Spoiler: I’ve been having more fun than expected.

I can’t resist. When certain devices start being called ‘vintage’ or just plain ‘obsolete’ and ‘useless’, something clicks inside me. Little by little, there’s this urge to take a closer look at such devices: Let’s see how useless they really are. In the case of the first-generation iPad (which I’ll henceforth refer to as “iPad 1”), my interest came mainly from a UI investigation perspective. I’m still doing research for a little project on iOS’s user interface, so I’m looking for iOS devices where I can see past versions of iOS directly in action. I already had a third-generation iPod touch running iOS 5.1.1, but I wanted to see it on a bigger screen, and the iPad 1 can’t go past iOS 5.1.1. So this was the main reason. I was also intrigued by the hardware design: like the first iPhone, the first iPad is different from all the models that came after. It’s thicker, with a slightly curved aluminium back. It has no cameras, not on the front, not on the back. I think it looks beautiful and clean:

Well, my excellent mate David was so kind and generous as to send me an iPad 1 about ten days ago. I was excited and really looking forward to exploring this eight-year-old model; I wanted to see whether I could get some use out of it. As I often say, I don’t like collecting stuff just to put it on a shelf and show to friends and acquaintances. I try to give a purpose to (almost) every device I own, and this iPad 1 was no different. 

A quick refresher before I proceed, so that you can have an idea of my starting point. 

• The iPad 1 was announced at the end of January 2010 and discontinued in March 2011.
• It is the heaviest of the 9.7″ iPads: it weighs 680 grams. The cellular version is even heavier: 730 grams. For comparison, the current 6th-generation iPad weighs 469 grams. The only iPad that’s heavier than the iPad 1 is the 12.9″ iPad Pro, which weighs 713 grams (Wi-Fi only model) and 723 grams (Wi-Fi & cellular), and both variants are still lighter than the cellular version of the iPad 1.
• It has a single core Apple A4 CPU. 256 MB of RAM. Wi-Fi 802.11n. Bluetooth 2.1+EDR. Display resolution is 1024×768. Pixel density is 132 ppi. It came in 16 GB, 32 GB, and 64 GB storage capacities. (Mine is a 16 GB, Wi-Fi unit)
• Original system software was iOS 3.2. Maximum is iOS 5.1.1.

Very first impressions

When I took the iPad 1 out of the padded envelope and bubble wrap in which it came (from California to Spain in two days — this iPad is fast), and held it in my hands, I was immediately surprised by how well it handled. I expected something heavier and a bit more cumbersome than my third-generation iPad; instead, the chunkier design of the iPad’s chassis makes for a steadier, stronger grip when you hold it. Also, the iPad 1 feels oddly lighter than the iPad 3. On paper, the weight difference between the two is negligible (according to the specs sheet, the iPad 3 is 28 grams lighter). When handling, the iPad 3 is certainly thinner but has the heaviness of a single block of material, if you know what I mean. It feels denser. On the other hand, the iPad 1 doesn’t necessarily feels hollower, but you get the impression that there’s more breathing room inside its chassis. The result is that the iPad 1 feels better to handle than the iPad 3 when you compare them without any protective case.

After taking the iPad 1 out of the packaging material, I pressed the power switch without really expecting it to turn on, but it still had 25% battery charge left, so after a few moments I was staring at a fresh installation of iOS 5.1.1, very similar to the stock iPad image you saw above. And here’s when I noticed another thing. Accustomed as I am to retina displays, I thought the iPad 1’s low screen resolution and pixel density would bother me. Strangely, that didn’t happen. This, I think, is due to the combination of two things: 1) the pre-iOS 7 user interface, and 2) holding the iPad at a normal reading distance. Because sure, if I move much closer I clearly see pixels everywhere and blurred fonts, etc., but when using the iPad normally, both the text and the interface elements are fine; nothing really different than staring at a non-retina external display when using the Mac. For comparison, when I take my wife’s iPad 2 — which has the exact same display as the iPad 1 — and look at the screen, the UI and text under iOS 9 look blurrier. This is a clear example of how unfit both the San Francisco system font and the flat design of iOS 7 and newer versions are for non-retina devices. 

