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would you prefer apple..

  • Reduce performance to increase battery life

    Votes: 31 25.8%
  • Optimise for performance even as battery capacity declines

    Votes: 89 74.2%

  • Total voters
    120

Galacticos

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Apr 5, 2016
692
379
This is one instance of Apple throttling devices. I’m against it, but I’d like to see what you all think about this as it’s at least a water tight example
 
Doing it they way they do it now, by throttling and not telling anyone, casts doubt across all Apple product lines. Is my macbook pro slow because it's old (outdated), needs a new battery, or because I'm pushing it too hard? Beats me, but now it's making me wonder...

Yep. Doubt is right. No matter what the mechanism, performance is reduced. Certainly raises questions about strategy for me. (Could argue reduced performance reduces repeat custom, but as Apple is so integrated I think the net effect would still be customers thinking they need to upgrade and doing so, when the don’t necessarily need to)
 
Phones should not be throttled when battery performance is degraded. People buy phones for two things: Advertised performance, and advertised battery life. Artificially limiting performance to hide a degraded battery is unacceptable.

A compromise I think would be okay would be to artificially limit the performance of phones where the battery is defective and causing the phone to shut down during high power loading, but in this event, Apple should provide notifications to the end user explaining that performance is limited because the battery needs to be replaced.
 
If they limit the performance it's just gonna take longer to do tasks. Thus using the same amount of battery power.

It wouldn't exactly work like that though, it's not 1:1 with stuff like this. Some tasks may take a little longer but for all we know, a 20% performance deficit could have a 50% decrease in power consumption.
 
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Offer a battery saving mode like Android does so people can choose based on their own priorities.
 
Offer a battery saving mode like Android does so people can choose based on their own priorities.

You mean like offering more granular controls for Low Power Mode?

Yeah, I think something like this would work for those who want more control over what is throttled and what isn’t.
 
When I run my 8 Plus in Low Power Mode, which apparently slows down the CPU slightly, there is no noticeable difference in performance at all.

Same with the 6s that it replaced.
 
When I run my 8 Plus in Low Power Mode, which apparently slows down the CPU slightly, there is no noticeable difference in performance at all.

Same with the 6s that it replaced.

Thats because it doesn't slow down the CPU:

https://support.apple.com/en-nz/HT205234

Low Power Mode reduces or affects these features:

  • Email fetch
  • "Hey Siri"
  • Background app refresh
  • Automatic downloads
  • Some visual effects
  • Auto-Lock (defaults to 30 seconds)

So it affects what it does or how often, not CPU itself. TBH I got a great increase by changing my email preferences to Fetch vs Push just for this reason...
 
Thats because it doesn't slow down the CPU:

https://support.apple.com/en-nz/HT205234

Low Power Mode reduces or affects these features:

  • Email fetch
  • "Hey Siri"
  • Background app refresh
  • Automatic downloads
  • Some visual effects
  • Auto-Lock (defaults to 30 seconds)

So it affects what it does or how often, not CPU itself. TBH I got a great increase by changing my email preferences to Fetch vs Push just for this reason...
It does slow it down, you can tell from benchmarks.
 
Thats because it doesn't slow down the CPU:

https://support.apple.com/en-nz/HT205234

Low Power Mode reduces or affects these features:

  • Email fetch
  • "Hey Siri"
  • Background app refresh
  • Automatic downloads
  • Some visual effects
  • Auto-Lock (defaults to 30 seconds)

So it affects what it does or how often, not CPU itself. TBH I got a great increase by changing my email preferences to Fetch vs Push just for this reason...
https://www.macrumors.com/2015/06/25/ios-9-low-power-mode-benchmarks/
 
I would prefer to be warned by a notificiation that the phone is doing this. But doing this results in a loss of revenue for Apple.
 
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So the question here is Apple going to release a future iOS update that removes the throttling
They've confirmed it for iPhone 6, 6S, and SE. iOS 11.2 brought it to iPhone 7. They said they plan to bring the feature to more devices in the future.
 
They've confirmed it for iPhone 6, 6S, and SE. iOS 11.2 brought it to iPhone 7. They said they plan to bring the feature to more devices in the future.
Potential consumer (and perhaps beyond) backlash might change that, although if anything it will probably drive them to provide some actual notification of it all if and when it might affect a device, and perhaps provide remedies for those devices, like some sort of battery replacement programs.
 
Last edited:
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Consumer (and perhaps beyond) backlash might change that, although if anything it will probably drive them to provide some actual notification of it all if and when it might affect a device, and perhaps provide remedies for those devices, like some sort of battery replacement programs.
Hardly anyone know about it for there to be a backlash. People are buying a new phone unawares.
 
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Likely the X and 8 get it when X Plus and X 2018 launch.
It's interesting the way they they only seem to target specific devices at different times. I wonder why that is?
Consumer (and perhaps beyond) backlash might change that, although if anything it will probably drive them to provide some actual notification of it all if and when it might affect a device, and perhaps provide remedies for those devices, like some sort of battery replacement programs.
That would be nice for 11.3 or iOS 12 but I'm not really getting the impression that Apple thinks it's causing massive backlash.
 
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Hardly anyone know about it for there to be a backlash. People are buying a new phone unawares.
It's interesting the way they they only seem to target specific devices at different times. I wonder why that is?

That would be nice for 11.3 or iOS 12 but I'm not really getting the impression that Apple thinks it's causing massive backlash.
Seems like the news is just starting to go mainstream, so it remains to be seen what it will be like. (But, yes, probably saying "potential" backlash might be more accurate at this point.)
 
Seems like the news is just starting to go mainstream, so it remains to be seen what it will be like. (But, yes, probably saying "potential" backlash might be more accurate at this point.)
Apple has described it as a safety feature and one that prevents accidental shutdowns and prolongs device life which should reduce potential backlash. And while that may be true I agree a notification or toggle would be an improvement, as well as battery replacement like you suggested.
 
They've confirmed it for iPhone 6, 6S, and SE. iOS 11.2 brought it to iPhone 7. They said they plan to bring the feature to more devices in the future.
Thumbs up for the info. Thumbs down on the situation
[doublepost=1513824984][/doublepost]So if I understand this correctly.. Apple want to make our phones last longer? Now why do I feel skeptical about that..
 
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Apple has described it as a safety feature and one that prevents accidental shutdowns and prolongs device life which should reduce potential backlash. And while that may be true I agree a notification or toggle would be an improvement, as well as battery replacement like you suggested.
Agreed on how it's described, unfortunately the perception of can often enough be different (as some replies in this thread demonstrate):
So if I understand this correctly.. Apple want to make our phones last longer? Now why do I feel skeptical about that..
 
So my question is this. Does this only affect devices that upgrade to newer iOS on an older device or the same iOS as it came with?
 
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