IFC the M8 chip is being used to separately process tasks. Perhaps 1GB system RAM is sufficient in that case.
If that is the case, why add more system RAM? Just to say that you did - that make no sense. Perhaps there is a power consumption issue with more system RAM? Perhaps there is a heat issue with more system RAM? Is a 2GB RAM chip larger than a 1 GB RAM chip?
Would someone please research and write about the task handling/processing between the system RAM, A8, M8, and iOS 8? - without violating your NDA of course.
Is iOS 8 very efficient in handing off tasks to processors that excel at processing them - i.e. graphics, motion sensing, etc.? If that is the case - it would make sense that Apple would to the best balance - cost, user experience, battery consumption, heat, etc. - in term of system RAM. Perhaps 1 GB system RAM is the best balance ...
Until we understand the relationship between all the processors and system RAM everyone complaining about 1GB system RAM is just complaining about a number.
If you have more information on why you think 1 GB system RAM is insufficient - I look for to your written explaination.
The entire industry is trying to make phones, and tablets, as thin as possible. I think they're thin enough. I'm happy there is a little bit of better battery life for the 6, and bigger gains for the 6+. I really haven't wanted a 5.5" phone, but now, I'm leaning towards it. I'll know once I get I to the store and try both out. The 6+ has enough better features that it might sway me.
Likely 1GB RAM is enough for the 6, but I wonder about the 6+. You're right about screen resolution. As far as I know, it's still shared RAM. But with the doubling of transistors, I've wondered if so e of that is dedicated GRAM. I would have thought that Apple would have mentioned that at the introduction, but with them, maybe not.
They won't actually be thin enough until they can be easily rolled and folded.
I don't follow the Android reference as that is also a mobile OS, I was asking about OS X. Obviously I am wondering how far off a MacBook Air type machine running OS X without an Intel Chip might be. Perhaps Apple have another chip under development that isn't a mobile version ....
I used to think that an ARM-based MB Air running OS X was inevitable. But now I'm thinking that Apple could release an MB Air-like device running iOS instead of OS X. And that the division between consumer and Pro Macs might eventually be iOS / AX vs. OS X / Intel. Now that the iPhone 6 is on the horizon, Apple's auto-scaling of iOS apps could easily be applied to a laptop form-factor screen.
With either OS, an ARM-based AX SoC MB Air would have a far less-expensive CPU.
No more Intel Tax (tm). That could bring the price down and simultaneously keep Apple's margins up.
IFC the M8 chip is being used to separately process tasks. Perhaps 1GB system RAM is sufficient in that case.
If that is the case, why add more system RAM? Just to say that you did - that make no sense. Perhaps there is a power consumption issue with more system RAM? Perhaps there is a heat issue with more system RAM? Is a 2GB RAM chip larger than a 1 GB RAM chip?
Would someone please research and write about the task handling/processing between the system RAM, A8, M8, and iOS 8? - without violating your NDA of course.
Is iOS 8 very efficient in handing off tasks to processors that excel at processing them - i.e. graphics, motion sensing, etc.? If that is the case - it would make sense that Apple would to the best balance - cost, user experience, battery consumption, heat, etc. - in term of system RAM. Perhaps 1 GB system RAM is the best balance ...
Until we understand the relationship between all the processors and system RAM everyone complaining about 1GB system RAM is just complaining about a number.
If you have more information on why you think 1 GB system RAM is insufficient - I look for to your written explaination<span style="font-family:'helveticaneue-light', 'helvetica neue light', 'footer-logohelvetica neue', 'segoe ui', helvetica, arial, 'sans serif';line-height:1.4em;">.</span>
I suppose that for me my real concern is not what the performance will be like in iOS 8 or even iOS 9 but rather what it'll be like with iOS 10 & perhaps iOS 11.
The biggest reason give for an iDevice not getting an update is usually attributed to the amount of Ram.
When I buy an iDevice I want & expect that device to have three years use with the latest software.
True, but I'd be happier with the same thickness as the iPhone 5S with a bigger battery and 2gb+ or Ram.
I love Mr Ive's designs, but he frequently seems to choose form over function when it comes to the thickness of a device.