Making it useful: a journey of discovery

After charging the iPad, and doing some basic customisation, I started my adventurous journey in search of third-party apps still working under iOS 5. So far, it has been a journey of unexpectedly positive surprises, alternating with “Oh, I really thought this would work” moments. But overall, I really can’t complain. 

One feature that’s been undoubtedly useful comes from the App Store itself, providing you with the ability of installing a previous version of the app you want that’s still compatible with the iOS version your device is running. Of course you’re out of luck in at least two cases:

1. The app you’re trying to install was first introduced under iOS 6 or later versions (duh);
2. The app developer decided to remove the old version of the app after a major update. In this case the response you get from the App Store app is something along the lines of This application requires iOS 8.0 or later. You must update to iOS 8.0 in order to download and use this application.

I’ve also run into a funny third case, where I could download a previous version of an app, but although it was listed as ‘compatible with iPad’, when I launched it I found myself staring at the not-iPad-optimised, tiny 1x iPhone interface. My guess is that in this case the app was fully optimised for the iPad’s bigger screen sometime after iOS 6 was out. And believe me, you don’t want to use the 2x magnified version of an app optimised for the old 320×480 iPhone display resolution. 

In my app hunt, I’ve also had a bit of luck. For even though some apps don’t have their iOS 5‑compatible versions available anymore through the App Store, I did have the old .ipa file stored locally, so I managed to install it anyway. To get into more detail, for those interested: Back in 2011, when I upgraded from my old iPhone 3G to the iPhone 4, I didn’t want to lose the ability to reinstall apps that worked under iOS 4.2.1 in case I had to restore the iPhone 3G. So I cloned the Mobile Applications folder of my main iTunes Library and transferred it to one of my PowerBook G4s. From then on, I used said PowerBook to manage apps and backups for the iPhone 3G and all the other older iOS devices I’ve been acquiring over time, being very careful not to update the apps from iTunes (though I have a full backup of the Mobile Applications folder with the older .ipa files, just in case).

While having its frustrating moments — the trial-and-error “Let’s see if this app can be installed/does work on the iPad 1” approach can be tedious — the journey has been fun overall. So let me just show you what I’ve managed to install on this iPad in the past ten days:

 

Some comments related to the apps:

1. Every app you saw in the above screenshots works, except for the iMDB app, which doesn’t fetch contents from the iMDB servers.

2. The apps that do work typically retain a 95–100% functionality. What does that mean? It means they work well for the most part, but may have some non-working features due to their age. For example, if they offer Dropbox sync, it may not work anymore because of deprecated APIs (iA Writer Classic is one of these apps, but local document storage and iCloud sync still work, so the app is still largely functional).

3. As mentioned previously, some of the apps you see come from installing the old .ipa file I still own and that I have kept in my archives. Surprisingly, though, the majority are apps I could install via the App Store thanks to the “Download last compatible version” option.

4. Something beautiful happened as I was searching my local app archive for suitable apps. I happened to unearth some discontinued apps, and apps that I had stopped using after a terrible redesign. What I didn’t expect is that they still worked. For example, in the second screen, you can see an app called Posts. This was a very nice WordPress client which at some point stopped working, maybe around the time iOS 7 came out (I honestly don’t remember), and was removed from the App Store. 

I had hoped the official WordPress app would improve (especially after acquiring the excellent Poster client) so I could use that to blog from my iPad, but its interface never clicked with me; I’ve always found it better for just reading my blogs’ WordPress statistics and little else. Left without viable alternatives, I basically stopped using the iPad to write and publish posts on my blogs — in this regard, it was reduced to a note-taker. I would write my posts on the Mac using MarsEdit.

Imagine my surprise when, after installing Posts on the iPad 1 and entering the credentials to access my System Folder blog settings, the app started syncing and working as if time hadn’t passed:

Now, you may not like the interface guidelines for iOS versions prior to 7, or even the general look of older apps before iOS 7 came and flattened everything. I could write a book about how the pre-iOS 7 user interface was more consistent, better conceived, more user-friendly, but I guess in the end it’s all a matter of personal taste, so I won’t argue. But trust me when I say that Posts was really a nice, functional WordPress client. Now that I realised I can still use it on this iPad 1, I may even go back to writing more on the iPad. That I had to go back to move forward in this regard is, well, pretty incredible.

