iOS 7 Beta - Insights and Experiences

[philcruicks]

Finally got it installed after a few buggy attempts, i will say on the 4 it does run a bit laggy, but I'm sure that'll improve over time.

Overall I like the OS, shame as much as you can now have pages in folders you can;t get as many app on 1 view, that's a bit of a pain...

But overall a nice update, just needs some smoothing and a few tweaks.

[Kriz]

Few glitches to report (iphone 4s), couldnt seem to use the IMDB app for longer than 5 seconds, it crashes and closes. Had a few issues with lock/home buttons not responding and just getting a black screen for 20-30 seconds. Also unable to add more than 12 people to a multi text the area just goes white and im unable to do anything but cancel. Apart from that running pretty smoothly.

[Tigurinn]

Can anyone enlighten me as to why many users were saying that iOs was "boring"?

Boring in what way?

Why aren't people then crying out for a different look on the OS X Mavericks (if boring=ugly)???

...I'm an iPhone 4 user, with the ios 5, and apart from the faux-leather and green felt etc, it looks pretty much ok to me - quite unlike iOs 7, which is hideous, apart from the notifications pane (thank you Mohister for the comparison pictures)

[bbfc_uk]

Looking at those comparison pics of iOS 6 and 7, i must admit that iOS 7 on the whole looks a lot better (I have it installed). The UI is more consistent, though I'm not too sure about all the white. Music, App Store, Safari, Messages, Settings all look much better on iOS 7. Calendar needs some work.

[Brian Miller]

I found 2 new bugs issues today:

1. Skype keeps crashing when I go in to "Recent".
2. When I search for a song by name (in the Music app) and the search results does not allow the song item to be tappable.

Improvements I'd like to see:

1. Undo option when sending mail, just like Gmail)
2. Make home screen holders taller, showing one extra lines of app icons.

Overall, some nice touches, it's still very un-polished.

 

Anyone know when Beta 2 will be out?

[Argi]

I think the UI is ugly as.  I hope it goes through some MAJOR revisions.  I removed it and installed iOS6 again.

[philcruicks]

I found 2 new bugs issues today:

1. Skype keeps crashing when I go in to "Recent".
2. When I search for a song by name (in the Music app) and the search results does not allow the song item to be tappable.

Improvements I'd like to see:

1. Undo option when sending mail, just like Gmail)
2. Make home screen holders taller, showing one extra lines of app icons.

Overall, some nice touches, it's still very un-polished.

 

Anyone know when Beta 2 will be out?

Its normally every 2-4 weeks.

Ah! just found where spotlight search has run off to, rather than a separate screen to the left, you just pull down on any home screen page (anywhere on the screen except the very top, obviously you'll get notifications pulling down there).

[Astra.Xtreme]

Even I have no problem admitting that the new interface looks simply terrible.

I've always been a firm believer that iOS absolutely didn't need an overhaul, and this is exactly the reason why.

 

I'm sure it will be smooth and fast and have a bunch of new features, but they've turned it into an eye soar. 

[Chasethebase Reporter]

The font on the lockscreen/home screen definitely needs a little drop shadow, it's difficult to read on lighter backgrounds at present.

[philcruicks]

The font on the lockscreen/home screen definitely needs a little drop shadow, it's difficult to read on lighter backgrounds at present.

I think the'll just change it to black, if you open pretty well any stock apple app that's white (basically all of them now) the signal, network, clock and batt details at the top all change to black....whereas on the home screen and non-stock apps its white.

I suspect they'll put some image recognition in to change the font colour based on background colour.

[Fourjays Veteran]

As a total outsider when it comes to iPhones (my first smartphone is a Windows Phone), I really like the new style in general as I love straight forward, simple designs. However, the neon colours and gradients on some of those screens above make it look downright awful (e.g. messages blue/green too bright, video app's icon looks like the first time I discovered gradients in Paint, the alarms app's red is too bright, etc). They need to work on the shades they are using - make the tone of the colours more like they are in iOS6.

[sundayx Veteran]

I don't know if it's been mentioned, but there're a lot of features missing from the Music app. The most annoying is probably that I can't shuffle songs from a single artist and I can't rate songs.

[Mohitster]

iOS 7 Epilepsia 

[neeldenn]

I don't know if it's been mentioned, but there're a lot of features missing from the Music app. The most annoying is probably that I can't shuffle songs from a single artist and I can't rate songs.

I find it even more annoying that when you're on iTunes Match, you have to download each song individual, song by song.

[vanx]

Im running it on my iPhone 5 and let me tell you, its simply fantastic to use. So far the only thing that is buggy is the scrolling of youre contacts (it lags a bit) but the new features are just beautiful to use. When it does become widely available, you will all love it.

Feel free to ask me anything specific about it.

 

Could you please let me know if it is finally possible to add a song to a playlist from the "Now Playing" part of the Music app? I feel that this is such basic functionality that Apple hasn't had 2 braincells to implement so far.

[+Anarkii Subscriber²]

Could you please let me know if it is finally possible to add a song to a playlist from the "Now Playing" part of the Music app? I feel that this is such basic functionality that Apple hasn't had 2 braincells to implement so far.

It isnt implimented as yet. 

