background apps and the iPhone/iPad
I just read this post by Andy Ihnatko on the absence of multitasking for third party apps on the iPad. Also: A mere hour ago John Gruber wrote this:
The iPad’s twice as fast as an iPhone 3GS, and appears to have the same amount of RAM: 256 MB.
This made me think about the implications of running apps in the background on the iPhone and iPad.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but the iPhone 3GS draws some of its speed improvement (over the iPhone 3G) from the doubled amount of RAM. If one starts opening apps in the background, how fast will this affect the overall responsiveness of the device (not talking about things like scrolling inside an app)? I’m not particularly against background apps — I’d love to have Tweetie and Reeder download stuff in the background — but I fear it may eat up RAM fast. Same on the iPad, as apps tend to be a bit bigger than iPhone apps, even if only by a bit.
I’m not convinced Apple will — or should — implement multitasking on iPhone OS devices. If they do, maybe they’ll have to limit the amount of RAM, apps that run in the background, can use (not necessarily the amount of apps running).
