Despite those who are having issues with their iPad 2s, Apple still supports it on every iOS version since iOS 5.
My Wife's and Mom's iPad 2 are running fine on iOS 9, but they mainly use their iPad 2s for photos, saving recipes, web surfing, email, social media and the occasional solo play games or card style games.
They are not really taxing their iPad 2 models as much as I use mine, daily.
But they have not reported any issues to date on iOS 9.
My iPad 3 is going to be 4 years old and is still running as it should on iOS 9.
I don't feel like Apple is forcing me to upgrade to a newer iDevice, however I have been waiting for larger iPads for many years since the first iPad, so I am strongly considering a purchase of a new iPad Pro model when they arrive, but not because I think my iPad 3 has reached the end of its useful life.
I want additional screen real estate to draw and paint on.
I do not use my iPads for hard core mobile gaming as some users, though. I have one or two driving games and mostly pinball style games on my iPad and that is all the type of gaming I do.
I use my iPad mostly for creative artwork and photography uses and some graphics and word processing.
I tend to use my iPad more or less like a regular laptop computer or MacBook.
I just recently uograded my very old iPod Touch 2nd gen to the new 6th gen because my 2nd gen iPod Touch is almost 8 years old and I bought an 8 Gb versions that became totally inadequate for storage of photos and music about 2-3 years after I purchased. That and Apple ended its iOS at 4.3.
I used it for many years after, but got tired of having to always unload old music/reload new music and having to remove old photos to make room for new ones.
Plus, the 2nd gen iPod Touches had no cameras on them.
So, I purchased the 6th gen iPod Touch 64 GB storage model as this model's specs really comes close to that of the new iPhone 6 models at half the price.
I expect to have and keep using my new iPod Touch for, at least, the same amount of time I used my old one.
As far as the original iPad is concerned, I purchased one of these for myself and my Mom in 2010.
I had felt at the time that this iPad would last longer than 2 years, but when you purchase brand new technology such as this was in 2010, you know you are going to be the early tester and early adopter of brand new technology and I realised this and sort of knew I was going to purchase a newer iPad model sooner than later and, in fact, that did happen. I was a little upset, but knew the outcome going in.
I always felt that the original iPad was really an early technology, early adopter model.
The positive is that I purchased a much better and powerful iPad that has kept up with all of the upgrades and updates, to date.
It has a decent back camera and has the front facing camera for using to FaceTime my family and friends as well as for Skype-ing friends and family who don't use Apple products.
My iPad 3 has been working well and I feel was well worth the purchase and purchase price.
The iPad Pro, for me, is going to be a much bigger jolt in the wallet for an iPad than I am used to paying, so, that is why I am going to have to contemplate whether it will have the same or longer longevity of my current iPaf.
My Mom retired her original iPad earlier on than I did because she wanted the iPad with the later cameras so she could Skype and FaceTime with family in different States.
My Wife got my original iPad and used it for one more year until she got so frustrated with its poor performance online and using it for FaceBook and with no more iOS upgrades to help with some of its issues.
So, I got her a couple of years, ago, a 64 GB storage iPad 2 that was an Apple reseller Demo model that hardly saw any use and got this at a really good, discounted price and the seller warrantied it for one year.
I looked and ran like a brand spankin' new iPad!
It came with a non-Apple charger that I didn't trust, so we went to our nearest Apple Store and purchased the proper charger.
It has worked very well for her, but since it only had 512 MBs of RAM, she always complains that she can't keep a lot of apps running in the background and she has to makes sure not to have a lot of web tabs open in her web browser.
Other than that her iPad 2 has been running and performing very well for her.