Phone Systems: Confirmed: iPhone 4 Has 512MB of RAM--Double the iPad, iPhone 3GS

According to MacRumors, iPhone developers were told last week of the memory boost at Apple's annual developers conference, where CEO Steve Jobs unveiled the iPhone. The new model is slated to go on sale June 24.

The first two models -- 2007's original iPhone

The first two models -- 2007's original iPhone and 2008's iPhone 3G -- sported 128MB of system memory. Last year, however, Apple doubled that to 256MB in the iPhone 3GS.

This is really about allowing [iOS 4's] limited multitasking to actually have a robust performance, said Vronko. With only 256MB, the iPhone would waste a lot of time and battery power managing memory [during multitasking]. This definitely helps, and will let you keep more apps in the background without affecting battery life.

In iOS 4, which will launch on Monday, software like Skype or Pandora will be able to take incoming VoIP calls or play tunes while other applications are in the forefront. The mobile operating system upgrade will also let users quickly switch between in-memory applications using an app tray that appears when users double-tap the iPhone's home button.

256MB of system memory will still be pretty robust, said Vronko, but the iPhone 4's doubling means that it will seem snappier, be able to keep more programs in memory for instant access and, most importantly, eat up less battery power. That's because it won't have to swap out sections of system memory to the smartphone's flash RAM-based storage space.

The 256MB mark appears to be the minimum required for iOS 4 to multitask; while iPhone 3G owners can upgrade their phones to the new OS, they won't get multitasking.

By bumping up memory to 512MB, Apple leaves the door open to later expanding the iPhone 4's multitasking abilities. The bigger issue is that this lets Apple release, maybe gradually, as it has always done with the iPhone, more functionality, said Vronko. It can provide more [multitasking] APIs, maybe this year, maybe a year from now, that allow for more resource-hungry multitasking.

But Apple can better manage the memory it has in the iPhone with its centralized memory management than can Android phones, Vronko claimed. The difference isn't huge -- Vronko estimated that iPhone apps require 10%-20% less memory than similar Android software -- but every little bit helps.