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Why did Apple not give 4GB RAM on the 9.7" iPad Pro ?

bufffilm

bufffilm

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May 3, 2011
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alecgold said:
Lot's of arguments, but most of them are more of the same.

One argument that I missed was: Apple doesn't publish the RAM, it just tells how great it is. (And let you decide if you want to spend your money on it). Apple don't pretend your iPad will last decades. Heck, AFAIK the average life expectancy of an iPad is 3-5 years.

Just for the sake of argument: give the iPad Pro 8Gb RAM, then it would last what, 5-8 years?! But the battery has a life expectancy of 5 years max, so that is a problem, but say you solve it by using a bigger battery. The LED's in the display will dim to 80% in about 4 years, industry standard is that beyond 80% is not acceptable. So you'll take bigger/more LED's and drive them a bit less hard, now they last longer. But bigger/more LED's need more power, so the battery gets even bigger. More sq-mm chip from upgrading the 2Gb RAM to 8Gb will also use more power, so hey-ho, make the battery again a little bit bigger.

I think a lot of people don't understand/appreciate how complex and how much compromises are made in designing the complex devices that tablets are these days.
It's very easy to comment on design decisions and say: "they cheated out, just want to make more money". And I'm sure they want to make profit (hell, they do succeed pretty well at that).
But you could give them a bit more credit then that, they have made lot's of products that lasted for years and they might have the prognosis that 2Gb of memory is all they need for the next 5 years.

One other thing I often wonder about too: if you buy an android device, you're lucky if you get an update within 6 months from your device-maker after Google released it. If you get it all.
One more thing: can the Samsung Galaxy S3 run Android 6 marshmallow? IIRC it stopped after 4.2 jelly bean.
The iPhone 4s can run iOS 9... Might not be a speed demon, but you do have the choice of upgrading.
Click to expand...

What makes you say battery life is ~5 years?

The battery in my ipad2 will be 5 years come May and it's fine and can easily go another 2+ yrs w/o breaking a sweat.
 
5684697

5684697

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alecgold said:
Lot's of arguments, but most of them are more of the same.

One argument that I missed was: Apple doesn't publish the RAM, it just tells how great it is. (And let you decide if you want to spend your money on it). Apple don't pretend your iPad will last decades. Heck, AFAIK the average life expectancy of an iPad is 3-5 years.

Just for the sake of argument: give the iPad Pro 8Gb RAM, then it would last what, 5-8 years?! But the battery has a life expectancy of 5 years max, so that is a problem, but say you solve it by using a bigger battery. The LED's in the display will dim to 80% in about 4 years, industry standard is that beyond 80% is not acceptable. So you'll take bigger/more LED's and drive them a bit less hard, now they last longer. But bigger/more LED's need more power, so the battery gets even bigger. More sq-mm chip from upgrading the 2Gb RAM to 8Gb will also use more power, so hey-ho, make the battery again a little bit bigger.

I think a lot of people don't understand/appreciate how complex and how much compromises are made in designing the complex devices that tablets are these days.
It's very easy to comment on design decisions and say: "they cheated out, just want to make more money". And I'm sure they want to make profit (hell, they do succeed pretty well at that).
But you could give them a bit more credit then that, they have made lot's of products that lasted for years and they might have the prognosis that 2Gb of memory is all they need for the next 5 years.

One other thing I often wonder about too: if you buy an android device, you're lucky if you get an update within 6 months from your device-maker after Google released it. If you get it all.
One more thing: can the Samsung Galaxy S3 run Android 6 marshmallow? IIRC it stopped after 4.2 jelly bean.
The iPhone 4s can run iOS 9... Might not be a speed demon, but you do have the choice of upgrading.
Click to expand...

Well said.
[doublepost=1459214469][/doublepost]
brendu said:
Sadly with the tone all too many self righteous people take today, it wasn't obvious that you were being sarcastic. I also thought you were serious and thought you were a lunatic.
Click to expand...

I am a lunatic, with a sick and twisted sense of humor. And I'm dating your daughter. Sort of...
 
temna

temna

macrumors 6502a
May 5, 2008
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bufffilm said:
What makes you say battery life is ~5 years?

The battery in my ipad2 will be 5 years come May and it's fine and can easily go another 2+ yrs w/o breaking a sweat.
Click to expand...

My original iPad 64gb WiFi is still running strong.
 
A

austriak

macrumors regular
Jul 10, 2011
175
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The majority of people do not upgrade their iPad or iPhone every year. That is why new devices only have to seem great to those with two year old or older devices. If you have an iPad Air 2, the iPad Pro might not seem like a big jump. If you have an iPad Air or older, it does. If you have an iPhone 6, the 6s doesn't seem like a huge jump but if you had the 5s or older, it does. That is why the apple website compares the processors in the iPads to the A7 and not to the A8 or A8x. Apple hopes to get some air 2 people to upgrade but they are not their focus because the odds are not as good.
 
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alecgold

alecgold

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Oct 11, 2007
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bufffilm said:
What makes you say battery life is ~5 years?