Another favourite app that stopped working under iOS 7 is Planetary, which is one of the most original takes when it comes to designing a music player interface. But since this is iOS 5, the app works perfectly (and its interface isn’t dated at all, by the way):

Another pleasant surprise was having Penultimate’s old design back. Penultimate was my absolute favourite handwriting note-taking + sketching app back then (read this review on AppStorm from 2011 to get a better idea), but then Evernote acquired it, and later launched a rethought version which made the app lose a lot of its usefulness and charm. Again, you may disagree with me, and you may think that all the old, skeuomorphic apps deserve good riddance. I actually think that there are many, many examples of skeuomorphism done right that make the overall experience nicer and more fun. The old design for Penultimate is one of these examples:

 

5. As you can see, I’ve ended up with a good mix of still useful apps, which manage to cover a surprisingly wide range of tasks:

• Cloud services — The Dropbox, Box, and Simplenote apps still work and sync correctly. Let’s hope it lasts. ClouDrop is a CloudApp third-party client, and it still works too.
• Music apps — The official Spotify client still works, and I even like its UI better than the current version (more on this later). Planetary and Groove are two very nice music players. Groove is one of the rare apps with a good pre-iOS 7 interface, and a good post-iOS 7 interface. But even if you stick with Apple’s own Music app, it’s simpler, cleaner, more pleasant to use than the current iteration. And for making music, while I was disappointed that I couldn’t download an older, suitable version of Apple’s GarageBand, I was pleased to find out that older versions of Novation Launchkey and Propellerhead’s Figure do indeed work.
• Podcast apps — So far, I haven’t made many attempts at finding a third-party app that still works under iOS 5. Apple’s own Podcasts does the job, and if you, like me, loved the tape reel interface, it’s back in all its glory. Finding a good app to listen to Internet radio stations has proven to be harder than anticipated. So far, the old Tuner app seems to work, but a lot of streams return errors.
• Video-related apps — The official YouTube client still works. There is a reminder that the app is obsolete and ‘may stop working in the near future’, but for now it works. Same for VLC. (The YouTube app Apple used to include in the first iterations of iOS is now useless, instead).
• Writing and Productivity — Let’s see, there are iA Writer Classic, TaskPaper (for notes, documents, tasks, etc.), WriteRoom (from the same developer of TaskPaper — I haven’t installed it yet, but it should work), Documents by Readdle (still one of my favourite document viewers), Phraseology and Terminology (a writing app and a dictionary, both from Agile Tortoise, both very nice apps with a clear, friendly interface); the already mentioned Posts and Penultimate; and Dragon Dictation, which works surprisingly well and understands me better than Siri.
• RSS feed readers and related apps — Newsify and Slow Feeds (which is now called Web Subscriber) both work great, and now that Feedly has fixed an issue with the authentication page, a lot of older apps with Feedly integration have regained functionality. Instapaper, too, works without problems.
• News — Flipboard works, and while the old interface isn’t that much different from the current one, I was surprised at how responsive it is, especially when compared with Flipboard on my iPad 3 under iOS 9. The old AP Mobile app from the Associated Press works as well. There are probably other apps in this category out there that still work, but I haven’t searched much, admittedly.
• Weather — Finding working apps that also look decent was unexpectedly difficult. Usual suspects like AccuWeather or The Weather Channel or Weather Underground — apps I knew have been around for a long time — all required more recent iOS versions to work. The three apps you see in the screenshots above — Weather 2x, Weather Motion HD, and Weather HD Classic (both display as “Weather HD”) — are pretty much all I could find after a bit of searching. Weather HD Classic is my favourite of the three, and it also seems to be the most accurate.
• Web browsing — Safari is decent, but it’s old. Sometimes it doesn’t handle modern, bloated websites very well. Other two working alternatives are Chrome and Opera Coast. Chrome seems to be the best and most stable option.
• Maps — The original Google Maps that came built in iOS 5 still works fine, but doesn’t display transit information (at least in my area): you only get walking and driving directions when you want to investigate how to reach some destination. Maps+ has nicer touches, but offers little more than Google Maps, feature-wise, and doesn’t have transit information either. I’m still searching for a good solution here, but these two apps are a decent starting point to find your way around (no pun intended).
• Utilities — For communications, it’s great to see that Scotty and Panic’s Prompt still work. Scotty can be used to wirelessly transfer files between iOS and Mac devices, and between iOS devices (if you’re using an older version of the app; this feature was sadly removed in the last update); it’s simple, fast, and does its job well. Prompt is a SSH client by the good folks at Panic. They have released Prompt 2, so you won’t find the older version on the App Store. I had it stored locally, since I had purchased it a long time ago. Speaking of Panic, I didn’t expect Status Board to work, probably because I mistakenly thought it was a much more recent app. It’s an old iteration of the app, but it appears to be working well. I was also very happy to be able to install an older version of Edovia’s TouchPad, because it’s quite useful to be able to use an iPad as a big Trackpad and as a wireless keyboard/media remote for the Mac if necessary (i.e., when all USB ports are in use, and I can’t resort to other wireless input devices). WolframAlpha is another good addition, though I had to look at a suitable version for the iPad 1 in my locally-stored apps.
• Graphics — For sketching, drawing, retouching, editing, I’ve assembled some essentials which should cover basic needs: Penultimate, Skitch, Snapseed, Adobe Photoshop Express, Paintbook, Brushes, and Pix. I was able to install an older version of Diptic, too, which I typically use to create photo compositions or to show screenshots side by side.
• Social Networking — This has been, by far, the most disappointing experience; but given how fast social networks and related services move today, it was also expected. I don’t care about Facebook, so I don’t know whether its client and apps work or not on the iPad 1. As for Twitter, its official client doesn’t work (it doesn’t load anything). Using a browser to check the mobile version of Twitter is doable, but for some strange reason Twitter seems to be serving a crappier-looking Web interface when it detects you’re using an old device (or an old browser).

