Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
iPhone 4 Confirmed to Have 512MB of RAM (Twice the iPad and 3GS)
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
I just sold my iPad to get upgrade my wife and I's iPhones.
Even hearing this news, it makes me think no less of what an amazing device the iPad is. If I could afford both, I would still have both. I think people are overreacting a little bit.
The great thing about Apple products has always been that they just work. They are intuitive, well designed and reliable. They have made a business on not comparing "specs" but touting the ease of use and benefits they provide. Take one look at any of their Mac line and you can see this with their "sub-par" video cards and expensive build-to-order machines.
As there is currently NO device on the market today that does what the iPad does, 256MB of RAM in the iPad doesn't make it any less amazing.
Even hearing this news, it makes me think no less of what an amazing device the iPad is. If I could afford both, I would still have both. I think people are overreacting a little bit.
The great thing about Apple products has always been that they just work. They are intuitive, well designed and reliable. They have made a business on not comparing "specs" but touting the ease of use and benefits they provide. Take one look at any of their Mac line and you can see this with their "sub-par" video cards and expensive build-to-order machines.
As there is currently NO device on the market today that does what the iPad does, 256MB of RAM in the iPad doesn't make it any less amazing.
LOL!! I can't believe some of you are so childish that you would think this suddenly makes your iPad worthless. Seriously, enjoy your iPad now then buy the new one when it comes out? Unless you're unemployed or financially unable to buy the new one, in that case, should you really be wasting your money in such a way on these luxury items?
I don't hear anyone complaining the iPad is actually slow. They're only looking at tech data and drawing conclusions. Methinks comparing the amount of RAM in a mobile device (with mobile applications) to a desktop is like apples to oranges (forgive the pun).
The iPad runs a lite OS, replete with lite programs...none of which, in my eyes, require gobs of RAM. Not too many years ago, computers were coming with 256 standard, and I'd venture the desktop apps of that day were about as RAM hungry as the mobile apps of today. Indeed, both the iPad and iPhone are running a chip clocked at 1 GHz...those are year 2000 desktop speeds, and yet, no one seems to be complaining about that.
As a semi-aside, I think we're all overlooking the iPad's use of flash memory, which negates the read/write times of a traditional drive (thus increasing performance). That, and it's a highly-optimized platform.
Until actual performance issues arrise, I'm not concerned. I've done a ton of research on the iPad...I've read all the positives and negatives, and not once, not a single time, have I heard someone say the iPad is slow or lags. In fact, most everyone says it's quite snappy.
I think we need to keep things in perspective, and understand the iPhone and iPad run software with hardware requirements that are in line with what was available on a desktop 10 years ago. As such, it's more or less fruitless to complain about RAM, when in fact it seems the specs are quite in line with what the software demands.
The iPad runs a lite OS, replete with lite programs...none of which, in my eyes, require gobs of RAM. Not too many years ago, computers were coming with 256 standard, and I'd venture the desktop apps of that day were about as RAM hungry as the mobile apps of today. Indeed, both the iPad and iPhone are running a chip clocked at 1 GHz...those are year 2000 desktop speeds, and yet, no one seems to be complaining about that.
As a semi-aside, I think we're all overlooking the iPad's use of flash memory, which negates the read/write times of a traditional drive (thus increasing performance). That, and it's a highly-optimized platform.
Until actual performance issues arrise, I'm not concerned. I've done a ton of research on the iPad...I've read all the positives and negatives, and not once, not a single time, have I heard someone say the iPad is slow or lags. In fact, most everyone says it's quite snappy.
I think we need to keep things in perspective, and understand the iPhone and iPad run software with hardware requirements that are in line with what was available on a desktop 10 years ago. As such, it's more or less fruitless to complain about RAM, when in fact it seems the specs are quite in line with what the software demands.
Plus if the device is successful then expectation of an update will help them spread demand.
Isn't the RAM in iDevices embedded in the A4 chip package?
If so wouldn't it be better for economies of scale to be only making one 512MB A4 instead of two with different RAM so the iPad should see the extra RAM sooner than later.
