Comments Locked

41 Comments

Back to Article

  • ltcommanderdata - Wednesday, March 9, 2011 - link

    Lack of iOS 4.3 support for older devices makes sense given that it doesn't seem that most of the new features of iOS 4.3 would run on older devices anyways. Personal Hotspot only supports the iPhone 4, not even the iPhone 3G S probably due to processor cycle and RAM consumption concerns. Airplay isn't supported on the iPhone 3G even is iOS 4.2. And lack of Airplay support would likely make iTunes Home Sharing untenable too.

    The most obvious benefit for 2nd gen devices in iOS 4.3 would be the faster Safari browser, but that actually wouldn't work either. The new faster Nitro Javascript engine is faster because it uses Just In TIme compilation to spit out optimized machine code. In this case the machine code is for the ARM v7 architecture for 3rd gen devices. Supporting 2nd gen devices would requiring writing another new and separate Nitro engine for the ARM v6 architecture, which while nice would be a dead end effort since I don't think anyone expected 2nd gen device support in iOS 5.

    So in the end, with no new features in iOS 4.3 coming to 2nd gen devices, it makes sense that iOS 4.3 isn't available for 2nd gen devices. And it's not like there is competitive pressure from other OEMs who still support their ARM11 devices with the latest OS version.

    However, I was expecting an iOS 4.2.2 to just bring iOS 4.3's security updates over to 2nd gen devices. As pointed out, 2nd gen devices were sold until September 2010 and it's reasonable to expect at least continued security support. That is a disappointment.
  • Guspaz - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    Except for one problem: Nitro, AKA SquirrelFish Extreme, already supports ARMv6. It supports the following CPU architectures:

    X86 - 32-bit Intel (for example, Windows, or Mac OS X versions Leopard or earlier)
    X86_64 - 64-bit Intel (for example Mac OS X SnowLeopard or many Linux distributions)
    ARM_TRADITIONAL - traditional ARM instruction set, works on ARM v4 or newer
    ARM_THUMB2 - ARM thumb2 instruction set, works on ARM v7 or newer

    So... there isn't really any excuse. Yeah, it might not provide quite as big an advantage, but since they're still *SELLING* ARMv6 devices officially (see refurb iPod Touch 2nd gen, which was even sold new as recently as 7 months ago), there's really no reason not to support it.

    Consider this: with all the complaints about iOS 4 performance on these devices (which they kept selling long after iOS 4 came out), the new javascript engine would have been a decent thing to help resolve that.
  • ltcommanderdata - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    I haven't been tracking SquirrelFish development since the original announcement which included those 4 architectures. But has all four architectures kept being developed in sync? Presumably not otherwise Apple wouldn't have waited until now to introduce Nitro/SquirrelFish to iOS when it was available in OS X in 2008. If it's taken Apple nearly 3 years to get Nitro in a shippable state for ARMv7, that wouldn't bode well for the additional effort needed to get ARMv6 up to speed if extra work is necessary.
  • dsumanik - Friday, March 11, 2011 - link

    Not quite... wifi hotspot works just fine on my jailbroken 3GS using mywi... With no 3 user limit....and has for over a year now... Even before iphone4 was released... There is absolutely no reason to block this feature except to force an upgrade.

    The 3G could handle it easy as well.

    If you own an older device and it bothers you apple didn't bring you this feature...

    Please jailbreak.

    It's simple fast and easy

    And oh yeah guess what.... you don't have ti pay fir arediculous data plan to use it either.... It just works.

    Yet another idea the jailbreak community implemented that apple copies and then deliberately limits in order to make a profit (handset upgrade an data plan requirement)

    If apple ever finds a way to permanently block jailbreakers I'm switching to android, iOS in it's stock form is very frustrating... You can't even use your phOne as a USB device unless you have iTunes and some sort of app installed lol
  • piroroadkill - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    Not even 3GS because of CPU and RAM concerns?

    No. I have an HTC Magic 32B (yes, the shit one with 192MB RAM, and only a 528MHz ARM9, not a 600 Cortex A8 and 256MB like the 3GS) that can do wireless tethering after root, and have done successfully to at least two machines at once. Does get hot, though.
  • piroroadkill - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    ARM11, sorry.
  • ltcommanderdata - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    The iPhone 3GS can already do basic 3G tethering via Bluetooth or USB since iOS 3.0 (iOS 4.0 for AT&T). By not supporting Personal Hotspot the iPhone 3GS is limited to sharing the 3G connection with 1 device compared to 5 for the iPhone 4.

    Besides, if you are comparing to a rooted Android phone, I'm sure it won't take long for people to find and easy way enable Personal Hotspot on jailbroken iPhone 3GS.
  • fogpuppy - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    It already exists. It's called MyWi. The best wifi hotspot for jailbroken iPhones ....
  • MobiusStrip - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    There are plenty of software-design defects that should never have made it out the door on the first iPhone, never mind remaining on two generations of phones for four years. Topping the list would be the lack of continuing periodic AUDIBLE alerts for missed calls and voicemails.

