This apparently isn't common knowledge given all the *OMG GAME CRASHES U SUCK 1/5" reviews in the App Store, but it's a critical thing to know. Installing (or Updating, which is essentially re-installing) large games takes up a large amount of the device's RAM, and for some reason iOS doesn't like giving it back. The aforementioned large games coincidentally require a lot of RAM, and since there's much less RAM than expected, boom, crash. You reset iOS devices by holding the home + sleep buttons until the Apple logo appears. Or, if you want to be very efficient at RAM clearing, hold the two buttons until the "turn off device" appears, turn it off, wait 30 seconds, then turn it back on by holding the same two buttons. It's a good habit to practice. Haven't had any blatant crash issues in awhile following this.
ummm.... most everyone on this site knows this. Most people here have a decent knowledge of iOS. just sayin....
Lol this is posted on most larger file games on the AppStore already. It's just that the majority of AppStore customers are illiterate. 75% or more of all one-star reviews are about crashing upon launching the app or an app not being compatible, which is listed on every game to the left. Generally, everyone here understands this very well though.
It's not really that people are illiterate. It's an issue that needs to be addressed by Apple. Sure, you'd think that people read the description of what they download (and especially of what they buy), but the device doesn't really give people the intuitive impression that it needs to be rebooted after the installation of new software (it's very Windows 3.1'ish) and it's not obvious how to even do that. And then you have iTunes where you see a few lines of text before you have to click on "more..." to read the whole description. I certainly agree that people here know that kind of stuff (at least those who post), but there are probably many that lurk who aren't as experienced, and I agree that many people don't bother to read the whole description of what they download, especially if it's free, but being lazy or inexperienced -- or simply unaware of what amounts to a bug -- doesn't quite make people illiterate.
I rarely ever do this and never have crashes but I do use xsysinfo now and again and have it free up some RAM it seems to do a good job.
I don't do hard resets. Instead I use the Systems Activity Monitor app. But doing hard resets should be (and unfortunately not to some) fairly common knowledge and was a requirement for most games back in the ol' days.
I'm pretty sure it does. Restarting helps clear memory so even if it is synced, there might be stuff from previous gaming sessions. Especially with big games. Clear some of your multitasking bar for that too
It's just a saying. You make it sound like it's too hard to glance at the same spot on the iTunes description every time you purchase something. The iPod comes with a thin start-up guide that's like 10 pages, each page containing like 20 words and a big picture on it. It tells you in there explicitly how to reset your iPod. Every device not by Apple contains an enormous manual that probably exceeds 100 pages, like the 3DS I bought two days ago. There's a reason people might not bother opening that. But to read a 10 page colorful pamphlet, and then read on the iTunes description, "Please restart your device up the RAM because this game requires heavy memory usage," I don't think that's too much to ask. LOL, you also make it sound like it's too much work to click "more" on iTunes, oh goodness. 12 year old with a 2 second attention span? I think so. People complain about free apps? LOLOL.
Also does a restart still help if you start an app it crashes a few times, and then you restart to see if it's a memory issue?
I don't "make it sound" like anything, really. I agree with you that people "should" do this, and that it doesn't take much effort to reset the device and read the description. I'm not disagreeing with any of this. But see, I deal with people in a community/support management field every day, and I have done so for nearly twenty years. Fact is that most people are lazy and used to getting everything served on a silver platter. They're customers, so that's quite all right for them. Restarting a device after you installed something is pretty much common sense for you, I and probably many people to whom a computer is not quite the same as a toaster. However, most people simply aren't like that. Take my mother for example. She's in her mid 60s and while she is quite brilliant and capable, she doesn't have an interest in the "inner workings" of a computer. She's a user, not someone who administers her own machine. So, if she had an iPad, it would simply never naturally occur to her to restart it after downloading an app, because nothing really hints at the necessity of having to do that. There is no button called "restart", iTunes doesn't ask to do this, the device doesn't pop up a window suggesting it. The whole device is designed for "users" who want to have as little as possible with the inner workings (unless you JB it). So, naturally, the vast majority of the iDevices owners are clueless users who don't know much about the technical side of things. They could still read the desc, of course, but I just looked at some larger, popular apps and none of them recommends a device restart in the description. So how does Joe User really know about this? Forums? Forums are for geeks. People who have their secretary buy them an iPad so they can play Angry Birds aren't going to sit with us on a message board mostly populated by nerds, geeks and gamers. (And don't diss the 12 year olds, they have access to the money of their parents and they make wonderful customers! ). Anyway, my point summarized is just that: It needs to be fixed by Apple, because you'll never get this in the heads of millions of people. Most of them don't care, aren't interested, don't want to have to deal with it. If an app crashes after installation, they'll rate it at on star, because for them it didn't work. But we don't really disagree on anything here, really. I've just settled for the realization that the service provider (company, publisher, vendor etc.) has to adjust to the customer, not the customer to the service provider.
Whenever I put in the description telling people to reboot, Apple will reject my app and tell me to remove it from the description. They don't want people to know that their device isn't perfect. I wish there was an option for a game to reboot the device and then immediately start.
Interesting obviously it's possible for software to free some Ram up itself, like the app I mentioned earlier so what stops a game maker from doing something similar once the game is initialized, ok it may add a bit to the loading but I don't see why it couldn't be done. Then again I'm not an IOS developer so maybe there are valid reasons. I think at heart though it's an apple created problem both in the operating system, hardware and the way they have implementing multitasking doesn't help, I hate having to manually go through the dock closing everything. Hopefully the next devices add about a gb to match the newer android phones, I've a feeling 512mb will probably be pushed instead though, then again the amount of Ram isn't as important as how the device uses it.
