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iPad mini Is 64G big enough space in 2021 for several years

I

Inpresmoj

macrumors newbie
Original poster
May 31, 2019
20
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I keep my tec purchases a long time. My current tablet I’m having to replace because the 16GB base model I’ve been constantly having to clear and manage storage space over the past couple of years. So I’m looking at getting my first iPad, a mini 2019 and its a choice between 64G or 256G. Im a light user, I don’t play games, I don’t have big editing apps, main use is just browsing, social media, and streaming. There are very odd occasions when I travel I would like to download some TV shows and movies, as access to internet is variable, but these won’t need to stay on the device for long, maybe 20hrs worth in total max.

I want to keep this new iPad as long as the CPU is fast enough and the apps are supported, I don’t want storage to be reason for replacement as it is now. Another reason I want to keep as long as possible is the headphone jack, I use this all the time and I don’t want to be using adapters and wireless headphones are not for me, and this is going to be the last iPad with the headphone jack I imagine.

Just wondering if there is any reason why IOS is suddenly going to start using more space or general apps are going to increase in size. There is about £130 difference in price between 64G and 256G and I obviously don’t want to overspend if I’m never going to use the extra space, but likewise I don’t want to have to be managing storage again especially if its possible to get 7-10 years of use from the device for my light needs.
 
Only you can answer this. What will you want to store on it over the years? There is going to be a bunch of people who could easily make a 32G one work fine for their purposes. There will be others who will swear they need 2TB or more. But none of them are you. Think through the scenarios of what you want to store on it, mentally allocate the space for those things, add about 20% to your guesses to cover some over-conservative bias.

If you have anything now (above the 16G reference), how close are you to 64G? If you are within about 25%, I'd be leaning towards 256G.

Planning to shoot lots of video but won't necessarily offload it in a timely manner? Video eats lots of storage space.

Planning to sync lots of music? If you have a lot of music to sync, it eats a lot of storage space too.

Like BIG games? Some of them needs lots of storage.

It sounds like you are accustomed to being a storage miser... but at the expense of bumping into storage management hassles. However, 64GB is 4X more than 16GB. So the way you use it now seems like either will be plenty for you.

The biggest key here is if you had more space, how much more would you normally use. Right now, you deal with storage management. If you no longer had to do that, what would be your general "carrying around" storage level. If you get within about 25% of 64G, I'd probably favor 256G. If about double your 16G would completely cover every scenario you can imagine, you would still have DOUBLE that in spare storage for special situations with the 64G version.

Lastly, you can always buy iCloud storage for a short time, Dropbox, Google Drive, etc. There are also devices you can buy to direct attach and have external storage much like USB drives used with computers. So if more than about 48G seems likely to never be used, you would still have those kind of options for the occasional storage overkill need.
 
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I agree with Darryl. I will say that I’ve found 64 Ge to be too small for my needs. It’s workable but I always felt like I had to remove stuff to keep it from filling up and running slow. I feel like 128 is the perfect size. I know there is t a 128 FSB option for you, but Personally, I’d go for the 256.

If you’re a really light user or you don’t mind adding/deleting apps/content, the 64 will probably work.
 
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Only you can decide that for yourself. If you’re just browsing and streaming, you hardly save any data on the device. On the other hand, with more storage you may change your usage habits and have more piece of mind.

This topic has been covered often for iOS devices, I recommend you search for similar threads too.
 
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Inpresmoj said:
Just wondering if there is any reason why IOS is suddenly going to start using more space or general apps are going to increase in size. There is about £130 difference in price between 64G and 256G and I obviously don’t want to overspend if I’m never going to use the extra space, but likewise I don’t want to have to be managing storage again especially if its possible to get 7-10 years of use from the device for my light needs.
Click to expand...

As new features get added, the space System consumes tends to get bigger. On my 32GB iPad 7th gen, System+Other takes up around 12-15GB.

At least for purely web and streaming, I think 64GB is fine. Even 32GB has been holding up OK for that thus far. When you add downloads to the mix though, then 64GB starts getting iffy. What content are you managing/offloading from the 16GB tablet now and how big are they? The fact you're needing to manage storage suggests to me you do download some stuff.

7-10 years is a long time. You may find 64GB is more than enough but it's also entirely possible you'd have some usage changes that would require extra storage. The 256GB model offers greater leeway and flexibility—at the cost of £130.
 
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Planning on using an ipad mini for 7 to 10 years ?

I think i be more worried about me dropping it and breaking it, battery failing, ipad failing, how slow it will it be say after 5 or so years, when will apple stop support for IOS updates it so it will lose app support, what new stuff is going be coming out over that amount of time as tech changes very fast, etc etc
 
Chaparral02 said:
Planning on using an ipad mini for 7 to 10 years ?

I think i be more worried about me dropping it and breaking it, battery failing, ipad failing, how slow it will it be say after 5 or so years, when will apple stop support for IOS updates it so it will lose app support, what new stuff is going be coming out over that amount of time as tech changes very fast, etc etc
Click to expand...

We're no longer getting 50-100% single-core CPU gains every generation so it will take longer before CPUs start to feel slow. Indeed, A15 is barely an improvement over A14 in that regard. 3GB RAM is a bit tight but it can be fine if not multitasking.

It seems to me iPhones and iPads are fairly mature at this point and we're not really getting massive tech changes. The Air 2 is receiving at least 8 years worth of firmware updates. At this stage, I think we can expect similar longevity as Macs and PCs barring hardware failure.
 
Sounds like 64GB should be enough for you. Yeah you won't be able to sync entire seasons or something. And you better pray you don't develop an interest in some app/game that requires storage later on. Other than that, 64GB is fine. Splurge on 256 if it's financially viable and if it helps your peace of mind.
 