Don't forget that these phones are taller and wider than the 5s, so by making them thinner that helps (sure, its mm but still) your thumb access things. I agree that there is a point where thin-ness for the sake of thin-ness is silly. Maybe even dangerous, I don't want my phone to snap in half easily.
As to ram- From what I've read more ram means more continuous power draw on the battery. If Apple increases (lets say doubles) ram every year I believe there is a larger probability that a 2 year old phone would be useless. And guess what, WE GET A HUGE trade in on our phones because they are still useful. For example- my GF's LG phone is a few months older than my iPhone 5. Her phone is worth $3 according to one of the trade in sites. Mine is worth over $200. That $200 goes a long way towards a new phone every year.
I also believe that, to an extent, more ram can be like more cores in that it doesn't really guarantee much. I prefer there be pressure to do more with less on a mobile device. To contradict myself- if Apple adds more demands on apps like higher resolutions then that is a consideration to add more ram.
IFC the M8 chip is being used to separately process tasks. Perhaps 1GB system RAM is sufficient in that case.
If that is the case, why add more system RAM? Just to say that you did - that make no sense. Perhaps there is a power consumption issue with more system RAM? Perhaps there is a heat issue with more system RAM? Is a 2GB RAM chip larger than a 1 GB RAM chip?
Would someone please research and write about the task handling/processing between the system RAM, A8, M8, and iOS 8? - without violating your NDA of course.
Is iOS 8 very efficient in handing off tasks to processors that excel at processing them - i.e. graphics, motion sensing, etc.? If that is the case - it would make sense that Apple would to the best balance - cost, user experience, battery consumption, heat, etc. - in term of system RAM. Perhaps 1 GB system RAM is the best balance ...
Until we understand the relationship between all the processors and system RAM everyone complaining about 1GB system RAM is just complaining about a number.
If you have more information on why you think 1 GB system RAM is insufficient - I look for to your written explaination<span style="font-family:'helveticaneue-light', 'helvetica neue light', 'footer-logohelvetica neue', 'segoe ui', helvetica, arial, 'sans serif';line-height:1.4em;">.</span>
Apple has been using a more efficient multitasking model. By turning off apps that are not actually needed to do something in the background, and just maintaining the state of those apps, less RAM is needed than for Android, which has a more Desktop method of multitasking, and so keeps apps turned on, unless specifically turned off with the manager. But, Apple has been expanding what apps do in the background, decidedly so in iOS 8, so it would seem that more RAM would be needed. In addition, 64 bit apps do need more room, and the highe the Rez, the larger the graphics held in RAM also.
I'm hoping that the 6 will see sufficient RAM, but I wonder about the 6+. We read that the iPad may get 2GB, but maybe only the 9.7" model.
The M8 will do about what it did last year with the M7.
While I think the unhanged RAM is disappointing, it isn't such a massive deal on the phone.
However, if the next iPad retains teh 1GB of RAM, and does not increase it, it would be an iPad3 style dead generation. The iPad desperately needs a RAM upgrade.
Note that increasing RAM also increases costs, something Apple is very careful about.
It also takes more battery power. I think Apple will have calculated that the extra performance of adding more RAM is outweighed by the additional battery power required by the additional RAM.
Cue the AI experts telling Apple it needs more RAM ....
Anand Shimpi, recent Apple hire and founder of Anandtech.com (often accussed of being an Apple fanboi) did an anaylsis of the iPhone's 1GB of RAM (I believe it was an iPhone 5) and was able to show it was causing performance problems in various situations.
I think this is probably an 80/80 type situation. 80% of the people won't notice a difference 80% of the time. Personally, I think it is bad for entirely different reason. It paints Apple as a penny pincher, cutting design specs to the bone just to save a buck. Apple makes premium products and that isn't something a producer of premium products does.
One other thing...having 2GB could also help with running new versions of iOS on the phones. Who knows what might be added to iOS 9 and 10 but it is reasonable to assume at some point Apple will move to 2GB and this could easily cause new features to perform much more slowly or not at all on phones with only 1GB of RAM.
1gb of ram only???? for a phone that costs between $700 and 1000?? what do we need to wait 3 years and beg again for more ram as we did for larger screens?
What part of dramatic increases without a RAM increase, and that additional RAM would be a significant hit to battery life do you not understand? Let's all work on improving our comprehension skills.
