All iPads iPad Air - how severe is the RAM problem?

[HenryDJP]

Ok now I know for sure: you are just another Apple basher trying to justify a defect that doesn't exist (at least on MY iPad, or to a lesser extent ).
I use KBB because Count Blah asked for that, and KBB is much more heavy than Engadget ....
You spoke about a ram issue, I demonstrated it is not so severe.
But it doesn't count because it works, right ?

Do I have an iPad Air special edition ???

Now just a minute here sir. I have no idea who you're getting agitated with but you need to calm down. There are two things that are 100% wrong about your post towards me. I am no Apple basher. If anything in past posts I have been called an Apple fanboy and I just came back from the Macworld show in SF which I attend every year, so you're way out place calling me that.

Secondly , you have been the one telling people they have defective iPads and when YOU decided to videos to prove you have no tab reloading issues you chose to use a different browser initially and not use the websites you said you would.
I simply asked you to use Safari and two specific websites because someone else suggested them and I have been able to reproduce the reloading on multiple iPads and my iPhone.

I never once have mentioned the iPad having a ram issue. In fact I've been asking people if Apple has even verified this claim people are making.
Don't say that I said things here when I didn't. You're either quoting the wrong person, your confused or you're making it up as you go along. Which one is it?

 

[Max(IT)]

Now just a minute here sir. I have no idea who you're getting agitated with but you need to calm down. There are two things that are 100% wrong about your post towards me. I am no Apple basher. If anything in past posts I have been called an Apple fanboy and I just came back from the Macworld show in SF which I attend every year, so you're way out place calling me that.

Secondly , you have been the one telling people they have defective iPads and when YOU decided to videos to prove you have no tab reloading issues you chose to use a different browser initially and not use the websites you said you would.
I simply asked you to use Safari and two specific websites because someone else suggested them and I have been able to reproduce the reloading on multiple iPads and my iPhone.

I never once have mentioned the iPad having a ram issue. In fact I've been asking people if Apple has even verified this claim people are making.
Don't say that I said things here when I didn't. You're either quoting the wrong person, your confused or you're making it up as you go along. Which one is it?

I was asked to post a video using KBB website (a couple of instances), this forum and some apps in background and I did.
But you and others weren't happy because it wasn't Safari (and this thread is NOT about Safari itself, but about a supposed ram issue of iPad Air).
I was also accused to use an iPad mini where my video was made with my silver iPad Air ....
Never mind, I did another video with Safari and still no reloads ....
But it wasn't enough, you asked me to post Engadget ... And I did ! Not two but three tabs with the articles full loaded with photos and embedded videos.
Is that enough ?

I also reported how kbb website did cause unresponsiveness on my Nexus 7.
But the whole question here is just one: people want to demonstrate that 1 Gb on the iPad is not enough, no matter what I did or I would show.
Ok, fine, I'm done.
Go and buy a Samsung tablet with 3 Gb of ram, I'm sure you'll be happy (I'm not referring directly to you).

 

[GalFriday]

FWIW, I've had my iPad Air for a short time and haven't had any problems with tabs reloaded. Right now I have Engadget and Amazon loaded with iTunes Radio and Email in the background and absolutely no reloads. Instead of screaming and getting agitated with those of us not having issues (and insinuating we are either idiots or lying) why not just accept that not everyone is having problems?

 

[zhenya]

FWIW, I've had my iPad Air for a short time and haven't had any problems with tabs reloaded. Right now I have Engadget and Amazon loaded with iTunes Radio and Email in the background and absolutely no reloads. Instead of screaming and getting agitated with those of us not having issues (and insinuating we are either idiots or lying) why not just accept that not everyone is having problems?

Two tabs open and a couple of other lightweight programs open are not exactly pushing things.

Even so, given enough time, even those two tabs would eventually be flushed from RAM and reloaded. It's not a matter of some people having issues or not; all the devices behave in exactly the same manner.

 

[GalFriday]

Two tabs open and a couple of other lightweight programs open are not exactly pushing things.

Even so, given enough time, even those two tabs would eventually be flushed from RAM and reloaded. It's not a matter of some people having issues or not; all the devices behave in exactly the same manner.

Several posts in this thread insisted that having Engadget and Amazon open at the same time caused tab reloads. I have not experienced this.

 

[petvas]

Several posts in this thread insisted that having Engadget and Amazon open at the same time caused tab reloads. I have not experienced this.

That's great for you, but don't worry, at some point you will also see tabs refreshing. It's a design decision that Apple took years ago, and it has nothing to do with faulty devices..Every iOS device behaves the same.

