I think this is a downside for Apple about all the media hype they get. I've talked to a couple of people about it this week, who would happily admit they know bugger-all about computers. Both said that Apple updates were designed to slow down older iPhones so you'd buy the latest one.
I'm no fan of Apple, but that sounds like bollocks to me. I certainly thought that my iPad 1 slowed down with both the updates it got. I think they must have been building down to a price, because I remember that the iPhone that came out a couple of months after it, got a newer processor, and I think more RAM. Then iOS 4 didn't go onto the iPad 1 for at least 4 more months, and I felt slowed it down - and re-introduced a bunch of WiFi bugs they'd only just squashed in iOS 3. I had to put the iPad back on a fixed IP address on the local network, as it seemed to be unable to stay connected if it had to talk to the DHCP server.
iOS 5 was a mistake, and I regretted putting the poor iPad 1 on that. There was sometimes quite severe lag in the UI, if it was trying to process stuff in the background.
On the other hand, I've since waited for updates until the reports after the first patch comes out. And my work iPhone 5 went to iOS 8 with no problems, and seems to be just as fast, and have just as good battery life as before.
One comment I would make about iOS is that it's getting awfully complicated. It used to be that there only a few settings, scattered somewhat randomly around the settings menu. But I went through them from top to bottom after my latest update, and there are absolutely loads now. Almost as many as the last 'Droid I set up (Galaxy Note 2 for a friend). Also Apple had reset some of them to their defaults after the update, that I'd specifically set the other way before. Which is rather cheeky - although backing up to iCloud worked perfectly, other than that obvious deliberate decision to re-enable all sorts of stuff that I don't want.
They need to nuke their settings and start again from scratch, in some more logical way. Quite a few useful bits are hidden away in the accessibility stuff. Although I do give them credit for having lots of accessibility options, far more than Android. And I happen to know that this is an area Tim Cook takes personal interest in pushing - as I know people with disabilities he's talked to about how to improve their systems (along with enrolling them on a testing/evaluation program). So kudos to Apple for making considerable effort in that area.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
