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

Sloppy Animations still persist in iOS 4.2

Stumbled across this thread looking for some info on the lag on iOS 4.3.

It can be a complete lottery how smoothly apps will open/close in 4.3.1 ... and some apps, if not open and stored in the memory, don't even show the "open" animation when pressed. They just pop on screen.

I've always maintained that Apple, as much as I like them and their products, definitely sabotage a current model prior to releasing the new one. When the iPhone 4 was launched, the iPhone 3G was killed by iOS 4, and some screamed that it was a ploy to "force" those users to upgrade for a better experience. I laughed it off at the time, but now I'm beginning to think these people who said Apple deliberately slow down their current models with software updates may be onto something ...
 
As far as the 3GS is concerned I can confirm that 4.3.1 is horribly stuttery and not smooth at all. It was horrible, I went back to 4.0. Really smooth. Somethimes I do wonder why Apple cant get it right.
 
kre62 said:
As far as the 3GS is concerned I can confirm that 4.3.1 is horribly stuttery and not smooth at all. It was horrible, I went back to 4.0. Really smooth. Somethimes I do wonder why Apple cant get it right.
Click to expand...

I would happily go back to 4.0, but I've no SHSH blobs saved or anything, I'm on stock 4.3.1 and have never jailbroken this particular iPhone 4.

I guess I'm stuck with 4.3, and as much as I enjoy Home Sharing, I'd rather have the quality of user experience I had with 4.0.

I dread to think how iOS 5 will run on the 3GS or the iPhone 4, because I'm now utterly convinced it's a marketing ploy by Apple to drive sales of newer "faster" devices.
 
I think these updates can be a crapshoot and agree this is a ploy from Apple to make you buy the next one. A business practice to not make everything so perfect for you. It is very similar to how Apple holds basic features back and then uses them as a new feature. There is a give and take with updating. Then again, at least Apple updates iOS even after two years. Nokia didn't always update Symbian after a year and we know what carrier branded Android users are going through. They all are guilty and want us keep buying the next one.

My suggestion is to never update so soon and wait to see what people say about it. Some updates are not worthy which makes some things worse (ie battery) and you don't want to ruin such a good thing just for a few new features that you may not need. It is similar to when we update apps. Sometimes it crashes and ruins the app.
 
Savor said:
I think these updates can be a crapshoot and agree this is a ploy from Apple to make you buy the next one. A business practice to not make everything so perfect for you. It is very similar to how Apple holds basic features back and then uses them as a new feature. There is a give and take with updating. Then again, at least Apple updates iOS even after two years. Nokia didn't always update Symbian after a year and we know what carrier branded Android users are going through. They all are guilty and want us keep buying the next one.

My suggestion is to never update so soon and wait to see what people say about it. Some updates are not worthy which makes some things worse (ie battery) and you don't want to ruin such a good thing just for a few new features that you may not need. It is similar to when we update apps. Sometimes it crashes and ruins the app.
Click to expand...

All good points.

And I agree, no-one forces us to upgrade, but we do it anyway. I leap at updates, I actually look forward to them, and I also acknowledge that Apple is a business and will do what it can, within reason, to make their latest products even MORE appealing to those with even last years model.
 
iFiend said:
We need an institutional size roll of tinfoil in this thread :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

I believe the term is "Industrial Size"?

And your attempt at sarcasm, rolled eyes and all, is completely lost on me.

In other words, if you've something to say why not bloody well just say it?

Here they come .... :rolleyes:

Fact: the features added to iOS 4 from .0 to .3.1 are not intense nor impressive enough to make the iPhone 4 (or 3GS for that matter) worsen in UI performance.
 
Davvido said:
If your iPhone is jailbroken, go to /System/Library/CoreServices/SpringBoard.app/, open N88AP.plist with PlistEdit Pro (or any other PLIST editor), locate "launch-applications-while-animating" and change its value to NO. Tell me if it helps. You can use OpenSSH + Cyberduck or iPhone Explorer to get into filesystem. Of course you have to restart your iPhone after editing N88AP.plist.
Click to expand...

Wow, so for my iPhone 4 I edited N90AP.plist and removed

Code: 
<key>launch-mode</key>
<string>pre-animate</string>

Now everything is launching very smoothly.

I'm not sure what that is for or why it is there but it definately seems to have an affect on the smoothness of opening animations.

Would be nice to be able to change that without jailbreaking...or you know, Apple fixing that...
 
Last edited:
haulis said:
Wow, so for my iPhone 4 I edited N90AP.plist and removed

Code: 
<key>launch-mode</key>
<string>pre-animate</string>

Now everything is launching very smoothly.
Click to expand...

