New iPad Notes: Battery Charging at 100%, Safari Scaling Images

A couple of new findings as people spend more time with their new iPads. First, iLounge reports on findings by DisplayMate on the new iPads charging behavior. It turns out the iPad continues to charge for as long as an hour after it says its at 100%, suggesting the on-screen indicator isn't quite accurate and may still need more charging.

In an email exchange with iLounge, DisplayMate President Ray Soneira indicated that the third-generation iPad—when connected to power via the included Apple 10W Power Adapter—actually continued to draw 10W of power for up to one hour after reaching what is reported by iOS as a full 100% charge

iLounge found in their battery testing of the new iPad that sometimes the charge would drop initially quickly when they thought the iPad was fully charged.

Earlier in the week, Tom's Hardware noticed that Safari on the new iPad was automatically scaling large images down significantly.

comparison
Large images were automatically scaled down to near 1 megapixel resolutions. This means that if you are viewing large images through Safari, you aren't getting the full Retina experience. A workaround mentioned is to save the image to Photos which seems to preserve the original resolution.

These findings were confirmed by web developer Duncan Davidson who ran into the limit when trying to enhance his websites with Retina-sized images.

Popular Stories

Apple Wallet ID Illinois

Apple Plans to Expand iPhone Driver's Licenses to These 7 U.S. States

Wednesday December 24, 2025 8:40 am PST by
In select U.S. states, residents can add their driver's license or state ID to the Apple Wallet app on the iPhone and Apple Watch, and then use it to display proof of identity or age at select airports and businesses, and in select apps. The feature is currently available in 13 U.S. states and Puerto Rico, and it is expected to launch in at least seven more in the future. To set up the...
iPhone Top Left Hole Punch Face ID Feature Purple

iPhone 18 Pro Launching Next Year With These 12 New Features

Tuesday December 23, 2025 8:36 am PST by
While the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max are not expected to launch for another nine months, there are already plenty of rumors about the devices. Below, we have recapped 12 features rumored for the iPhone 18 Pro models. The same overall design is expected, with 6.3-inch and 6.9-inch display sizes, and a "plateau" housing three rear cameras Under-screen Face ID Front camera in...
maxresdefault

Where's the New Apple TV?

Monday December 22, 2025 11:30 am PST by
Apple hasn't updated the Apple TV 4K since 2022, and 2025 was supposed to be the year that we got a refresh. There were rumors suggesting Apple would release the new Apple TV before the end of 2025, but it looks like that's not going to happen now. Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more videos. Bloomberg's Mark Gurman said several times across 2024 and 2025 that Apple would...
maxresdefault

10 Mac Apps Worth Trying in 2026

Wednesday December 24, 2025 9:27 am PST by
2026 is almost upon us, and a new year is a good time to try out some new apps. We've rounded up 10 excellent Mac apps that are worth checking out. Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more videos. Alt-Tab (Free) - Alt-Tab brings a Windows-style alt + tab thumbnail preview option to the Mac. You can see a full window preview of open apps and app windows. One Thing (Free) -...
iOS 26

iOS 26.2 Adds These 8 New Features to Your iPhone

Monday December 22, 2025 8:47 am PST by
Earlier this month, Apple released iOS 26.2, following more than a month of beta testing. It is a big update, with many new features and changes for iPhones. iOS 26.2 adds a Liquid Glass slider for the Lock Screen's clock, offline lyrics in Apple Music, and more. Below, we have highlighted a total of eight new features. Liquid Glass Slider on Lock Screen A new slider in the Lock...
airpods color prototypes

Apple Tested AirPods in Bright Colors

Saturday December 27, 2025 6:06 am PST by
Apple reportedly tested a version of the first-generation AirPods with bright, iPhone 5c-like colored charging cases. The images, shared by the Apple leaker and prototype collector known as "Kosutami," claim to show first-generation AirPods prototypes with pink and yellow exterior casings. The interior of the charging case and the earbuds themselves remain white. They seem close to some...
iPhone Fold Vertical Feature

Why Apple's Foldable iPhone May Be Smaller Than Expected

Tuesday December 23, 2025 5:21 am PST by
Apple's first foldable iPhone, rumored for release next year, may turn out to be smaller than most people imagine, if a recent report is anything to go by. According to The Information, the outer display on the book-style device will measure just 5.3 inches – that's smaller than the 5.4-inch screen on the ‌iPhone‌ mini, a line Apple discontinued in 2022 due to poor sales. The report has led ...
iPhone SE Cosmopolitan Clean