 

[Zorlac]

There simply isn't enough ram on the air. It's just a fact and anyone who says otherwise doesn't know what the hell they're talking about. I have to friggin copy any text I type because if I switch tabs I will almost certainly lose anything I typed in the previous tab.

I'm a member on arstechnica forums. I had 2 damn tabs open, one on the reply page, and one on my battle.net profile. I was posting into a thread about Diablo 3. EVERY SINGLE GODDAMN time I switched tabs they would reload. Like I said I have to copy the text I type because if I don't I lose everything.

This is not normal nor is it something I should get used to. If this is the case this iPad Air might as well be my first and last. Ridiculous.

No, there is nothing wrong nor defective on my air. It is a design flaw simple as that. Do not attempt to argue otherwise. 1gb of ram is simply not enough, no if and or buts about it.

 

[zhenya]

There simply isn't enough ram on the air. It's just a fact and anyone who says otherwise doesn't know what the hell they're talking about. I have to friggin copy any text I type because if I switch tabs I will almost certainly lose anything I typed in the previous tab.

I'm a member on arstechnica forums. I had 2 damn tabs open, one on the reply page, and one on my battle.net profile. I was posting into a thread about Diablo 3. EVERY SINGLE GODDAMN time I switched tabs they would reload. Like I said I have to copy the text I type because if I don't I lose everything.

This is not normal nor is it something I should get used to. If this is the case this iPad Air might as well be my first and last. Ridiculous.

No, there is nothing wrong nor defective on my air. It is a design flaw simple as that. Do not attempt to argue otherwise. 1gb of ram is simply not enough, no if and or buts about it.

Clearly you are a genius and apple are idiots. When can we buy your tablet?

FYI my brand new Samsung Galaxy tab with 2gb ram does the same thing, probably more than the ipad, and it's far slower to reload the tabs.

 

[Count Blah]

Clearly you are a genius and apple are idiots. When can we buy your tablet?

FYI my brand new Samsung Galaxy tab with 2gb ram does the same thing, probably more than the ipad, and it's far slower to reload the tabs.

Unless you are an nfl player, you can't talk football. Unless you are in congress/senate, you can't talk politics. Unless you produce your own tablet, you can't talk tablets.

100% garbage stance to take.

Apple sells a big $$$ tablet, but only caters to the 80%. You need look no further than this thread to see people who don't even know the ram limitation is happening in safari, until they check for themselves. Apple makes more $$$ by not catering to people who notice such things. They also minimize the ram so people will have to replace their devices more often.

They can still produce a fantastic product, WITH inherent limitations - no matter how much the person I quote will fight tool and nail.

It's for the VERY question the op asked, that you will get the responses describing the ram limitations.

So sorry, poster I quoted, you could not be more wrong in here, in just about every way possible

 

[zhenya]

Unless you are an nfl player, you can't talk football. Unless you are in congress/senate, you can't talk politics. Unless you produce your own tablet, you can't talk tablets.

100% garbage stance to take.

Apple sells a big $$$ tablet, but only caters to the 80%. You need look no further than this thread to see people who don't even know the ram limitation is happening in safari, until they check for themselves. Apple makes more $$$ by not catering to people who notice such things. They also minimize the ram so people will have to replace their devices more often.

They can still produce a fantastic product, WITH inherent limitations - no matter how much the person I quote will fight tool and nail.

It's for the VERY question the op asked, that you will get the responses describing the ram limitations.

So sorry, poster I quoted, you could not be more wrong in here, in just about every way possible

Why do you think that the vast majority of announcers and analysts for any sport are former players? It's a level of knowledge and respect. This guy couldn't even bother to read the thread or try to understand the very real reasons for Apple making the decision they did, nor could he possibly have written that if he'd realized that Android tablets do the same damn thing. So when you make stupid arguments, you get snarky responses.

 

[Rodster]

Clearly you are a genius and apple are idiots. When can we buy your tablet?

FYI my brand new Samsung Galaxy tab with 2gb ram does the same thing, probably more than the ipad, and it's far slower to reload the tabs.

I recently purchased a Galaxy Tab 4 8.0 with a 1280x800 display and 1.5GB of ram. I can honestly say the experience at times is not as smooth especially in any browser (Dolphin, Chrome, Samsung stock browser) as on my lowly iPad 2 with 512MB of ram and running iOS 7.1.1

update: I don't have a tab reloading problem on my Galaxy Tab 4. I had 7 tabs open in Chrome including The Verge and Engadget with Youtube, Memo, Play Store, task manager, file manager, settings, Gmail. All my tabs were exactly where I set them.

 

[cynics]

Clearly you are a genius and apple are idiots. When can we buy your tablet?

FYI my brand new Samsung Galaxy tab with 2gb ram does the same thing, probably more than the ipad, and it's far slower to reload the tabs.