  The only viable option for me was to resort to Twitterrific, which still delivers a great experience, but with some limitations: 280-character tweets are not supported in this older version of the app (and when you read the timeline, tweets longer than 140 characters are truncated and displayed with a link to the original tweet); and it appears you cannot add more than one photo when you tweet. Other third-party clients don’t seem to work (e.g. Echofon, as something goes wrong during authorisation). I wish I had the old Tweetbot 2 to try out, but it’s no longer on the App Store, and I don’t have an old copy of the file in my archives. At the moment, Twitterrific looks like the only option for a good Twitter experience on an iPad 1.

• Games — I’m such a casual iOS gamer that I still haven’t explored the options in this category, also perhaps because ‘Games’ is by far the biggest category of iOS apps. So far I’ve only installed Drop7, which was one of the first puzzle games I got addicted to back in the day. I’ve been told that Kometen is a beautiful, inexpensive game that only requires iOS 3.0 or later; and that an older, compatible version of Machinarium can still be installed (hat tip to Nicola and Angelo, respectively). Another classic is Deep Green Chess: it now requires iOS 7, but you can install an older, compatible version via the App Store without issues. I’m sure there are many other good games out there: feel free to send suggestions on Twitter if you still use an old iOS device for gaming.

The iPad 1 and iOS 5 experience in 2018 — further observations

Performance

This is where I was most blown away by the iPad 1. Of course, everything is relative. If my daily driver were any iPad model newer than an iPad Air, how this iPad 1 behaves would be nothing to write home about. But since my main iPad is a third-generation iPad with iOS 9.3.5, when it comes to responsiveness, animations, transitions, even switching from an app to another (yes, iOS 5 had multitasking), the iPad 1 felt noticeably snappier than the iPad 3. And where it wasn’t actually snappier, it definitely felt… less overwhelmed. 

On paper, this shouldn’t be possible: the iPad 3 has a dual-core A5X processor, while the iPad 1 has a single-core A4. The iPad 3 has four times the amount of RAM (1 GB vs. 256 MB). Evidently it’s all in the software optimisation, and how well the two iPads manage their memory and resources. Once again I was reminded of how wrong Apple was in allowing the iPad 3 to update to iOS 9. Not to mention the iPad 2 which, in this informal comparison, was noticeably the most sluggish of the three and the worst performer.