The first gen iPad seem like it was intended to be a very public developer preview. I guess other sneaky old Apple theory would be that one of big targets for First gen devices will be the developers. So limiting the device, but not crippling, means they have to be more careful so when the second gen does come around that increase can be used to push up features, not get sucked up by programming.
In which case the the iPad was maybe always intended to be part of iPod yearly updates just in time for xmas an all from now on, Keeping the iPhone as the head of family.
Doesn't have anything to do with being childish. Like I said, I don't mind paying to upgrade every year when something new comes out. But when it's only 6-8 weeks after the launch of a new product where you've paid top dollar, and a new related device comes out with more under the hood, that's a little insulting, when the ability was there with the iPad, especially for what Apple is charging for the higher end models.
And to top it off, AT&T pulls the plug on one of the biggest selling attributes of the iPad only 6 weeks after launch. Again, a little insulting and branding early adopters as suckers in my book, from both an Apple and AT&T perspective.
I'm looking for some longevity in an electronic purchase, not much as I know the world we live in, but at least give it 6 months for crying out loud.
Good news, but still inadequate. I'm looking forward to real world results for 720p video, iMovie and FaceTime. Then we'll know for sure. Makes iPad look sad, thoughcan't run iMovie?? Glad I waited 'till next year
Apple has learned from their penny pinching to keep iPad prices down. Problem was, they only had netbooks to compete with which set the bar pretty low. Then take out webcam, HD video, Finder, printers, fonts etc and you see where this is going. iPad is technology before its time. I'm pleased they started somewhere, though.
Load iPhone 4 up with data, run a few apps in the background and it will still stress. Then think of the life of the phone and how it will go after 2 years of iOS upgrades.
Problem with Apple is that, like user expectations, the software demands can be pretty high (iMovie being one example) & good as their hardware is, it always seems just inadequate to the task. Wait until you get multitasking and actually have stuff running in the background (Pandora, Skype, etc).
Apple has learned from their penny pinching to keep iPad prices down. Problem was, they only had netbooks to compete with which set the bar pretty low. Then take out webcam, HD video, Finder, printers, fonts etc and you see where this is going. iPad is technology before its time. I'm pleased they started somewhere, though.
Load iPhone 4 up with data, run a few apps in the background and it will still stress. Then think of the life of the phone and how it will go after 2 years of iOS upgrades.
Problem with Apple is that, like user expectations, the software demands can be pretty high (iMovie being one example) & good as their hardware is, it always seems just inadequate to the task. Wait until you get multitasking and actually have stuff running in the background (Pandora, Skype, etc).
Isn't that what we predicted last year, iOS versions of iLife and iWork? Good to see these predictions (albeit slowly) coming true!You will see iLife go mobile on all the iOS devices, mark my words!
Yeaaaaap: iPad v.2 or v.3 will be incredible. This one was the trial-cheapie, which makes perfect sense. In about 5 years I suspect iPads will be phenomenal, Apple squeezing more stuff in and providing more power. I'll definitely buy one sooner or later.
This was an awesomely stupid post. Funniest thing on here in years.
This was an awesomely stupid post. Funniest thing on here in years.
What's wrong with you people. Selling your Ipad bc it doesn't have the ram of your new iphone? The Ipad is snappy and does a great job with everything I throw at it. I don't get why people want to get rid of the Ipad bc the phone has more ram. IMO, if it works, why fix it?
yes it's snappy, but not with safari, it always reloads the damn tabs. but i think it's not because of lacking ram, because my iPhone 3GS's safari is not behaving this way anymore since i upgraded to the iOS 4 Gold Master. maybe the safari in iPad will be fixed by the iOS 4 for iPad.
Because apple tells the developers how much ram is in the iPad. And it is trivial to write code to detect how much memory is available. And the package part number is encoded with the amount of RAM. And the answer is 256MB.
My Ipad was purchased for my wife for her facebook addiction. It works great and is fast. All the apps I have downloaded are great and quick. I think it's a great product for our situation.
one thing important is the facebook app has not been updated to support iPad, lame..
that behavior is a software issue for Safari, it has nothing to do with the iPad memory. Go get any of the alternative browsers for iphone/ipad and you will not have this problem again.