Some basic questions on iPad

[lopri]

I have a few questions about iPad Air. It's been a while I used an iOS device and a lot has changed, so consider me a noob.

• How do you text-wrap in a browser? I do not see an option in Safari and Opera Mini and the usual trick (zoom and double-tab) does not work. Is there a way?
• Is there a simpler way to "go back" to previous screen than to bring up app history?
• Talking about app history, is there a way to clear them all at once, instead of swiping one at a time?
• Keyboard is unexpectedly laggy. I cannot imagine the fault lies on the processor, so there has to be something wrong. Does anyone know if this is a typical behavior or is there a solution?
• I have experienced crashes. It doesn't occur all the time, but often enough to notice it, usually while browsing. In some cases it is reproducible. For example, GFXBench's various subtests seem very prone to cause crash. Is it because of lack of memory or is it because of iOS 8? In other words, does iOS users experience experience more crash using iOS 8 than iOS 6/7?

Thank you in advance.

 

[boomhower]

I have a few questions about iPad Air. It's been a while I used an iOS device and a lot has changed, so consider me a noob.

• How do you text-wrap in a browser? I do not see an option in Safari and Opera Mini and the usual trick (zoom and double-tab) does not work. Is there a way?
  Not exactly sure what you mean.
• Is there a simpler way to "go back" to previous screen than to bring up app history?
  Five finger swipe to switch between apps.
• Talking about app history, is there a way to clear them all at once, instead of swiping one at a time?
  Not that I know of, no real need to resource wise.
• Keyboard is unexpectedly laggy. I cannot imagine the fault lies on the processor, so there has to be something wrong. Does anyone know if this is a typical behavior or is there a solution?
  I have the same issue with my Mini, never did get a solution. Went away when I upgraded to an Air 2. It only became a problem upon upgrading to iOS 8. Your air is strong enough you shouldn't have issues hardware wise, could be a memory thing.
• I have experienced crashes. It doesn't occur all the time, but often enough to notice it, usually while browsing. In some cases it is reproducible. For example, GFXBench's various subtests seem very prone to cause crash. Is it because of lack of memory or is it because of iOS 8? In other words, does iOS users experience experience more crash using iOS 8 than iOS 6/7?
  I've never had a crashing issue on any of my iOS devices other than in certain apps, autoblog seems particularly succeptable. If it's that benchmark that crashes often it's an app problem and not an iOS problem.

Thank you in advance.

If you haven't done a wipe in a while it may be worth a shot.

 

[lopri]

By text-wrap I mean you zoom in/out to change the text size and the sentences and paragraphs rearrange around the space in order to accommodate the new text size. Same as Ctrl + Wheel Up/Down (or Ctrl ++/--) on desktop browsers.

I did not know about five finger swipe. Thank you! (Edit: 4 fingers work, too. Yay.)

Deleting app history is more of a privacy feature than performance feature for a family use tablet. In my household, that is. I use this tablet only occasionally.

I've never had a crashing issue on any of my iOS devices other than in certain apps, autoblog seems particularly succeptable. If it's that benchmark that crashes often it's an app problem and not an iOS problem.

Including crashes in Safari? Keeping NYTimes.com and AnandTech.com in the background, and scrolling fast on TheVerge.com usually ends up with a crash sooner or later, for example. (Crash as in crash to home screen, not shutdown or reboot)

If you haven't done a wipe in a while it may be worth a shot.

As you can guess from my questions, the tablet is brand new. Thank you for the suggestion, nevertheless.

Edit: I fixed the keyboard lag issue. It apparently had to do with iCloud backup feature. A lot better now.

 

[weevilone]

I haven't had any Air crashes since iOS8 was brand new, and I use it daily and pretty heavily.

Are you all up to date on the software updates?

 

[MotionMan]

You can clear two or three apps at a time by swiping with two or three fingers, one on each app.

MotionMan

 

[TheStu]

By text-wrap I mean you zoom in/out to change the text size and the sentences and paragraphs rearrange around the space in order to accommodate the new text size. Same as Ctrl + Wheel Up/Down (or Ctrl ++/--) on desktop browsers.

That just isn't how iOS zooms in. It zooms the entire page, not just the text.

 

[lopri]

I hadn't had a chance to play with the tablet again for a few days and I forgot that I made this thread. My apologies. The tablet is for household use and I use it only on the go. (the tablet is data enabled)

I learned a few more things about it. It seems like text wrap is not supported as TheStu explained, neither is clearing app history for once. Since I do not use this tablet very often, they are not a big deal for me. I was just curious.

Same goes for the crashes. I guess I was just pushing things around to see how well the tablet does. I can use the tablet without causing crash just fine.

I found a very nice setting that allows changing white balance to more neutral white, which I prefer to bleached white the tablet defaults to. It is kind of hidden in an obscure place (accessibility?) - I do not know why it does not belong to Display settings, but I am glad that it is there.

Thank you for everyone's help.

 

[lopri]

Oh, BTW: The tablet is AT&T version and appears to be locked to AT&T's network. When I inserted T-Mobile SIM that is active, the tablet found the network and connected to it but I was not able to actually surf.