I manage with 64gb in a similar usage scenario to you.

However… 7-10 years is a long time. Can you be sure your own usage scenario will not change in that time?
 
When I got my 16G tablet once I installed about 20 apps that I use, I had used about 8G of the 16G so that’s half the space gone when I got it new. Its over the years the system and app updates have pushed me towards 16G and every week or so I’ve been transferring about 1G off to an SD card I installed, but some stuff will not transfer, so I’ve had to remove apps.

I don’t store anything on local storage for a tablet and I can’t see that changing, I have a PC for that. Only thing I can think of is when I travel be nice to download some stuff to watch when I don’t have any internet access, I’ve worked out 20hrs of video would be only be about 4G, once back it would be deleted.

Im not into games this iPad is purely for browsing and streaming really. Any photos or video I’m happy for that to stay in the cloud.

So I think I would have about 45G free so that’s two thirds to last me once you take off say 20G for IOS and my apps at the most. That is better than 16G which was half gone straight away.

Think I know 64G is enough for me and my needs its the IOS and app updates that are the unknown element that I just wanted to look into what size they might grow to over the years as that is what is causing me my current issues.

Perhaps the base storage isn’t what it used to be and 64G is seen as more than enough for the life of the device for light users?
 
Inpresmoj said:
When I got my 16G tablet once I installed about 20 apps that I use, I had used about 8G of the 16G so that’s half the space gone when I got it new. Its over the years the system and app updates have pushed me towards 16G and every week or so I’ve been transferring about 1G off to an SD card I installed, but some stuff will not transfer, so I’ve had to remove apps.

I don’t store anything on local storage for a tablet and I can’t see that changing, I have a PC for that. Only thing I can think of is when I travel be nice to download some stuff to watch when I don’t have any internet access, I’ve worked out 20hrs of video would be only be about 4G, once back it would be deleted.

Im not into games this iPad is purely for browsing and streaming really. Any photos or video I’m happy for that to stay in the cloud.

So I think I would have about 45G free so that’s two thirds to last me once you take off say 20G for IOS and my apps at the most. That is better than 16G which was half gone straight away.

Think I know 64G is enough for me and my needs its the IOS and app updates that are the unknown element that I just wanted to look into what size they might grow to over the years as that is what is causing me my current issues.

Perhaps the base storage isn’t what it used to be and 64G is seen as more than enough for the life of the device for light users?
Click to expand...
On my 64GB mini I just deleted couple of large Apple apps that were reinstalled via system update that I never use (example GarageBand is 1.57 GB). Still at almost 43 GB free with mostly using it casual with some photos, other misc documents. Running iPadOS 15.1 RC2.
 
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mk313 said:
I agree with Darryl. I will say that I’ve found 64 Ge to be too small for my needs. It’s workable but I always felt like I had to remove stuff to keep it from filling up and running slow. I feel like 128 is the perfect size. I know there is t a 128 FSB option for you, but Personally, I’d go for the 256.

If you’re a really light user or you don’t mind adding/deleting apps/content, the 64 will probably work.
Click to expand...

Apple skimped on storage the year they made major gains on the iphone 13 and base ipad (doubling storage). Such a pity. They couldn't help but copy the ipad air 4 to a T.
 
Chaparral02 said:
How much would that TB of icloud storage cost over 10 years ?
Click to expand...
I was talking about external USB-C storage. But since you asked

iCloud+ plans and pricing - Apple Support

When you sign up for iCloud, you automatically get 5GB of free storage. If you need more space in iCloud, you can upgrade to iCloud+.
support.apple.com support.apple.com

United States (USD) per month
50GB: $0.99
200GB: $2.99
2TB: $9.99

Also part of Apple One services also.
 
64gb's of storage seem to be more than enough for you OP. You sound just like me. I've had my iPad Air 4 64gb for a year now and still have 40 gb's available. If I travel I'll download a few movies and a season of a TV show to watch and 64gb's is more than enough for that.
 
Think of it this way, the iphone 6s plus game out 6 years ago and today all 16GB of memory are taken up by system stuff. If you plan to keep it for 7 years just spend the extra money. I can barely download 100 songs before It’s full. Also I downloaded a whole season of the Mandalorian and that alone used up like 20 gigs and it’s only less than 10 hours of video.
 
I agree with others that this is up to you.
However, after managing over 5,000 iPads for a multi-school system for a period of 6 years I do have some guidance.
If you will be a heavy user of apps such as GarageBand, iMovie or any other app that may generate big files and you are not managing any files that you want to keep by saving them somewhere else, then the bigger the storage the better.
Otherwise 64GB should be more than sufficient.
To give an example from my experience, when I left my last job earlier in the year about a third of the iPads had 32GB of storage with the remainder having 128GB. in 100% of the cases where the iPads had issues that was attributed to lack of storage they were the 32GB models.
So, if you can afford the higher storage or need it due to need, then buy it.
 
If you always work in range of wifi or can get a cell connection (via phone) then with an iCloud account the 64gb should last you a long time. Both of my iPad Pros are 64gb. I do a lot of work in Notes including embedding numerous pdf files. I also use Numbers a lot and have a few fairly large spreadsheets. And Books, I store a lot of both regular books as well as user manuals for all my "stuff" in Books. All of these can be pretty storage intensive but I still have over 40gb of free space. Storage management is really great.
 
svish said:
If keeping for many years, better to get 256GB. 64GB may be less.
Click to expand...

100% agree here. Especially since the OP mentioned that they keep their tech for quite a long time. The 256gb is more expensive, it will probably pay off in the long-term though.
 
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