Someone else asked if multitasking is as fluid as it looks - answer is yes it is :)

Ill go trhough this thread and answer all the questions when I get home tonight now that the forums are back up

[+Anarkii Subscriber²]

I have been using it since Monday night, and its pretty nice. The changes take some getting used to, like having the control panel.

I have it on a Verizon iPhone 5. I feel I am pretty knowledgable about the iPhone, I used to have my phone jailbroken and have had a few Android phones in the past. I am also running the OSX 10.9 beta on my Air right now.

Overall, I really like it. I hear a lot of people wondering if other apps icons will make it look crappy, and it honestly doesn't look any better or worse to me.

My home screen:

<omitted>

I REALLY like the overall uniformity. Everything looks like it was made by the same team, and the same time. in iOS 6, some things looks great and slick, other things looked terrible and 5 years old. That was a big plus to me.

Lockscreen:

<omitted>

The lock screen looks great to me, I like minimalistic things. Having the notification drop down on the lock screen is very nice. Works smooth and looks good.

Multitasking is really smooth and fast. Its great to have it. A lot better to me then tweaks like Auxo for jailbroken phones. it also works in landscape mode, which I thought was a nice touch.

Having infinite folder sizes is a blessing, as well as being able to dumb newsstand in there.

HOWEVER it is very much a beta. Not all apps work (Skype doesn't even load), and some have graphical issues:

<omitted>

Battery life is not as good as iOS 6. I would say about 75% as good as before. I listen to podcasts all day, which a few hours of talk time (maybe 3), and light web browsing. I cannot make it to 5pm on iOS 7. But it is expected in the beta.

There are some slowdown on some of the animations, but I'm talking like half a second, if that. It is noticeable, and not Apple's polish.

Overall, I would say if you are the type of person that loves to try new things, and are not afraid of a few bugs, it is save to install, baring you can deal with the battery life.

Ask me anything about iOS 7, I'll try to get either pictures here, or some Vine shots. I have no way of recording video unless you want a crappy video on YouTube from an iPhone 4S!

 

Does youre version of Skype work when you goto recents?

 

I noticed that turning off Settings > General > Background App Refresh dramatically increases battery life on my iPhone 5 running iOS 7 beta 1. I was wondering why location services were constantly turned on. Apparently it was Weather app updating my current location in the background using GPS.

 

Thank you, that was one little secret I never realised would make such a huge difference.

[joemailey]

I've been using iOS7 on the iPhone 4S for over a week now, it's pretty buggy. But no where near as buggy as iOS 6 beta 1, which was unusable.

 

So far:

 

Apps crash a lot, facebook and other apps crash if you click on some links

Its slow/sluggish as hell.

Sometimes when your switching between apps/closing apps via the multi tasking list - when you select to go back to the home screen all icons disappear until you hit the lock button and then swipe to unlock.

messaging app crashes if you try to take a picture and send it to the contact you are texting/messaging. choosing an image from your library works fine thou.

My car struggles to connect to the phone via usb cable and play songs sometimes it screws up the radio in the car completely until I disconnect the phone

I have the above problem when I connect via bluetooth for hands free calling.

I've not notice to many things, a part from random crashes and the phone reboots its self from time to time. Made issue is speed for me and the animations laggy and things like that.

 

I also hate how when you tap in to a folder it zooms the background wall paper too, its annoying and distracting.

 

There is probably other bugs I've forgotten, there's been that many. But it is much more stable and usable than iOS 6 beta 1.

[philcruicks]

Really random bug happened to me last night, I do a lot of travelling for business and was in a Hilton hotel, uses a BT openzone connection, which my iphone tried to connect to it as soon as it detected the wifi.

Its one of these connections you have to login to so it brings up a little login page, I hit cancel and it opened podcasts...

 

Really random lol...

 

Also is anyone else not being able to update apps?...I can't do them on the phone, over 3G or Wifi, have to sync it to get it to update.

[vanx]

It isnt implimented as yet.

 

Thanks for letting me know. For all the brain power at Apple, they have really dropped the ball on that one. Again.

[Praetor]

Im running it on my iPhone 5 and let me tell you, its simply fantastic to use. So far the only thing that is buggy is the scrolling of youre contacts (it lags a bit) but the new features are just beautiful to use. When it does become widely available, you will all love it.

Feel free to ask me anything specific about it.

it lags? an iPhone? how dare you to say such lie! /s

[Quillz]

I've noticed the new lyrics overlay isn't transparent, compared to most other iOS 7 overlay elements. Not sure if this was an intentional choice or not.

[Bizkit]

Does youre version of Skype work when you goto recents?

 

Nope, Skype crashes and also doesn't work on the OSX 10.9 beta either. Sadly that is a deal breaker for me, but beta is beta. 

[Kriz]

Seems to be getting worse, a lot of apps just randomly shutting, Instagram wont open at all after their latest update yesterday. Random restarts, its to be expected though im still quite happy with the new setup :)

[philcruicks]

So I went back to iOS6 just for now, GPS doesn't work on the iPhone4 and it was a pain and I do a lot of travelling for work and no GPS has been a problem.

still not working according to the beta 2 change log.

So guess I'll be waiting till beta 3 or 4 before I try it again.