Is it because the tablet is SIM locked? If so, can I have it unlocked by making a call to AT&T? The tablet is purchased outright, of course. (but not from AT&T)

 

[dagamer34]

You should not be swiping up to kill apps unless it is misbehaving. Apps that are killed are effectively dead to the OS (get no push notification, cannot schedule local notification, no geofencing, no iBeacon support, no location tracking, etc...)

 

[lopri]

@dagamer34: Thank you for that information. I had no idea. I thought the app history screen is essentially collection of screenshots with pointers, and nothing more. It may have some bearings on my usage because I only use this tablet maybe once a week or so and I swipe off the the apps I used from the history. It's curious why iOS handles app history that way. What about the setting that lets you selectively allow background processing/mobile data per app? Is that setting overridden by swiping off app history?

I kind of wish the iOS had multi-user support, at least on tablets. That and slow scrolling on web pages are my only gripes so far with this tablet. It is quite annoying to scroll multiple times on a long page. (e.g. comments sections, listings, etc.)

 

[MotionMan]

You should not be swiping up to kill apps unless it is misbehaving. Apps that are killed are effectively dead to the OS (get no push notification, cannot schedule local notification, no geofencing, no iBeacon support, no location tracking, etc...)

I am not so sure that is true of all apps. I always swipe off apps and I still get notifications and location tracking works fine.

MotionMan

 

[UglyCasanova]

I am not so sure that is true of all apps. I always swipe off apps and I still get notifications and location tracking works fine.

MotionMan

Agreed. I close Gmail for instance and still get notifications.

 

[Ichinisan]

Apps and web pages in iOS 8 crash CONSTANTLY on all my 64-bit devices.

 

[MotionMan]

I have an app crash in iOS 8 maybe once a week, and I use them constantly.

MotionMan

 

[Artdeco]

Oh, BTW: The tablet is AT&T version and appears to be locked to AT&T's network. When I inserted T-Mobile SIM that is active, the tablet found the network and connected to it but I was not able to actually surf.

Is it because the tablet is SIM locked? If so, can I have it unlocked by making a call to AT&T? The tablet is purchased outright, of course. (but not from AT&T)

You need to change the settings to TMobiles, and it'll work on ANY carrier, all iPads are sim unlocked.

https://support.t-mobile.com/docs/DOC-9710

Look under "network" for the settings.

 

[CZroe]

You need to change the settings to TMobiles, and it'll work on ANY carrier, all iPads are sim unlocked.

https://support.t-mobile.com/docs/DOC-9710

Look under "network" for the settings.

The IMEI may be blocked on T-Mobile. My Galaxy Note 3 was purchased new and unlocked from Negri Electronics and eventually had the IMEI blocked on T-Mobile.

 

[Artdeco]

I have VZ iPads, and a VZ LG GPad 8.3 on TMobile, no problems... LOL, I'm using the $30 "unlimited" phone plan too

 

[CZroe]

I have VZ iPads, and a VZ LG GPad 8.3 on TMobile, no problems... LOL, I'm using the $30 "unlimited" phone plan too

You don't understand. Yes, they are sold unlocked and you can normally do exactly that, but I'm talking about a scenario where you still may not be able to despite being unlocked.

I'm talking about the possibility that it could be banned on a particular provider's side due to non-payment, fraud, theft, etc. He said that he did not get it from AT&T yet he suspected it was locked to AT&T, which implies that it could have been purchased from one of those deadbeats who doesn't pay their T-Mo bill after taking advantage of their free financing.

That Gnote3 was unlocked but T-Mobile blocked it anyway. Other Negri customers affected speculated that it was some kind of audit that showed that these were never associated with a T-Mo account and, thus, should never have been sold. AT&T allowed it despite the shared IMEI database because it was not reported stolen or fraudulent. It's definitely possible.

 

[Artdeco]

Too many unknowns to give valid advice...

 

[Ichinisan]

Oh, BTW: The tablet is AT&T version and appears to be locked to AT&T's network. When I inserted T-Mobile SIM that is active, the tablet found the network and connected to it but I was not able to actually surf.

Is it because the tablet is SIM locked? If so, can I have it unlocked by making a call to AT&T? The tablet is purchased outright, of course. (but not from AT&T)

Keep this in mind: T-Mobile (and every other major carrier) knows it's a tablet because Apple shares the IMEI numbers with them. If you don't have a tablet-specific data plan on that SIM, they won't let the device use their network.

I bought a iPad mini 2 (retina) from T-Mobile, even though I'm not a T-Mobile customer. I tried putting the AT&T nano-SIM from my iPhone 5/5s into the tablet, but it doesn't work. That's because AT&T *knows* it's a tablet and won't allow it on the network unless I'm using a SIM with a tablet-specific data plan. I've also tried the newer AT&T SIM from my iPhone 6 Plus in the iPad and that didn't work either.

 

[lopri]

Very interesting. I have the tablet now so I will do some SIM swapping and report back.

 

[lopri]

I did not get to test it last week but I did it today, and the iPad works with both tablet plan SIM and phone SIM on AT&T. The SIMs share a plan and thus a same data pool.

T-Mobile's phone (not tablet) SIM does not work on this iPad. I am inclined to believe Ichinisan's explanation, that T-Mobile controls and separate phone plans and tablet plans.

It must be a new thing, though, because I used to swap SIM back and forth between the Nexus 7 (2012) and the Nexus 4, using T-Mo's $30 plan.