No it doesn't. Android doesn't utilize RAM the same way iOS for web browsing. You can have 30 tabs open on an Android device an as long as you don't put the app in the background they will not refresh.

Here is a video response I made for another member. This is a Motorola Xoom (Androids first tablet) which has 1gb RAM. Pandora playing in the background (excuse the music like I said it was a video response showing how its not refreshing tabs).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=utBPbRVpRD8

 

[Count Blah]

update: I don't have a tab reloading problem on my Galaxy Tab 4. I had 7 tabs open in Chrome including The Verge and Engadget with Youtube, Memo, Play Store, task manager, file manager, settings, Gmail. All my tabs were exactly where I set them.

But that can't possibly be. Apple is the best thing since the invention of the wheel, and they are infallible. If you question that, you must produce your own tablet in order to be taken seriously.

In reality, apple caters to the vast majority and now produces products that it knows are underspec'd, so people will encouraged to upgrade due to the advances in the next version of iOS. How anyone can argue differently is beyond me, but they try.

 

[Rodster]

But that can't possibly be. Apple is the best thing since the invention of the wheel, and they are infallible. If you question that, you must produce your own tablet in order to be taken seriously.

In reality, apple caters to the vast majority and now produces products that it knows are underspec'd, so people will encouraged to upgrade due to the advances in the next version of iOS. How anyone can argue differently is beyond me, but they try.

Yeah although as mention in the previous post. You won't see tabs reload if the browser is not running in the background. The Galaxy Tab supports multi-window, multitasking so Chrome was never in the background. The three browsers I use on the Galaxy Tab all support multi-tasking so none of them will reproduce the problem.

Ah I forgot, I also have Firefox and I don't believe that supports multi-window. I'll try it later with that browser.

 

[GalFriday]

There simply isn't enough ram on the air. It's just a fact and anyone who says otherwise doesn't know what the hell they're talking about. I have to friggin copy any text I type because if I switch tabs I will almost certainly lose anything I typed in the previous tab.

I'm a member on arstechnica forums. I had 2 damn tabs open, one on the reply page, and one on my battle.net profile. I was posting into a thread about Diablo 3. EVERY SINGLE GODDAMN time I switched tabs they would reload. Like I said I have to copy the text I type because if I don't I lose everything.

This is not normal nor is it something I should get used to. If this is the case this iPad Air might as well be my first and last. Ridiculous.

No, there is nothing wrong nor defective on my air. It is a design flaw simple as that. Do not attempt to argue otherwise. 1gb of ram is simply not enough, no if and or buts about it.

Wow, your anger and attitude are a bit much. Dial it back a bit and relax. I've had no problem with tabs reloading, sorry.

 

[Rodster]

Ah I forgot, I also have Firefox and I don't believe that supports multi-window. I'll try it later with that browser.

I just tried Firefox running 5 tabs in the background and posting this message while Gmail, YouTube, settings, file manager, task manager, memos app were all running and answered an email and I continued this post without a reload.

 

[s2mikey]

Wow, your anger and attitude are a bit much. Dial it back a bit and relax. I've had no problem with tabs reloading, sorry.

I really never have either, I almost feel like I'm offending those that have had the issue.

So sorry. Something has to be fixed or at least optimized. Hopefully apple is doing something about safari being kind of a memory hog. When just about every other graphically heavy app runs like a champ.... That points to safari being the real problem.

 

[richwoodrocket]

Not a problem at all

 

[maflynn]

[MOD NOTE]
Stop the bickering and get back on topic.

 

[s2mikey]

Apple sells a big $$$ tablet, but only caters to the 80%.

From a business perspective though, that 80% of the users being happy is more than enough to sustain profits then why would they do more? I'm not saying there isn't an issue here but as we've both debated countless times, I feel it's specifically safari versus just a RAM thing.

Low RAM would manifest itself in a LOT more ways than just safari tabs reloading. Right? Seems logical to me.

 

[Count Blah]

From a business perspective though, that 80% of the users being happy is more than enough to sustain profits then why would they do more? I'm not saying there isn't an issue here but as we've both debated countless times, I feel it's specifically safari versus just a RAM thing.

i am not argueing the business aspect of it, I never have. But there is an issue for that 20% It is a ram/safari issue now with 1 gig(970megs) of ram AND a move from 32->64 bit CPU. When I hear people shouting from the rooftops that there is NOT an issue for that 20%, or the 20% is crazy, or the 20% should build their own tablet, then I tend to get a little heated.

Low RAM would manifest itself in a LOT more ways than just safari tabs reloading. Right? Seems logical to me.