You removed those lines all together?
 
3GS 4.3.1 jailbroken

No lag here.

Make sure all the buggy push connections are dead (sign out of Store in settings), open and kill the Phone app once, sync email, notes and calender etc.
 
Ashin said:
3GS 4.3.1 jailbroken

No lag here.

Make sure all the buggy push connections are dead (sign out of Store in settings), open and kill the Phone app once, sync email, notes and calender etc.
Click to expand...


Signing out of store has nothing to do with push connections. Nothing else that I have tried has fixed the sloppy animations on opening apps except deleting those lines.
 
Savor said:
My suggestion is to never update so soon and wait to see what people say about it. Some updates are not worthy which makes some things worse (ie battery) and you don't want to ruin such a good thing just for a few new features that you may not need. It is similar to when we update apps. Sometimes it crashes and ruins the app.
Click to expand...
i did a jailbreak at 3.13 and at 4.2.1 and have no intention of upgrading further on the 3gs.
 
I too don't know why Apple can't seem to get the animations right anymore.

Everything was much smoother before 4.1 it seems.
 
4.3.1 UI is very smooth on my phone. I was JB prior to 4.3 and the experience was quite choppy at times.

One thing to keep in mind about 4.0 to 4.3 is that since the background API has been available, the number of apps preforming clean up routines when exiting has increased. This can further strain resources for a few seconds when switching apps.
The 'lag' could just be an artifact of newer apps as opposed to sabotage within iOS.
 
err404 said:
4.3.1 UI is very smooth on my phone. I was JB prior to 4.3 and the experience was quite choppy at times.

One thing to keep in mind about 4.0 to 4.3 is that since the background API has been available, the number of apps preforming clean up routines when exiting has increased. This can further strain resources for a few seconds when switching apps.
The 'lag' could just be an artifact of newer apps as opposed to sabotage within iOS.
Click to expand...

It's a little tiresome listening to the "reasoning" behind this, even more so on the official Apple discussion boards.

All I know is this. On 4.0/4.1 and even 4.2, I could press on ANY app on my iPhone 4 and the "opening animation" would go through it's normal routine. Now, on 4.3 & 4.3.1, certain apps (mainly third party ones) often do not show the opening animation unless they have been pre loaded and are now backgrounding. Then, and only then, can you return to the home screen and get the opening animation for the app.

This notion that people who have this issue are "making it up" or "seeing things" is somewhat insulting, but it's far worse on the over zealous Apple discussion boards.

WilliamG said:
Since this issue was actually fixed in 4.3.1 (not sure about 4.3), who cares anymore? :)
Click to expand...

No, it wasn't fixed in 4.3.1, and at the end of the day I know what I'm seeing in day to day use. I am a heavy iPhone user, my phone is used from 8:00am to 6pm every week day for iPod, web browsing, news apps, and games. While doing basic UI tasks, there is a degree of stuttering in animations or just plain missing frames (see above for the app opening animation).
 
WeegieMac said:
It's a little tiresome listening to the "reasoning" behind this, even more so on the official Apple discussion boards.
Click to expand...
Right, because "reasoning" is so much less interesting than conspiracy theories about how Apple tricks you into upgrading.

iOS does not exist in a black box. It's part of an ecosystem of Apps. The apps themselves have changed as much more then the OS on the last 9 months. This needs to be considered when evaluating performance of the system.

My phone was JB on iOS 4.1 until just recently. With the same apps (minus minimal JB tweaks), 4.3.1 is noticeably more smooth. I'm unsure as to why you find this insulting.

(to be clear, I do see the issue, I just see it much less frequently since updating from 4.1 to 4.3)
 
Last edited:
WeegieMac said:
No, it wasn't fixed in 4.3.1, and at the end of the day I know what I'm seeing in day to day use. I am a heavy iPhone user, my phone is used from 8:00am to 6pm every week day for iPod, web browsing, news apps, and games. While doing basic UI tasks, there is a degree of stuttering in animations or just plain missing frames (see above for the app opening animation).
Click to expand...

The issue described in the opening post IS fixed in 4.3.1. Open Safari or Mail, turn phone landscape, close Safari or Mail. Hold phone portrait. Open Safari or Mail. No such missing frames.

Are there OTHER frame issues with opening/closing? Yes. You'll find many of those are fixed on the iPad 2.
 
err404 said:
Right, because "reasoning" is so much less interesting than conspiracy theories about how Apple tricks you into upgrading.

iOS does not exist in a black box. It's part of an ecosystem of Apps. The apps themselves have changed as much more then the OS on the last 9 months. This needs to be considered when evaluating performance of the system.

