A few days after the WWDC, the pundits of Apple return to the novelties presented during the conference. Craig Federighi, software manager, notably delivered on iPadOS 16.
At WWDC 2022, Apple presented lots of new features for its iPads integrated into iPadOS 16. Collaborative work was highlighted, as was progress in multitasking which finally allows you to switch to a real windowed mode. with multiple apps on screen. Alas, this novelty called Stage Manager is reserved for iPads with an M1 chip.
The tactile versus the mouse
So only the 11 and 12.9-inch iPad Pro, as well as the iPad Air 5, will have the privilege of tasting the most important of the system’s innovations. What frustrate owners of older iPad who would have liked a little more flexibility in the use of their tablets. According to Craig Federighi, the head of software at Apple, this limit has simple technical explanations.
Asked by TechCrunch on the subject, the executive explained that with the use of multitasking on the iPad, one must ensure “that each of the apps can respond instantly to touch, which is not the case with a desktop application.” According to him, manipulation via a mouse and keyboard, since it is indirect, can accommodate a certain latency, whereas touch control cannot. “It’s like touching a real object directly below the screen”adds the manager.
iPads not powerful enough
Beyond these questionable usage considerations (are slowdowns on a PC really easier to swallow than on an iPad?), Craig Federighi offers technical explanations that are a bit more convincing. “Only the iPad M1s combine high dynamic random access memory (DRAM) capacities and NAND flash memory that is high enough and generous enough to offer super-fast swap memory”. This swap memory, which allows flash memory to be used much like RAM, is the condition sine qua non to the proper functioning of Stage Manager, explains Federighi: “We don’t have this option on other systems.”
In addition, Stage Manager is also thought of as a suite of services that are not limited to multitasking. Using a second screen connected to a tablet made in Cupertino is also limited to those with the M1 chip, because “the M1’s I/O supports connectivity that our previous iPads do not offer”. More simply, the performance of iPads without the M1 chip is not sufficient to take full advantage of multitasking. “We would like to make it available wherever we can, but we need at least that. This is the level of user experience we want to provide in the future. We do not want to force ourselves to offer something less good”, admits Craig Federighi. Too bad for those who hoped to turn their “old” iPad into a real work machine.