Sure, given the small amount of RAM, when switching from an app to another the iPad 1 had to reload more content than the iPad 2 and iPad 3, but somehow it was also faster at doing so; while my iPad 3 was quicker at presenting me an app’s state when returning to it, I also had to wait a bit before the app was actually ready to accept taps and interactions. This creates a frustratingly stuttering pace when multitasking. On the iPad 1, such transition felt more organic and homogeneous, for lack of a better term.

Another performance-related detail worth mentioning: this iPad 1 still has a tremendous battery life. I’m certain that how well a device fares in this department depends on how it has been treated, and I guess this iPad has been treated very well. Still, my iPad 3 on a full charge and in normal daily use lasts one day and the following morning. This iPad 1 under the same conditions lasts two full days and then some. One thing I’ve noticed is how well the battery behaves while the iPad is in standby. One day I left it on the table with the battery at 47%. When I picked it up again a few hours later, the battery indicator was at 46%. My iPad 3 loses more percent points of battery life while idling. 

Interface considerations

The deep, system-wide UI redesign that came with iOS 7 in 2013 gave a lighter feel to the whole interface. Lots of white space, a thinner variant of the Helvetica system font, and a flatter look for all graphic elements. I remember how polarised pundits and users were at the time. Some hated the iOS 7 look right away. Some couldn’t stand to look at iOS 6 and earlier anymore. I instantly loved the interface refresh, but I also recognised its immaturity in a few places where its usability left a bit to be desired when compared to the iOS 6 æsthetics. In short, I loved iOS 7 at once; but I still loved iOS 6 and earlier. 

Again, when it comes to visuals it’s ultimately a matter of personal taste, but one thing iOS’s user interface possessed before iOS 7’s flattening treatment was consistence and more robust, coherent, stricter interface guidelines. Guidelines that were followed by third-party developers more closely, and the result was that under iOS 6 and earlier versions, third-party apps presented a user interface that was cleaner, more predictable, easier to navigate than what came afterwards, update after update. After iOS’s UI got flatter, when it came to designing apps, things got out of hand, in an ‘anything goes’ fashion.

There are apps today with poor discoverability, ambiguous controls, UI elements whose state or function isn’t immediately clear — i.e. you cannot tell whether they’re tappable or not simply by looking at them; whereas before iOS 7, a button looked like a button right away, and you didn’t have to explore an app by tapping blindly here and there. Spotify is the first example coming to mind: its early iOS and Mac clients were more usable and had a better interface. Look at the Playlists view under iOS 5:

The visual architecture of panes and the element hierarchy are clear. Every control is immediately recognisable and you know where to tap just by glancing at the UI. The colour scheme is more thoughtful. The various panes and sections are more clearly defined, which helps when navigating the app. The typography — while being more ‘boring’ and adherent to the OS default — is also more efficient and legible.

Look at the Search Results page now:

It takes cues from the pre-iOS 7 Spotlight search interface. The various fields — Artists, Albums, Tracks — are well separated by subtle dividers and background colour changes. The artwork is big enough to be easily recognisable. Overall, yes, the interface has a utilitarian character and isn’t quite imaginative or edgy, but that’s the whole point of an app which basically consists of music discovery: it has to be user-friendly and help users find things. Over time, Spotify’s UI has become more complex — in most areas, unnecessarily so.

I could make other examples, but they wouldn’t be much different. During my trip down Interface Memory Lane these days with the iPad 1, I’ve stumbled on many other cases, and the result was always more or less the same: I found the old version of an app to have a more usable interface and a clearer interface language than its current counterpart. Despite all the pre-iOS 7 skeuomorphism, for many app interfaces of that time design was truly ‘how it works’. Today, more and more often (and it’s not only with iOS) I see examples where design is simply ‘how it looks’; attractive apps, but with ambiguous interface controls, poorly-designed UI architecture, and sometimes even with little to no accessibility, disregarding users with disabilities.

