

Tell HN: My iPhone 3G is unusably slow since upgrading to iOS 4.0 - blehn

Apps (even Apple apps) take forever to load, and routinely hang while performing simple tasks (typing, focusing on a form field, switching tabs, etc). I'd have to recommend staying with 3.x if you haven't already upgraded.
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thought_alarm
Your device is slow because apps are constantly triggering low-memory
conditions. Memory was very tight on the 3G, even before iOS 4. This is
precisely why multi-tasking isn't enabled.

Safari alone is consuming most of your device's memory, by a very large
margin. It stays resident in memory when you return to the home screen, and
it's one of the last apps to be killed in low-memory conditions. The problem
is that much worse if you do a lot of browsing on your iPhone or iPod; Safari
just grows and grows. This is why the problem appears to be fixed when you
reboot your device.

Here's the tip: You can quit Safari by closing all of its tabs and then
returning to the home screen. You should do this periodically; I did this
whenever I was finished with a browsing session. With Safari out of the way
the rest of the software on your device should run at normal speed without
triggering any low-memory conditions.

My primary devices now have 256 MB of RAM instead of 128 MB, and I no longer
have to worry about Safari's memory consumption.

~~~
sverrejoh
You can also kill Safari (and all other running apps) by holding the sleep
button until it shows the slider screen, and then hold the menu button until
you get the home screen.

~~~
Ivatar
You can also bring up the task tray, press and hold the icon for safari(or any
other app) like you would for moving apps on the home screen, then press the -
sign that appears to close it. Discovered it by accident, but it's quite
useful.

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micaelwidell
Strange. I have a 3G and 4.0 feels slightly faster compared to 3.1.3. Did you
jailbreak it and enable multitasking + extra animations?

~~~
sans-serif
On the other hand, multitasking helps with apps that take forever to load
since their state can be saved/loaded now. Work out the cost/benefit in your
case.

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gkefalas
Same, with both the upgrade and a full restore, and my phone is stock (no
jailbreak.) A good friend had great success with his after iOS4, so it's not
affecting everyone. I followed a guide online and manually rolled back to
3.1.3 and haven't looked back, and soon I'll pick up the 4G. It's not like
most of the compelling features were compatible with the 3G anyway.

~~~
thomasswift
Do you by chance have a link to this guide?

~~~
gkefalas
Sure; there are a couple out there. Lifehacker's was the most straightforward
and detailed. The process is much the same as jailbreaking.
[http://lifehacker.com/5572003/how-to-downgrade-your-
iphone-3...](http://lifehacker.com/5572003/how-to-downgrade-your-
iphone-3g\[s\]-from-ios-4-to-ios-313)

I had some shenanigans with it being an older backup and so had to re-transfer
my email accounts from my compy to the phone, but that was just a couple
checkboxes in iTunes and setting up MobileMe.

------
deco
I updated my 3G to iOS4 and noticed a serious performance hit along the same
lines as the original poster. Rebooting the phone brought things back up to
speed though, with some functions seeming snappier than they were under 3.x
(Safari being the stand-out example). The phone has been running fine over the
past couple of days since the reboot, so I'm not sure if there's a problem
with how the upgrade is carried out on the phone that causes the slowness, or
if there are some memory issues in iOS4 that will necessitate periodic
rebooting of 3G models.

------
jbriguet
Try a full restoration, it helps.

~~~
blehn
Thanks, I'll try that.

------
tomwans
If you have data on the phone, like texts, emails, etc. your iPhone 3G will be
unusable. Mine is also terrible, but I'll live with it until I make a fresh
install when I buy an iPhone 4.

~~~
yesimahuman
I'm also having a really slow experience. I guess I have a lot of texts,
emails and photos (thank the interface lift app for that).

The problem is that it wasn't this slow with 3.x, yet I've really not gained
any extra features, so it's basically a downgrade.

------
billturner
I haven't really noticed much of a slowdown with the apps and tasks on my 3G
since upgrading, but it does seem to eat up the battery a little quicker.

------
allend
My 3G seems to be the same in terms of speed. iBooks has pretty lousy
performance on it though.

The new mailboxes make it worth it for me.

Jailbroken? Don't enable wallpapers and multitasking. You'll find out why it
isn't supported officially by Apple. Absolute shit performance if you do.

~~~
blehn
Yeah I upgraded mainly for the new Mail features (grouped conversations and
archiving for gmail). The phone isn't jailbroken, but I'm going to try a full
restore and see what happens.

------
cjus
My 3Gs works just fine after upgrading to iOS4. I agree with @thought_alarm's
comments regarding the lack of memory being a likely candidate cause.

------
sverrejoh
I had the same problem with 3G and iOS 4.0, but after a hard reboot it became
fast again (Hold the sleep button for some seconds, and push the slider). It
took me almost a week to figure it out (during which the phone was next to
useless), but now it seems as fast as 3.x.

------
gaborcselle
My iPhone is currently running 3.1.2 - is it still possible to upgrade to
3.1.3 somehow?

~~~
thethimble
3.1.3 is a largely unnecessary update that doesn't do much besides fixing
certain jailbreak exploits. I would recommend sticking with 3.1.2 - that's
what I'm doing.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IOS_version_history#3.1.2>

------
kiwidamo
I'm finding it slow. I'll be rolling back to 3.1.2 Jailbroken with
Backgrounder. At least with Backgrounder you could kill Mail, Safari etc
easily if the system was running slowly or you needed extra to play a heavy
game (eg. Worms)

------
pplante
It is completely unbearable on my 3G. I did install a jailbroken rom which has
multitasking enabled, however it seems odd that "Backgrounder" ran apps just
fine yet iOS4 cannot.

Oh well back to 3.1.2 for me.

------
daveilers
My experience was that it handled having low storage space (Less than 400MB
free out of 16GB) less well than 3.1.3.

Once i freed some space the odd app crashes seemed to stop.

------
ubaldo
My 3G is generally slow as well after the iOS4 upgrade. Is there a way to
disable multitasking? I just want to see if it makes a difference.

------
cl3m
Mine is now very slow at getting back on wifi at home after the phone went to
sleep. That's annoying!

~~~
megablast
I heard that one of the updates for ios4 is that it would maintain a wifi
connection when put to sleep.

------
jeb
My 3Gs internet stopped working after the upgrade and I have no idea how to
reenable it.

~~~
allwein
This one is pretty easy to fix.

Go to Settings>General>Reset and select Reset Network Settings.

Do that and a quick reboot and you should be all set.

------
ctingom
A "Genius" told me the same thing yesterday. Said I should wait to upgrade.

------
carbocation
Would anyone be willing to share their experiences with tethering on iOS4?

~~~
semanticist
Tethering's working for me fine under iOS 4, although I'm also seeing the
general app slowness which is really frustrating.

