iOS 9.3 on an iPad 2 == Bricked iPad
First it nagged me about the new update: My old iPad 2 kept popping up the dialog box informing me about the availability of the new iOs 9.3.
Then I gave in: Yesterday I finally gave in an started the update process. EVerything downloaded OK and seemed to install OK too.
Did it work? Unfortunately no - Everything when fine until when the newly updated iPad wanted to authenticate with Apple.
After several minutes I got this message;
“Your iPad could not be activated because the activation server is temporarily unavailable. Try connecting your iPad to iTunes to activate it or try again in a couple of minutes.”
Well, this seems like an endless authentication loop.
Then you see it: When you start searching the net you pretty soon see a pattern. Loads of people have experienced the same problem, and loads of people now have a bricked iPad!
Ok, connect to iTunes, they say: I have Windows 10 x64 and did my latest version of iTunes ever detect the bricked iPad? Of couse not!! I also tried the raw connect mode on the iPad (“After a full stop of the iPad - hold both the on-button and Home-button at the same time when it starts. After you see the logo, release the on-button after 4 seconds” - if everything works you should see the iTunes/USB connect image on the pad).
Then the same search-read-test procedure repeated, getting the Apple Mobile Device USB Driver to work. Again, tons of searches yielded tons of people with the same issue. After I while I was pointed in the direction of manual install of the driver placed in the following directory;
C:\Program Files\Common Files\Apple\Mobile Device Support\Drivers
Right-clicking and choosing Install on the usbaapl64.inf file did the trick and I could see the iPad icon in iTunes!! iTunes soon told me that there was an issue with the iPad and that it needed to be either Updated or Restored. First I tried Restore:
This led iTunes to extract the files and put the iPad into some “receive” mode. But after 1/2 hour the iPad still showed this;
And after a while I got the error message 4018 ... pheew, things should never be straight forward!
Today I switched cable (albeit the old one both is an original cable, and has worked flawlessly for many years), and then the update process actually went somewhere!! It couldn’t update properly, so I went for a full restore as new machine instead.
That worked!
Verdict: What a loosy update from Apple!!! Don’t ever nag your users to update - if the hardware can’t handle it! I bet many users just toss away the old iPad as bricked. They might even want to sell it to someone - but wait - the user never had the chance to turn off Find my iPad!!! The iPad will therefore be locked to the old user when a patient buyer (like me) eventually make it work again!! Luckilly for me the owner of the iPad I had to unbrick, is married to me 
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