Usefulness

I’ll be honest: I didn’t expect much from an eight-year-old iPad in the usefulness department. I expected it to be severely challenged performance-wise. I expected it to be sluggish, laggy, unable to play modern videos, and so on. The iPad 1 completely caught me by surprise on practically every front. I was able to find many more working apps than I could have imagined. The iPad’s responsiveness was unexpected. I’ve watched a few YouTube videos with the official client, and playback was excellent (the only problem was with subtitles, which couldn’t be displayed). Even the iPad’s speaker sounded louder and clearer than my iPad 3’s. 

But the best test to prove whether the iPad 1 could still be useful eight year after its introduction, was also the simplest: I’ve brought the iPad 1 with me while out and about, leaving the trusty iPad 3 at home, and tried to accomplish the same things and carry out the same tasks I do on the iPad 3. It turns out that I didn’t miss the iPad 3 or iOS 9 that much. I could check Twitter, read my feeds, handle emails, browse the Web, check the weather, take notes, edit and annotate a few screenshots (Skitch is another example of ‘How great the UI was before’), upload some documents in Box and Dropbox, listen to music… Sure, I missed having an updated Google Maps for transit information, I missed certain specific apps, and a more complete Twitter experience, among other little things; but if I have to quantify this iPad 1’s usefulness at the end of the day, it still gets a solid 70–80% — which is awesome when you don’t expect more than 40%.

Another thing that struck me has been how very little I missed all the stuff Apple has added to complicate iOS’s user interface. Notifications were so few that I checked Notification Centre maybe twice in ten days (I know, push notifications have stopped working in some older apps, but still); Control Centre was missed more, but I quickly remembered how to reach the controls in the old way, and so its absence didn’t bother me that much. Today View… who cares? The uncomfortable truth is that iOS 5 had a great balance of simplicity and efficiency, a degree of straightforwardness in gestures and navigation, that got lost iteration after iteration. Today, you can do more with iOS 11 on an iPad, but the OS has become more complicated, less immediate, with a more complex (and at times opaque) gesture language, and a more stratified user interface. The tradeoffs of progress, I presume.

But for me, the most striking thing is this: if you look at this graph Apple showed when introducing the iPad Pro, you can clearly see how exponentially the CPU and GPU performance has grown in just a few years: 

Yet, what I’ve realised these past days while using the iPad 1 as my main iPad, is that if I had to draw a similar graph to indicate how much its usefulness has grown in the same time interval, the curve wouldn’t be equally dramatic. Really, the range of applications (in the sense of use cases) hasn’t expanded that exponentially, despite the increase in raw processing power and the better specifications of every iPad that has come after the first one these last eight years. This iPad 1 is definitely slower and can’t keep up where processor-intensive operations are required, no doubt, but the biggest blow to its usefulness today comes more from the dropped software and services support. And yet, whenever you find an app or service that still works under iOS 5 the same way it works on a modern iPad, then the iPad 1 suddenly gains usefulness points. Maybe the ‘Megahertz myth’ can be applied to iOS devices too?

In short — this iPad 1 has turned out to be more useful than anticipated, also thanks to the careful app setup I’ve assembled. On a personal level, the fact that I can go back and enjoy certain apps I had been missing (such as Posts, the WordPress client) makes the iPad 1 possibly more useful than my iPad 3 in certain areas.

Conclusion — It’s fun

Despite the sheer length of this piece (my apologies, folks), the message I wanted to convey is that it’s been a fun experience so far, and continues to be fun. It’s fun to rediscover the thrill of the first iPad. It’s fun to get back to that rabbit hole that is hunting for apps, quality apps that could still work on this iPad under iOS 5. In fact, I’ve never browsed the App Store this much in recent times. An even better resource has been Appshopper (even its old iOS app still works fine), and I’m also truly grateful to all the people who contributed to the AppStorm network for keeping online the archives of published articles and reviews. It has been a helpful resource for finding older, but still useful apps — if not for the iPad 1, at least for my other vintage iOS devices running iOS 6 and iOS 7. But most importantly, it’s fun being able to put this eight-year-old iPad to good use.

And last but not least, thanks again to David for gifting me the iPad 1 in the first place!