The iPhone and iPod Touch are for all intents and purposes handheld computers with mobile processors, memory and storage space, just like a real computer would have.  And, just like a real computer, it should be shut down every once in a while for best performance.

In the case of the iPhone, this will prevent it from fetching updated emails when you’re on a “roaming” or foreign network and in the case of the iPod Touch doing so will get you improved performance.

If you have a lot of songs on your iPod Touch, it’s almost as if going through your play list stores a cache of the songs you’ve played which stays in resident memory, even when it’s “off.”  With a large library of songs this is detrimental to the performance of the device.

Some iPod Touch owners have noticed that while playing large play lists or in “shuffle” mode, the iPod will stop playing music and return to the “home” screen.  Odd behavior to be sure but it’s almost as if the iPod has run out of memory and closes the music application to clear it.  But, some form of cache must still be saved because you will be able to play fewer and fewer songs before it exhibits the same behavior again.

By default when you “turn off” the iPod Touch, it goes in to a standby mode which maintains the device’s memory (RAM) just like a laptop would.  You wouldn’t go a week or longer without shutting down your laptop or desktop completely and the same holds true for the iPod.

You need to shut it down completely every so often to “clear” the memory/cache of songs.  To do so, press and hold the power button on top of the unit until “Slide to power off” is displayed, do so.  The only side effect of this is it will take longer to “startup” when you turn it back on, just like a real computer would.

My guess is that since the iPod Touch/iPhone run a mobile version of OSX that exiting the applications doesn’t really close them and they are still left running in memory, just like when an application is “closed” on the real OSX it is left running.  This was probably not a good design decision for a mobile device with more limitations on memory.  If that is the case and I’m not saying it is; superficially that appears to be the case.

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Related:

FlyTunes, streaming audio for your iPhone, iPod Touch

Turn your iPhone or iPod Touch into a wireless touchpad for your PC or Mac

iPod Touch bests iPhone’s internal design, costs $155 to make

Apple’s iPod Nano, iPod Touch have a burning problem

Slingplayer hitting iPhone / iPod Touch?

Entry was posted on Saturday, March 22nd, 2008 at 7:21 am under How-to, iPod Touch.  Print This Post

Read more entries by Jonathan Schlaffer.