And lets not forget the power usage implications...
I think the power cost is more critical. The way current OS's operate is that all RAM is utilized, thus sucking down all the power. So unless they can die shrink the RAM they can't add any more without needing to increase the battery size.
I'm sure Apple could put 32GB of ram on the device if the power cost could be justified. The difference between 4GB and 8GB on a notebook is 50$, and these have several chips on them. Apple's stacking RAM on the CPU, so they are literately limited by what can be thermally accepted.
Does anyone else find it odd that we have to speculate about iPhone hardware specs after it was announced and after people have placed orders for it? Apple does not even tell third party developers about the hardware platform they must develop for such as how much RAM they have to work with in their apps. I had to coax the fact that the A6 CPU could do a simple divide in hardware out of an Apple engineer. For years Apple had sessions at every WWDC to go over significant hardware changes, including changes to instruction sets or cache optimization. Those sessions have been missing the entire lifetime of iOS.
The word is that the texas FAB that Apple paid Samsung to build is currently undergoing renovations to prepare for 16nm development so it is offline and that pretty much tells you that Apple is using the supplier from Taiwan. Switching process systems is no trivial matter at this level of production. Apple probably made this processor update as simple as possible to make the yeild curve easier to manage. I would not be surprised if Apple used Samsung to develope the processor for the next generation processor in their pipeline. Intel has seperate teams working on each tick and tock for the next 5 years. That means they have 5 seperate teams working on new processors.
Keeping both fabs busy would make them have to compete for each design win. It would also allow Apple to demand more concessions such as building stronger firewalls between the teams working with Apple and the rest of Samsung's management. The partnership between Apple and Samsung was very important to both companies. Samsung has had much higher quality than their competitors in screens, SSD's and semiconductor manufacturing. Intel is too greedy to make an alliance work with Apple. Having two processors producing chips for Apple's products would also allow for a faster ramp on new designs. It is not hard to imagine that Taiwan would get the basic iPhone chips, and iPad chips. Samsung could supply the Apple phone, iPhone plus, and the next generation apple hardware. The way Moores law is collapsing it may be necessary to hedge your bets to make sure product introductions and or feature sets don't get delayed by problems scaling down to successively smaller geometries.
I always recall that Steve had a secret team running Mac OS on Intel in parallel to the Power PC years before it was known. I can't help wonder if there might be a skunk works team deep underground already running OS X on an secret new Apple chip as we speak.
Might be. But is that a good idea? Same OS - Windows - on tablet and PCs and mobiles etc - which is failing.
But, yeah - who knows what Apple has in its plan.
Personally, I love to SEE (only) OS X running on iPad. But, won't be liking working on it.
2GB of Ram would have allwoed proper multi-tasking and even 2 or more tabs to be actually running in the web browser. Heavens forbid, we could have even had a desktop mode setting in Safari.
Apple has been using a more efficient multitasking model. By turning off apps that are not actually needed to do something in the background, and just maintaining the state of those apps, less RAM is needed than for Android, which has a more Desktop method of multitasking, and so keeps apps turned on, unless specifically turned off with the manager. But, Apple has been expanding what apps do in the background, decidedly so in iOS 8, so it would seem that more RAM would be needed. In addition, 64 bit apps do need more room, and the highe the Rez, the larger the graphics held in RAM also.
I'm hoping that the 6 will see sufficient RAM, but I wonder about the 6+. We read that the iPad may get 2GB, but maybe only the 9.7" model.
The M8 will do about what it did last year with the M7.
I wonder if the 1GB of RAM is for the iPhone 6 only and the 6 Plus gets 2GB of RAM. According to this article;
The iPhone 6 Plus has to first render at 3X, to 2208 x 1242, then downsample to 1920 x 1080. This definitely requires more processing power, and I'm assuming more RAM overhead as well. What would having only 1GB do to the performance, in terms of UI smoothness, of the iPhone 6 Plus?
Comments
IFC the M8 chip is being used to separately process tasks. Perhaps 1GB system RAM is sufficient in that case.
If that is the case, why add more system RAM? Just to say that you did - that make no sense. Perhaps there is a power consumption issue with more system RAM? Perhaps there is a heat issue with more system RAM? Is a 2GB RAM chip larger than a 1 GB RAM chip?
