Apple Adding iPad 2 to Vintage and Obsolete Products List on April 30

Monday April 15, 2019 11:37 AM PDT by Joe Rossignol
Apple will be adding all iPad 2 models to its vintage and obsolete products list on April 30, according to an internal memo obtained by MacRumors.


Apple defines vintage products as those that were last manufactured more than five years ago. The iPad 2, originally released in March 2011, lived on as a lower-cost option until March 2014, complete with a 9.7-inch display with just 132 PPI, an A5 chip, and a whopping 0.7-megapixel rear camera.

What this means is that the iPad 2 will no longer be eligible for service at the Genius Bar or Apple Authorized Service Providers as of the end of the month. It's pretty impressive that this is just happening now, considering that the iPad 2 is over eight years old. It even has a 30-pin dock connector still.

The only exceptions will be in California and Turkey, where due to local laws, Apple will continue to service the iPad 2 until March 2021. At the time, the iPad 2 will finally go from "vintage" to "obsolete" worldwide.

Tag: vintage and obsolete
48 comments


Top Rated Comments

(View all)
Avatar
B4U
18 weeks ago
Funny thing is, the iPad 3 was vintage before iPad 2.
Still kind of upset what Apple did with iPad 3.
Rating: 5 Votes
Avatar
Unity451
18 weeks ago
My iPad 2 definitely feels Vintage and Obsolete... :(

'bout the only thing my iPad 2 is good for these days...

Rating: 5 Votes
Avatar
macduke
18 weeks ago
TBH I'm surprised that it's not already obsolete. I remember it feeling leaps and bounds faster than my original iPad. That 512MB RAM was like manna from heaven. But after only a few years it was crawling along worse than the original. It would have really benefited from some of the iOS optimizations in recent years—if only it could run them.
Rating: 3 Votes
Avatar
Avenged110
18 weeks ago
I still use my iPad 2 as an alarm clock with iOS 6. It's actually pretty great because I only have to charge it twice a year haha.
Rating: 3 Votes
Avatar
udontno
18 weeks ago

I got the impression that the iPad 2 was sold into schools and/or corporations for use in specific tasks, with the understanding (possibly enforced by contracts) that it would have a very long life. It remained on sale for a lot longer past introduction than many other iOS devices.

We have over a 100 of these left in my 1:1 elementary school... all are being sold at the end of the year and I cannot wait to get rid of every last one of them. So painful.

I have 6 in my library and they will be replaced with hand-me-down 2014 iPad Airs, which will be a heck of a lot better.
Rating: 3 Votes
Avatar
blasto2236
18 weeks ago
Good night, sweet prince.
Rating: 3 Votes
Avatar
bodonnell202
18 weeks ago

i really hate this move by apple, i understand that it gets to a point that the device can’t be supported any more because the hardware will be old and obsolete, then it it will run the latest software very slow, or it might not run at all, but at least let the hardware have a honorable death instead if just killing it because it reach certain age, apple strategy forcing people to upgrade and buy new devices, mean while you can install mojave even on a core 2 duo and run it at a considerable acceptable speed, if you use an SSD , yes the core 2 duo can be nirmally use up to High Sierra but by only using one file from High Sierra ob Mojave you can run mojave on a core 2 duo and that CPU is more than 10 years old, so how can a 5 year old pc or device can be obsolete, they don’t even try or test fir compability, they simply discard the device, add it to the black list list, call it a day and let just wait untill our beloved apple fans buy new devices

you guys can clap now

is all right Tim i already have the latest Mac Pro, one that i build myself, worth every penny, fully upgradable with water cooling

This just means that Apple will no longer be offering repairs to them, but doesn't necessarily mean you can't have it repaired by a 3rd party vendor and/or get parts from 3rd party vendors to complete repairs yourself. From the software side it hasn't received software updates since fall 2017 but you can continue to use it for as long as you like (i.e. Apple didn't kill anything).
Rating: 3 Votes
Avatar
Jeaz
18 weeks ago
Thought for a sec this was for the iPad Air 2 and went WTF. But then realised it's for the actual iPad 2. Ah the memories queueing for that one, long time ago. Fully understandable they pull the plug on it.
Rating: 2 Votes
Avatar
gsurf123
18 weeks ago

TBH I'm surprised that it's not already obsolete. I remember it feeling leaps and bounds faster than my original iPad. That 512MB RAM was like manna from heaven. But after only a few years it was crawling along worse than the original. It would have really benefited from some of the iOS optimizations in recent years—if only it could run them.


The references to memory size are of zero value as you have no idea if the iPad would have been any better with 1GB or 256MB.
[doublepost=1555359846][/doublepost]

i really hate this move by apple, i understand that it gets to a point that the device can’t be supported any more because the hardware will be old and obsolete, then it it will run the latest software very slow, or it might not run at all, but at least let the hardware have a honorable death instead if just killing it because it reach certain age, apple strategy forcing people to upgrade and buy new devices, mean while you can install mojave even on a core 2 duo and run it at a considerable acceptable speed, if you use an SSD , yes the core 2 duo can be nirmally use up to High Sierra but by only using one file from High Sierra ob Mojave you can run mojave on a core 2 duo and that CPU is more than 10 years old, so how can a 5 year old pc or device can be obsolete, they don’t even try or test fir compability, they simply discard the device, add it to the black list list, call it a day and let just wait untill our beloved apple fans buy new devices

you guys can clap now

is all right Tim i already have the latest Mac Pro, one that i build myself, worth every penny, fully upgradable with water cooling


There is nothing stopping you from continuing to use it. Apple did not turn it off.
Rating: 2 Votes
Avatar
machpost
18 weeks ago
I still have one and it still has impressive battery life. It rarely gets used anymore and it’s painfully slow when attempting tasks such as web browsing, but it still handles streaming video just fine.
Rating: 2 Votes
[ Read All Comments ]