My phone was JB on iOS 4.1 until just recently. With the same apps (minus minimal JB tweaks), 4.3.1 is noticeably more smooth. I'm unsure as to why you find this insulting.

(to be clear, I do see the issue, I just see it much less frequently since updating from 4.1 to 4.3)
Click to expand...

Stock firmware, most of the time from personal experience, will be smoother than jailbroken firmware.

There has not been changes monumetal enough to warrant stuttering UI animations or just animations skipping full stop.

4.1 stock was great, but even 4.2 didn't skip the opening animation on third party apps, and before the apps themselves are blamed, again I don't think the TUAW app or Sky News app hag undergone changes to make them lag.

If some whopping new feature had been added, fair enough ... but Home Sharing aside, there's nothing to warrant UI quality compared to 4.0 or 4.1.
 
WilliamG said:
The issue described in the opening post IS fixed in 4.3.1. Open Safari or Mail, turn phone landscape, close Safari or Mail. Hold phone portrait. Open Safari or Mail. No such missing frames.

Are there OTHER frame issues with opening/closing? Yes. You'll find many of those are fixed on the iPad 2.
Click to expand...

Well i used to press TUAW, Engadget, Sky News, and many other apps and they would show the opening animation.

Now, after updates, restores, DFU restores, disabling Ping, removing Spotlight searches, etc they skip their opening animation and just "pop" onscreen in a very ubrupt manner.

And if these skipped frames don't happen on iOS 4.3 on the iPad 2? Well, point proven, and I don't do conspiracy theories. They're slowing the iPhone 4 down, just like they did the 3G. I get the feeling that by the time we get to 5.3, the iPhone 4 will be as bad.
 
WeegieMac said:
Well i used to press TUAW, Engadget, Sky News, and many other apps and they would show the opening animation.

Now, after updates, restores, DFU restores, disabling Ping, removing Spotlight searches, etc they skip their opening animation and just "pop" onscreen in a very ubrupt manner.

And if these skipped frames don't happen on iOS 4.3 on the iPad 2? Well, point proven, and I don't do conspiracy theories. They're slowing the iPhone 4 down, just like they did the 3G. I get the feeling that by the time we get to 5.3, the iPhone 4 will be as bad.
Click to expand...

Maybe. Just downloaded the Engadget app on my iPhone 4 iOS 4.3.1 fresh install (last night), and it opens and closes super smoothly. Not sure what your phone is doing. And yes, I really DO know super smooth, as prior to iOS 4.3.1, the OP's post here did start to bother me with the skipping frames.
 
WilliamG said:
The issue described in the opening post IS fixed in 4.3.1. Open Safari or Mail, turn phone landscape, close Safari or Mail. Hold phone portrait. Open Safari or Mail. No such missing frames.

Are there OTHER frame issues with opening/closing? Yes. You'll find many of those are fixed on the iPad 2.
Click to expand...

By the way... it's not fully fixed... only somewhat.

Go to Mail... turn the phone landscape and quit.
Then open a DIFFERENT app (I used Notes) and then quit.
Then open Mail again (frames are missing from the launch animation)
BUT! If you open Mail AGAIN, it's back to normal.

However, Mail will still be messed up after you use a different app and go back to Mail. To truly fix this particular issue, you have to quit Mail and make sure it doesn't go into landscape mode (I lock my orientation)

Before 4.1, I never had to use orientation lock because everything opened and closed as expected back then (no matter what you did).

Edit: The same thing happens after using YouTube to watch a video (doesn't matter if orientation lock is on)... and it also happens in Camera (since orientation lock is ignored in the Camera app).

Hope this helps.

I'm baffled why Apple can't get this right again. Why'd they have to change it in the first place when it was already working in 4.0-4.0.1?

Also, Messages.app seems to stutter more when opening (compared to 4.2.1). It has a judder effect a lot of the time.
 
Mobster Sauce said:
By the way... it's not fully fixed... only somewhat.

Go to Mail... turn the phone landscape and quit.
Then open a DIFFERENT app (I used Notes) and then quit.
Then open Mail again (frames are missing from the launch animation)
BUT! If you open Mail AGAIN, it's back to normal.

However, Mail will still be messed up after you use a different app and go back to Mail. To truly fix this particular issue, you have to quit Mail and make sure it doesn't go into landscape mode (I lock my orientation)

Before 4.1, I never had to use orientation lock because everything opened and closed as expected back then (no matter what you did).
Click to expand...

What you say is true, but it's still less of an issue that it was. But I understand wanting to hold Apple to getting it right 100%.
 
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