Actually it is a browser(WebKit) thing. Dynamic we pages are not handled very efficiently in WebKit, which translates into memory leaks and eventual degradation of performance. I restart my air, and safari can handle multiple tabs, but before long - two tabs and NOTHING else open means I have to type draft responses in notpad, if I want to do any research, or else the only other tab gets refreshed when I go back.

The ram issue does not manifest itself in ither ways because non apple apps are allotted only so much space to run, and the 3rd party apps stick to it, or they don't appear on the AppStore. Apple has had over 1.5 years to get WebKit to NOT leak memory like mad, and they can't fix it. So without more ram, it is unlikely to at least get any better for the user. The company that many here bend over backwards to defend, WILL address crashing issues(see iOS 7.1), but they aren't addressing the memory issues with WebKit (see iOS 7.1).

 

[mangomind]

i am not argueing the business aspect of it, I never have. But there is an issue for that 20% It is a ram/safari issue now with 1 gig(970megs) of ram AND a move from 32->64 bit CPU. When I hear people shouting from the rooftops that there is NOT an issue for that 20%, or the 20% is crazy, or the 20% should build their own tablet, then I tend to get a little heated.

Actually it is a browser(WebKit) thing. Dynamic we pages are not handled very efficiently in WebKit, which translates into memory leaks and eventual degradation of performance. I restart my air, and safari can handle multiple tabs, but before long - two tabs and NOTHING else open means I have to type draft responses in notpad, if I want to do any research, or else the only other tab gets refreshed when I go back.

The ram issue does not manifest itself in ither ways because non apple apps are allotted only so much space to run, and the 3rd party apps stick to it, or they don't appear on the AppStore. Apple has had over 1.5 years to get WebKit to NOT leak memory like mad, and they can't fix it. So without more ram, it is unlikely to at least get any better for the user. The company that many here bend over backwards to defend, WILL address crashing issues(see iOS 7.1), but they aren't addressing the memory issues with WebKit (see iOS 7.1).

I agree with most of this. I know Apple is aware of memory leaks in its WebKit engine, which powers OS X Safari and iOS Safari. See this article: https://www.macrumors.com/2014/05/21/apple-releases-safari-7-0-4/

Especially since this is towards the top of the list of iOS 7 / iPad Air complaints, I think Apple will optimize Safari memory usage in iOS 8.

 

[s2mikey]

i am not argueing the business aspect of it, I never have. But there is an issue for that 20% It is a ram/safari issue now with 1 gig(970megs) of ram AND a move from 32->64 bit CPU. When I hear people shouting from the rooftops that there is NOT an issue for that 20%, or the 20% is crazy, or the 20% should build their own tablet, then I tend to get a little heated.

Actually it is a browser(WebKit) thing. Dynamic we pages are not handled very efficiently in WebKit, which translates into memory leaks and eventual degradation of performance. I restart my air, and safari can handle multiple tabs, but before long - two tabs and NOTHING else open means I have to type draft responses in notpad, if I want to do any research, or else the only other tab gets refreshed when I go back.

The ram issue does not manifest itself in ither ways because non apple apps are allotted only so much space to run, and the 3rd party apps stick to it, or they don't appear on the AppStore. Apple has had over 1.5 years to get WebKit to NOT leak memory like mad, and they can't fix it. So without more ram, it is unlikely to at least get any better for the user. The company that many here bend over backwards to defend, WILL address crashing issues(see iOS 7.1), but they aren't addressing the memory issues with WebKit (see iOS 7.1).

Sound like apple has to get their butts of the couch and work on this WebKit thing then! I've heard that mentioned before.

As far as third party apps only being allowed so much RAM to use.... How do they get such good performance and everything else with limitations like that? I'd think apple developers would be well versed in the memory management discipline. Right? Guess not though!

 

[Count Blah]

Sound like apple has to get their butts of the couch and work on this WebKit thing then! I've heard that mentioned before.

As far as third party apps only being allowed so much RAM to use.... How do they get such good performance and everything else with limitations like that? I'd think apple developers would be well versed in the memory management discipline. Right? Guess not though!

Any comments?

Two tab reload example

If you find this acceptable, then there isn't much more to say in our conversations. But I'll gladly tell others that I find this not acceptable. Since this is a "How severe is the RAM problem?" thread, I don't see how I could say otherwise.

 

[Yebubbleman]

So i feel like 1gb of ram for an ipad might not be enough for my purpose (opening multiple pdfs, writing notes, etc.)

Can you guys share some thoughts on this?
Do you guys experience a lot of freezes (I think they called it a phase out or something like that..)

I have never once felt like my iPad Air was deficient in terms of speed (be that caused by the processor or by the RAM). And I find myself doing a little bit more than opening PDFs and writing notes.