Would someone please research and write about the task handling/processing between the system RAM, A8, M8, and iOS 8? - without violating your NDA of course.
Is iOS 8 very efficient in handing off tasks to processors that excel at processing them - i.e. graphics, motion sensing, etc.? If that is the case - it would make sense that Apple would to the best balance - cost, user experience, battery consumption, heat, etc. - in term of system RAM. Perhaps 1 GB system RAM is the best balance ...
Until we understand the relationship between all the processors and system RAM everyone complaining about 1GB system RAM is just complaining about a number.
If you have more information on why you think 1 GB system RAM is insufficient - I look for to your written explaination.
They won't actually be thin enough until they can be easily rolled and folded.
Nope. Love the watch.
I don't follow the Android reference as that is also a mobile OS, I was asking about OS X. Obviously I am wondering how far off a MacBook Air type machine running OS X without an Intel Chip might be. Perhaps Apple have another chip under development that isn't a mobile version ....
I used to think that an ARM-based MB Air running OS X was inevitable. But now I'm thinking that Apple could release an MB Air-like device running iOS instead of OS X. And that the division between consumer and Pro Macs might eventually be iOS / AX vs. OS X / Intel. Now that the iPhone 6 is on the horizon, Apple's auto-scaling of iOS apps could easily be applied to a laptop form-factor screen.
With either OS, an ARM-based AX SoC MB Air would have a far less-expensive CPU.
No more Intel Tax (tm). That could bring the price down and simultaneously keep Apple's margins up.
The biggest reason give for an iDevice not getting an update is usually attributed to the amount of Ram.
When I buy an iDevice I want & expect that device to have three years use with the latest software.
True, but I'd be happier with the same thickness as the iPhone 5S with a bigger battery and 2gb+ or Ram.
I love Mr Ive's designs, but he frequently seems to choose form over function when it comes to the thickness of a device.
Don't forget that these phones are taller and wider than the 5s, so by making them thinner that helps (sure, its mm but still) your thumb access things. I agree that there is a point where thin-ness for the sake of thin-ness is silly. Maybe even dangerous, I don't want my phone to snap in half easily.
As to ram- From what I've read more ram means more continuous power draw on the battery. If Apple increases (lets say doubles) ram every year I believe there is a larger probability that a 2 year old phone would be useless. And guess what, WE GET A HUGE trade in on our phones because they are still useful. For example- my GF's LG phone is a few months older than my iPhone 5. Her phone is worth $3 according to one of the trade in sites. Mine is worth over $200. That $200 goes a long way towards a new phone every year.
I also believe that, to an extent, more ram can be like more cores in that it doesn't really guarantee much. I prefer there be pressure to do more with less on a mobile device. To contradict myself- if Apple adds more demands on apps like higher resolutions then that is a consideration to add more ram.
So I can see arguments in both directions.
Apple has been using a more efficient multitasking model. By turning off apps that are not actually needed to do something in the background, and just maintaining the state of those apps, less RAM is needed than for Android, which has a more Desktop method of multitasking, and so keeps apps turned on, unless specifically turned off with the manager. But, Apple has been expanding what apps do in the background, decidedly so in iOS 8, so it would seem that more RAM would be needed. In addition, 64 bit apps do need more room, and the highe the Rez, the larger the graphics held in RAM also.
I'm hoping that the 6 will see sufficient RAM, but I wonder about the 6+. We read that the iPad may get 2GB, but maybe only the 9.7" model.
The M8 will do about what it did last year with the M7.
Yeah. Rolled and then sat upon. Whoops!
However, if the next iPad retains teh 1GB of RAM, and does not increase it, it would be an iPad3 style dead generation. The iPad desperately needs a RAM upgrade.
It also takes more battery power. I think Apple will have calculated that the extra performance of adding more RAM is outweighed by the additional battery power required by the additional RAM.
Cue the AI experts telling Apple it needs more RAM ....
Anand Shimpi, recent Apple hire and founder of Anandtech.com (often accussed of being an Apple fanboi) did an anaylsis of the iPhone's 1GB of RAM (I believe it was an iPhone 5) and was able to show it was causing performance problems in various situations.
