restore from iCloud (unless using iTunes Match), you'll have to sync at least once to get music and photos back on.

 

[ThatsMeRight]

Yeah, and photos in photo stream will not take up any space. You can also back-up photos you took with the iPad (so not in photo stream), and that will take up space (but you can decide for yourself on the settings menu what you want to be backed up and what not).

The 5 GB is enough for most people, even with multiple iDevices.

 

[jman240]

Photostream is a little more complicated - 30 days of photos (and videos? I'm not sure) are kept in the cloud and pushed to your Mac. Any photo you take will be backed up instantly like that.

To clarify videos are not synced via photo stream.

Videos are backed up to iCloud in the iCloud backup part (separate from photostream). There is an on/off slider for camera roll which will back up all your photos and videos (no choice of excluding one or the other) and will take up space out of your 5GB.

The reason you would turn this on specifically is: if you need to restore your device, the camera roll is lost, unless you have it set to backup to iCloud backups. Photo stream will only redownload the last 30 days worth or 1000 photos you took and not videos.