Apple chose to handle iOS 8 rollout with own content delivery network

AppleInsiderAppleInsider
Posted:
in General Discussion edited September 2014
With its rollout of iOS 8 on Wednesday, Apple opted to handle a majority of traffic through its in-house content delivery network (CDN) instead of meting out traffic to third-party systems.




Internet monitoring firm DeepField said Apple used its own content delivery infrastructure to handle "a significant portion" of iOS 8 traffic yesterday, marking the first time the company tapped its CDN for a large-scale rollout, The Wall Street Journal reports.

Prior to the release of iOS 8, Apple turned to third-party CDNs like Akamai for massive distribution jobs, but it seems the company is looking to move responsibility to its own servers. DeepField pointed out that Akamai managed some of Apple's iOS 8 traffic, but Apple's own system took on most of the heavy lifting, causing traffic to spike 10 to 20 times normal levels on most networks.

"It really was a significant coming out party for the Apple CDN," said DeepField CEO Craig Labovitz. "This is definitely a realization that Apple is not just a software player. They're not just a maker of PCs. They have an Internet backbone and an international Internet presence."

According to DeepField's analysis, at its peak, iOS 8 downloads ate up more than three terabits of bandwidth per second.

It was reported that Apple had activated its CDN in July, but tasked the system to handle only a small portion of overall traffic. At the time, it was said that Akamai and Level3 would continue to serve iTunes and iTunes radio.
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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 59
    petripetri Posts: 118member
    It was not a good entrance. Easily the slowest and most frustrating update experience I've had on IOS in years.
  • Reply 2 of 59
    blastdoorblastdoor Posts: 3,296member

    I guess that explains why I still haven't been able to download iOS 8 for my iPad. I've been trying since yesterday. Finally got it on the iPhone, though.

  • Reply 3 of 59
    blastdoorblastdoor Posts: 3,296member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by petri View Post



    It was not a good entrance. Easily the slowest and most frustrating update experience I've had on IOS in years.

    maybe they should fire Scott Forestal again. 

  • Reply 4 of 59
    mdriftmeyermdriftmeyer Posts: 7,503member
    Best way to test the strengths and weaknesses is to go full throttle.
  • Reply 5 of 59
    dasanman69dasanman69 Posts: 13,002member
    mdriftmeyer wrote: »
    Best way to test the strengths and weaknesses is to go full throttle.

    Famous last words. ????
  • Reply 6 of 59
    inklinginkling Posts: 772member
    This is a most strange article. It mentions Apple's roll-out but not the troubles it had. The actual feed was a crazy mixture of color bars, Chinese translation, and prior video.
  • Reply 7 of 59
    gilly33gilly33 Posts: 434member
    My goodness people like to complain so damn much. First time some hiccups. They will get better or revert back to third party servers for the next one. Those of us who sit by the way side and watch always complain about the view. Nothing tried, nothing gain.
  • Reply 8 of 59
    gilly33gilly33 Posts: 434member
    inkling wrote: »
    This is a most strange article. It mentions Apple's roll-out but not the troubles it had. The actual feed was a crazy mixture of color bars, Chinese translation, and prior video.

    This is in reference to iOS 8 rollout yesterday. Not the event fiasco.
  • Reply 9 of 59
    rich gregoryrich gregory Posts: 121member
    inkling wrote: »
    This is a most strange article. It mentions Apple's roll-out but not the troubles it had. The actual feed was a crazy mixture of color bars, Chinese translation, and prior video.

    I think you are thinking of the video that introduced us to iOS 8 and the watch. This is referring to distribution of the actual iOS 8 download that we are getting if I understand correctly.

    For me it was smooth, but for some reason it worked from my iOS devices and not iTunes on my desktop. Go figure.
  • Reply 10 of 59
    mechanicmechanic Posts: 805member
    Updated all of my devices just fine 2 iPads, 3 apple tv's and 3 iPhones with no issue at all.
  • Reply 11 of 59
    iaeeniaeen Posts: 588member
    petri wrote: »
    It was not a good entrance. Easily the slowest and most frustrating update experience I've had on IOS in years.

    This was far and away the best OTA update that I have experienced thus far.

    The live stream was a different story, but the update was quick and painless (for an OS install).
  • Reply 12 of 59
    boredumbboredumb Posts: 1,418member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Inkling View Post



    The actual feed was a crazy mixture of color bars, Chinese translation, and prior video.

    Yeah, some were Apples, and some were oranges...

    (and I think they were Mandarin oranges).

  • Reply 13 of 59
    netroxnetrox Posts: 1,421member
    I downloaded iOS 8 in less than a minute on my gigapower (1 GBps). No issues at all.
  • Reply 14 of 59
    mrsneezymrsneezy Posts: 47member

    Had no issues from Australia.

  • Reply 15 of 59
    jpellinojpellino Posts: 700member

    ~20 devices in about 2 hours yesterday evening.  Mostly iPad2.  Biggest lag was the processor speed once the update was downloaded.  Yes, I know I need the update caching server.  That's coming next month.  

  • Reply 16 of 59
    mj webmj web Posts: 918member
    Glitches with the live stream, glitches with U2 download, glitches with Health Kit, glitches with Photo app, glitches with IOS 8 installation size, glitches with IOS 8 upgrade, glitches with iCloud, I don't mind a few glitches because it means Apple is launching news products. The more Cook & Co do this, the fewer the glitches. Meanwhile my iPhone 6 will arrive tomorrow.
  • Reply 17 of 59
    davendaven Posts: 696member
    No issues here. Updated an iPhone, iPad, and AppleTV.
  • Reply 18 of 59
    techmanmiketechmanmike Posts: 147member

    I don't know what everybody is complaining about but I had the best experience updating all my devices yesterday than I've every had! None of my devices took more than 10 mins to download the update itself, and that was in the morning and at night. iOS 7 it took an hour just to download. That's not to say that nobody else had issues, but I for one was a very happy camper.

  • Reply 19 of 59
    koopkoop Posts: 337member

    it was fine on my home wifi. just a tad slow is all. 

  • Reply 20 of 59
    no25no25 Posts: 16member
    No wonder it was so slow
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