Apple Discontinued These 25 Products This Year

Wednesday December 24, 2025 7:24 am PST by
With the end of 2025 near, the time has come to look back at the devices and accessories that Apple discontinued throughout the year. Most of the products that were discontinued this year were simply replaced by a new model with an updated chip. However, the iPhone SE line was entirely discontinued when the iPhone 16e launched, and the iPhone Plus line is being phased out. Below, we have...
Foldable iPhone 2023 Feature Iridescent Search

Samsung Developing 'Wide Fold' With iPhone Fold-Like Design Ahead of Apple's 2026 Launch

Tuesday December 23, 2025 11:55 am PST by
Samsung is working on a new foldable smartphone that's wider and shorter than the models that it's released before, according to Korean news site ETNews. The "Wide Fold" will compete with Apple's iPhone Fold that's set to launch in September 2026. Samsung's existing Galaxy Z Fold7 display is 6.5 inches when closed, and 8 inches when open, with a 21:9 aspect ratio when folded and a 20:18...

Top Rated Comments

Lordskelic Avatar
180 months ago
What's the point of the retina display if the images are just going to be scaled down? Didn't apple think about this before they released the iPad 3rd Generation?
Score: 14 Votes (Like | Disagree)
slicecom Avatar
180 months ago
The Safari scaling issue is infuriating when looking for wallpapers. You simply can't look for them in your iPad because they're compressed to hell and scaled down to 1024x1024, you have to look for them on a computer, then transfer them to your iPad. I hope they fix this.
Score: 9 Votes (Like | Disagree)
kolax Avatar
180 months ago
What's the reason for the large images being scaled down? iOS bug?

EDIT: For those who say it is for memory, cellular reasons or speed of the web browser, the iPad 3 is meant for high resolution images. If there's one available, and you are on WiFi, then why restrain it. It does have 1GB of memory..

This makes sense on other iOS devices, but the iPad 3's selling point is the retina display. Seems daft to downscale images below the 3 megapixel screen the iPad 3 has when a WiFi connection is available along with enough memory.
Score: 8 Votes (Like | Disagree)
rmwebs Avatar
180 months ago
Probably Safari scales images on the server side (like an Apple proxy, as Opera does with its Opera Mini "turbo mode"). This may be one more agreement between Apple and carriers to keep low bandwidth usage.

No. Wifi content does not go through a proxy. This is built into the Safari app.
Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Riemann Zeta Avatar
180 months ago
Expecting a mobile device (even one with 1GB of RAM) to be able to render 10-80 MPixel images is a little nuts. Even if we ignore the download bandwidth, the GPU itself doesn't have the memory or the bus throughput needed to render such a large image to framebuffer.

As for the battery, I think the meter is wildly inaccurate for iOS 5.1 on the iPad 3. Apple will need to calibrate it better in the 5.1.1 update that is soon to follow.
Score: 5 Votes (Like | Disagree)
palouf Avatar
180 months ago
Images in Ios safari were already downgraded, is it the same issue Here

Hi all,

I remember having trouble reading an online comic because some strips were bigger than 2Mega Pixels, the image was unsharp, as if the number of pixels was reduced to 1/4th (was confirmed on the ios Safari specifications doc)

is'nt it the same kind of behaviour ?

update: https://developer.apple.com/library/safari/#documentation/appleapplications/reference/safariwebcontent/CreatingContentforSafarioniPhone/CreatingContentforSafarioniPhone.html (https://developer.apple.com/library/safari/#documentation/appleapplications/reference/safariwebcontent/CreatingContentforSafarioniPhone/CreatingContentforSafarioniPhone.html)

Know iOS Resource Limits

Your webpage performing well on the desktop is no guarantee that it will perform well on iOS. Keep in mind that iOS uses EDGE (lower bandwidth, higher latency), 3G (higher bandwidth, higher latency), and Wi-Fi (higher bandwidth, lower latency) to connect to the Internet. Therefore, you need to minimize the size of your webpage. Including unused or unnecessary images, CSS, and JavaScript in your webpages adversely affects your site’s performance on iOS.

Because of the memory available on iOS, there are limits on the number of resources it can process:

The maximum size for decoded GIF, PNG, and TIFF images is 3 megapixels for devices with less than 256 MB RAM and 5 megapixels for devices with greater or equal than 256 MB RAM.

That is, ensure that width * height ≤ 3 * 1024 * 1024 for devices with less than 256 MB RAM. Note that the decoded size is far larger than the encoded size of an image.

The maximum decoded image size for JPEG is 32 megapixels using subsampling.

JPEG images can be up to 32 megapixels due to subsampling, which allows JPEG images to decode to a size that has one sixteenth the number of pixels. JPEG images larger than 2 megapixels are subsampled—that is, decoded to a reduced size. JPEG subsampling allows the user to view images from the latest digital cameras.
Score: 5 Votes (Like | Disagree)