If you read iDevice.ro yesterday, then you probably learned that iOS 5 may be incompatiblel with iPhone 3GS since launch. The information came from a fairly well-informed person who in the past did not have much valid information about Apple products. Regardless of whether the rumor launched by him will be true or not, I think it is good to review some advantages or disadvantages of the compatibility between iOS 5 and iPhone 3GS.
Let's start with the advantages. There are many iPhone 3GS owners, the terminal is available for purchase, so Apple should logically make iOS 5 compatible with it. Offering iOS 5 to 3GS owners would save Apple from scandals caused by those who recently bought the terminal and are now forced to buy a newer model to run the latest version of the operating system. Offering iOS 5 for 3GS widens the base of consumers who have access to the new applications from the AppStore, and be sure that applications that require iOS 5 will be available from July - August, if iOS 5 will be released in June. A new operating system that runs on several models of iPhone terminals is a reason for praise for Apple and I don't think they will miss such an opportunity.
Let's see what disadvantages there would be. iOS 5 will of course require quite powerful hardware to run without problems and the iPhone 3GS does not have such a thing. The RAM and the processor are the weak point and the 3GS will become a kind of iPhone 3G, that is, it will run iOS 5 very hard even if it will be severely limited in terms of the possibility of using certain functions. For Apple, there would be problems with the complaints of customers who cannot use iOS 5 properly on the iPhone 3GS due to limitations and performance problems, and this will lead to a lawsuit against Apple. Fragmentation is of course a big enough problem for developers who will have to provide support for old terminals with weak hardware, but for now Apple has solved this problem without much effort.
iPhone 3GS is EOL, i.e. end of life, production should come to an end, if it hasn't already. As soon as the iPhone 5 is available in stores, the iPhone 3GS will be discontinued and the iPhone 4 will take its place. The iPhone 3GS will not run iOS 5 as well as the iPhone 4/5 and you should be aware of this. The hardware will severely limit performance and probably many of you will choose to stay with iOS 4 instead of installing iOS 5.