I think this is probably an 80/80 type situation. 80% of the people won't notice a difference 80% of the time. Personally, I think it is bad for entirely different reason. It paints Apple as a penny pincher, cutting design specs to the bone just to save a buck. Apple makes premium products and that isn't something a producer of premium products does.
One other thing...having 2GB could also help with running new versions of iOS on the phones. Who knows what might be added to iOS 9 and 10 but it is reasonable to assume at some point Apple will move to 2GB and this could easily cause new features to perform much more slowly or not at all on phones with only 1GB of RAM.
-kpluck
I'm not sure why anyone would need more than 1GB of ram on a phone for using only one app at a time.
What part of dramatic increases without a RAM increase, and that additional RAM would be a significant hit to battery life do you not understand? Let's all work on improving our comprehension skills.
I think the power cost is more critical. The way current OS's operate is that all RAM is utilized, thus sucking down all the power. So unless they can die shrink the RAM they can't add any more without needing to increase the battery size.
I'm sure Apple could put 32GB of ram on the device if the power cost could be justified. The difference between 4GB and 8GB on a notebook is 50$, and these have several chips on them. Apple's stacking RAM on the CPU, so they are literately limited by what can be thermally accepted.
The word is that the texas FAB that Apple paid Samsung to build is currently undergoing renovations to prepare for 16nm development so it is offline and that pretty much tells you that Apple is using the supplier from Taiwan. Switching process systems is no trivial matter at this level of production. Apple probably made this processor update as simple as possible to make the yeild curve easier to manage. I would not be surprised if Apple used Samsung to develope the processor for the next generation processor in their pipeline. Intel has seperate teams working on each tick and tock for the next 5 years. That means they have 5 seperate teams working on new processors.
Keeping both fabs busy would make them have to compete for each design win. It would also allow Apple to demand more concessions such as building stronger firewalls between the teams working with Apple and the rest of Samsung's management. The partnership between Apple and Samsung was very important to both companies. Samsung has had much higher quality than their competitors in screens, SSD's and semiconductor manufacturing. Intel is too greedy to make an alliance work with Apple. Having two processors producing chips for Apple's products would also allow for a faster ramp on new designs. It is not hard to imagine that Taiwan would get the basic iPhone chips, and iPad chips. Samsung could supply the Apple phone, iPhone plus, and the next generation apple hardware. The way Moores law is collapsing it may be necessary to hedge your bets to make sure product introductions and or feature sets don't get delayed by problems scaling down to successively smaller geometries.
Thanks for the info.
I always recall that Steve had a secret team running Mac OS on Intel in parallel to the Power PC years before it was known. I can't help wonder if there might be a skunk works team deep underground already running OS X on an secret new Apple chip as we speak.
Might be. But is that a good idea? Same OS - Windows - on tablet and PCs and mobiles etc - which is failing.
But, yeah - who knows what Apple has in its plan.
Personally, I love to SEE (only) OS X running on iPad. But, won't be liking working on it.
(Sorry for my bad English)
Heavens forbid, we could have even had a desktop mode setting in Safari.
I guess there is always 2016 or 2017 to think of.
Apple has been using a more efficient multitasking model. By turning off apps that are not actually needed to do something in the background, and just maintaining the state of those apps, less RAM is needed than for Android, which has a more Desktop method of multitasking, and so keeps apps turned on, unless specifically turned off with the manager. But, Apple has been expanding what apps do in the background, decidedly so in iOS 8, so it would seem that more RAM would be needed. In addition, 64 bit apps do need more room, and the highe the Rez, the larger the graphics held in RAM also.
I'm hoping that the 6 will see sufficient RAM, but I wonder about the 6+. We read that the iPad may get 2GB, but maybe only the 9.7" model.
The M8 will do about what it did last year with the M7.
I wonder if the 1GB of RAM is for the iPhone 6 only and the 6 Plus gets 2GB of RAM. According to this article;
http://www.paintcodeapp.com/news/iphone-6-screens-demystified
The iPhone 6 Plus has to first render at 3X, to 2208 x 1242, then downsample to 1920 x 1080. This definitely requires more processing power, and I'm assuming more RAM overhead as well. What would having only 1GB do to the performance, in terms of UI smoothness, of the iPhone 6 Plus?