The battery in my ipad2 will be 5 years come May and it's fine and can easily go another 2+ yrs w/o breaking a sweat.
Click to expand...
Believe me, the way I use my iPad Pro the battery won't get 5 years :D

But my first point was that if you change one parameter when designing a device like an iPad, chances are you'll have 15 other things to take care of or accept they get worse.
(With my second point that Apple does provide an extreme amount of update-life-cycle when compared to other hardware producers.)
 
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rasputin1969

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Mar 4, 2010
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alecgold said:
Believe me, the way I use my iPad Pro the battery won't get 5 years :D

But my first point was that if you change one parameter when designing a device like an iPad, chances are you'll have 15 other things to take care of or accept they get worse.
(With my second point that Apple does provide an extreme amount of update-life-cycle when compared to other hardware producers.)
Click to expand...

You guys do know that Apple will replace your batterys? In the UK thisnis quite a good deal at £75.
 
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aristobrat

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Oct 14, 2005
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617aircav said:
You call replacing a battery at the cost of two brand new Amazon Fire tablets a good deal.
Click to expand...
The $49 7" (eww) Fire Tablets that pretty much require an ongoing $99/year Prime subscription to get the most out of?

At least with an Apple iPad battery replacement, you get your entire iPad replaced. Not a bad way to refresh an old device.
 
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stulaw11

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bufffilm said:
What makes you say battery life is ~5 years?

The battery in my ipad2 will be 5 years come May and it's fine and can easily go another 2+ yrs w/o breaking a sweat.
Click to expand...

Uh you do understand how lithium ion batteries work right? 100% on the device isn't even 100% of the battery capacity over time. Batteries degrade over time from charging and discharging.

While your display may show 100% get an app that examines the battery. You may find out your battery capacity at 100% on the display is really 60% of the batteries true capacity 5 years later (lithium ion degrade about 20% per 300-400 charge cycles, so about per year to year and a half if you charge your ipad daily).

Ie. you may find that 6930mah battery's true capacity is only 4158 mah after 5 years of charging regularly, despite the device calling it 100% charged. So your 100% battery icon on your screen could really only be 60% battery capacity.

This has been the case for years on iOS devices. Good article on the topic http://www.macworld.com/article/1058916/smartphones/iphonebattery.html
 
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bufffilm

bufffilm

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617aircav said:
You call replacing a battery at the cost of two brand new Amazon Fire tablets a good deal.
Click to expand...

I'd do the battery thing any day over getting 2 tablets with no way to expand the limited storage.
[doublepost=1459266190][/doublepost]
stulaw11 said:
Uh you do understand how lithium ion batteries work right? 100% on the device isn't even 100% of the battery capacity over time. Batteries degrade over time from charging and discharging.

While your display may show 100% get an app that examines the battery. You may find out your battery capacity at 100% on the display is really 60% of the batteries true capacity 5 years later (lithium ion degrade about 20% per 300-400 charge cycles, so about per year to year and a half if you charge your ipad daily).

Ie. you may find that 6930mah battery's true capacity is only 4158 mah after 5 years of charging regularly, despite the device calling it 100% charged. So your 100% battery icon on your screen could really only be 60% battery capacity.

This has been the case for years on iOS devices. Good article on the topic http://www.macworld.com/article/1058916/smartphones/iphonebattery.html
Click to expand...

I'm aware of all that.

But my battery indicator is calibrated well ie. it's accurate and this will go another 2+ years easily, if not more.

The fact that it's JB is another reason why I love it. It will be hard to go back to stock iOS on my next iPad.

Just the notion of seeing the 12.7" Pro with all that wasted screen space is a joke. One that iOS 10 better fix or else there will be an uproar.
 
Last edited:
Rafterman

Rafterman

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Apr 23, 2010
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bufffilm said:
It's a legitimate gripe.

Even a blind man can tell that Apple needs to optimize iOS for the Pro's larger screen.
Click to expand...

Yep, just making icons bigger and farther spaced apart isn't going to cut it anymore, especially if Apple wants people to replace their low end laptops with iPads.
 
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Ries

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Apr 21, 2007
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ZBoater said:
Nope.
[doublepost=1459181906][/doublepost]

It works just fine with 2GB. Now just move along....
Click to expand...

No it doesn't it, i.e. pixelmator rescales images and has limited layers. You cannot load images from the Mac OS X versions on the iPad version due to these limitations.
 
augustya

augustya

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dos Gris said:
I'm three years old, just the the rest of the forum members (and Donald Trump)!
[doublepost=1459218727][/doublepost]

This thread is weird. Forget ISIS, suddenly, 2 Gigs of RAM is the most important thing in the world!
Click to expand...

When I started this thread never imagined that suddenly, there is going to be such a downpour of messages on this as if the entire world feels why Apple why ? Why did you do this to us ? :p It has gone into 9 pages with 225 replies and still, counting...that is like my highest amount of replies thread ! lol !

Makes me feel proud !
 
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