    What special kind of stupidity leads to a phone that chirps once, immediately after you miss a call, and then never again? Let's say your phone's charging on your dresser while you're taking a shower, and you miss a call. You get out of the shower and spend 10 minutes right next to it, and it never makes a peep. The next day you go to use your phone and find out your friends called you for happy hour. MORONIC. There are plenty of scenarios just like this, which lead to you missing time with friends and family because in 2011, Apple's handheld Unix computers are too stupid to tell you that you missed a call.

    I have a 1980s microwave that beeps periodically if I forget to take the food out. My 1990s StarTAC audibly told me that I missed a call 20 minutes ago. WTF, Apple?
  • strikeback03 - Friday, March 11, 2011 - link

    I have no idea if my current Android phone will give repeated audio alerts, but I know my previous Windows Mobile phone did not without a third party program. Both do have notification lights, so as long as you look at them occasionally you would see the notification. This does seem to be somewhat widespread for smartphones though.
  • tipoo - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    Yeah...Still sucks though, considering the 8GB Touch they were selling last year was 2'nd gen hardware, thats an awfully quick end of support.
  • PrinceGaz - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    I would have thought that iTunes Streaming would be the most useful feature for 8GB 2nd gen iTouch users (like myself). Having only 8GB of space (in practice less than 7GB) onboard for all your music, video, and of course apps means being able to stream music and especially videos/movies from home when in wifi coverage would be a great addition, and one which would certainly be well within the capability of the hardware (it can already stream videos from YouTube, BBC iPlayer, etc).
  • vol7ron - Wednesday, March 9, 2011 - link

    Just upgraded... don't really see a difference, except Safari was like "can't open this page" - is that how it's supposed to be faster?
  • bplewis24 - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    It's opening the page so fast, your eyes aren't able to process the render... so you only see the subliminal image by default.

    Brandon
  • tipoo - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    Its just saving you from porn by not showing any of the web. Its a feature!
  • sprockkets - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    "Sorry, iPhone 3GS users, but this feature won’t be available for you."

    Officially, lol.

    "Still MIA is an improved implementation of the AirPrint feature, introduced in iOS 4.2, which was originally intended to allow iOS users to print to any printer shared via iTunes by a PC or Mac. This feature was scaled back at the eleventh hour to support only direct printing to a handful of mostly-new printers built to support the feature. Workarounds exist to get it working with any printer, but official support for any ol’ printer has never materialized, and Apple has never offered much of an explanation."

    One apple nutcase thought it is because HP has the methods of doing so all patented.
  • kigoi - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    those sunspider results for the 4.3 iphones are both off their typical scores by about 15%. do they have background processes running?
  • Azsen - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    Have the provided a function to close down all the open apps at once? It's so slow having to do it one by one.
  • MobiusStrip - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    Have they provided an option to close apps when you "close" them under Mac OS? Nope.

    Apple has some kind of stick up its ass about quitting things. They love to see resources wasted. Never mind the fact that the user manually launched the app, so he should be able to manually quit it just as easily. Otherwise, why not launch every app on the system at startup?

    More Apple hypocrisy.
  • Vadatajs - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    What the hell does that have to do with anything? This isn't about OSX.

    Furthermore, Mac OS has always closed applications when you _quit_ them.
  • enderwiggin21 - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    @Vadatajs:

    "Furthermore, Mac OS has always closed applications when you _quit_ them. "

    Yeah...exactly his point. An iOS app gets closed... when you _quit_ it. Individually. One at a time. Going out of your way to do so. Just like an OSX app.

    Point made. You just echoed it.
  • Shadowself - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    So when I close a window it is supposed to do what is done in Windows (as in on the Windows machine on which I am typing this)? Sometimes it closes that window. Sometimes it closes multiple windows within a single window. Sometimes it closes multiple major windows -- even across multiple screens in a multi screen setup. Sometimes it closes (quits) the application. How doesTHAT makes sense?

    And MobiusStrip... how hard is it to do "Command-Q" for 99.99% of all applications? Seems much easier than to remember that for some applications it's Control-Q, for some it's Control-X, for some it's Control-E, for some there is no supported control sequence (just close every single open window and it quits the application). Yea, that makes much more sense!

    I am NOT saying Apple has done it the best way it (or anyone) possibly can, but knocking Apple's implementation when the way it quits things is the most consistent one out there is just stupid.
  • kigoi - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    why do you close them? they close automatically. what you see in the task switcher is only a list of what you recently used, not currently running apps.
  • solipsism - Saturday, March 12, 2011 - link

    WTF are you talking about? The Fast App Switcher when you double-click the Home Button? Those aren’t your running apps, those are a list of your apps as you’re last used them in the order you used them. You can test this by power cycling your IDevice and then seeing all those apps still in that list as soon as you can access the device. How the hell does one come to this site and not know that?
  • secretmanofagent - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    I just installed it on my 3GS, and I noticed that in places in my apartment that I used to have poor service I have either full signal or almost full signal. I know they updated the baseband and carrier file, is anyone else seeing this?
  • MobiusStrip - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    They're probably just dicking around with the signal-strength display again, to obscure the truth further.

    Remember when they claimed they'd been displaying it "wrong" for years? But when you actually looked at how they had been working, it was much more meaningful. It's a digital system, so for a wide range of signal strength, there's no change in performance. The meter used to reflect the variation across the significant (bottom) of the signal-strength range. But that was just a bit too much information for AT&T and Apple's comfort.

    It revealed the flaws in Apple's antenna design and AT&T's service.
  • Shadowself - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    Actually the signal strengh issue was just the opposite as you describe as very clearly shown by this site in one of the most thorough reviews of the iPhone 4 anyone has done.
  • bplewis24 - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    No, he is describing exactly what Apple did: they changed the way the battery signal was displayed and claimed they had been displaying it "wrong" for years.

    This site's review clearly illustrated the same, but it showed that the iPhone4 held it's signal at the lower attenutation better than it's predecessor did. It also, through a bit of subjective bias, tried to excuse it away by using anecdotal evidence (best case scenario by a person in a great coverage area) to dismiss claims that the problem was as bad as some thought.

    Brandon
  • tipoo - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    I understand why some features aren't introduced to older hardware, but they don't even give the new javascript engine? What the heck. Especially considering that last years 8GB Touch was second generation hardware, and now not supported. One year old hardware, not getting updates. One of the things I dislike about Apple.
  • ltcommanderdata - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    I was wondering if you could run your GLBenchmark 2.0 benchmark and see if there is any change in graphics performance in iOS 4.3?
  • Stuka87 - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    These things are all great, but what I *REALLY* want is a "Mark all items read" inside mail. I get my mail in several locations, so I don't always need to read them on my phone. But to clear out the count, I have to go and select each one, let it load, then move on to the next.

    But, maybe in iOS5!
  • Spoelie - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    Use IMAP instead of POP?
  • aguilpa1 - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    Why else would they cut support to devices so quickly and release the ipad 2 so quickly behind the heels of the ipad 1? They see so many other manufactures working on dual core and even quad core devices that easily mimic or exceed the performance standards of their own devices and they have no choice. The problem is when you start pushing your development cycles up to try and stay relevant you risk pissing off the very people that support them. I have only one apple device which I bought against my better judgement (iphone 3G) and when they released the iOS that literally crippled my device I saw what they were doing. Upgrade to our new devices or we will break or make your old one useless. That is the one and only apple device I will ever purchase.
  • chris1317 - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    Fragmentation :)

    lol it feels good to get some revenge

    Regards
    Eric Schmidt
  • bplewis24 - Thursday, March 10, 2011 - link

    lol... in deed.
  • strikeback03 - Friday, March 11, 2011 - link

    Yeah, I don't see why the article says this will prevent fragmentation. Users aren't going to get rid of those devices just because they don't support the newest OS version. I'm sure there will be plenty of 2nd gen iPod touches still in use a year from now, not sure how that wouldn't be fragmentation.

    Nevermind that even devices with the same OS version don't necessarily have the same capabilities. There seems to be more fragmentation than reviewers want to admit.
  • solipsism - Saturday, March 12, 2011 - link

    You call one company that doesn’t give away its OS to any and all vendors and who updates their products on a yearly cycle “fragmentation”? Seriously?! Your ass probably bitches about Apple not updating more frequently as soon as some new component gets into a test phase or for not giving iOS away just so it can be fragmented across hundreds of devices that never see an update, unless iDevices that get 2.5-3 years of rich updates.
  • mikael.skytter - Friday, March 11, 2011 - link

    Hello!
    As previously pointed out here, the scores for 3GS in 4.3 seems abit low.
    My friend and I have 3GS phones, he has a 32Gb model and I have the 16 Gb model.

    He got 5333.1 and I received 5479.1

    We had just updated to 4.3 and had no other Safari windows open.
    We also both have alot of applications installed so it´s not a "clean" phone.

    I ran the sunspider benchmark twice yesterday with the 4.2.1 software to compare it to your results. The result were similar. Within ~35 on both runs.

    The other scores, with the 4.3 software have also been re-run and we are 7-800 below you.
    This opens up a question on how this phones were tested.

    Is it possible for you to re-run the 4.3 benchmark on the 3GS phone?
  • philipus - Friday, March 11, 2011 - link

    On my 16GB 3GS 4.3 seems faster. Safari is snappier, but also the OS interface seems perkier. 4.2 seemed a lowpoint on my phone. 4.1 was good. But 4.3 is much better.
  • davidm71 - Monday, March 14, 2011 - link

    Anyone test battery life improvements if any over previous iOs versions?
  • navaneethg - Tuesday, March 15, 2011 - link

    Since some of us are still on our iPhone 3G contracts and are not ready to upgrade yet, how does 4.3 performance compare to the previous version? Can we, the iPhone 3G crowd expect any improvement in the performance? With progressive upgrade up to 4.2, the usage of iPhone has become painfully slow. Hoping that 4.3 does give some respite.

    Regards.

Log in

Don't have an account? Sign up now