HT202696 What happens if Apple Support expires for a product? Does it mean there is no more help available and you are on your own just because you have an older Apple product?

Question

We have a family of Apple products at home, and with every new one, we learn a new aspect of the Apple Life.  After switching to iPhone 5S and struggling between some applications, I've decided it is time to upgrade rest of my older devices requesting an IOS Upgrade to 8.1.2 for weeks.
My older iPhone 4 didn't have an upgrade, which was not advanced enough anymore to carry a new software, this I understand.  The upgraded iPod Touch and iPad Mini don't seem to have any problems with the recent changes so far.  However, the older iPad (2) we had is messed up, just like many other people's as mentioned on the pages of these discussion groups.  According to these user comments / complaints, it is obvious that upgrading to IOS 8.1.2 was not the right option to older version iPads just like it was not for iPhone 4; actually it shouldn't be an option in the first place.
On my previous problems with iPhone 5S, I've come to realise the practicality & functionality of the Apple Support system when contacted directly, instead of going through many discussion pages of people with same or similar problems where everybody is asking but just a few is replying.  So, I wanted to give it a try to find a solution to my recent problems with iPad, but this time Apple Support pages replied with "Technical Support & Service Coverage are both Expired" message.
First, I did not know that Apple supported its users personally, and I loved it.  Maybe this is because I didn't have previous problems with my old iPhone and iPad.  Especially the Apple Support - Chat option I preferred, where I got help step-by-step from Apple operators.  And then, I did not know that this service support was only for my devices until an expiration date, and this did not please me much.
Can anyone enlighten me on how to receive any response from Apple about what to do with problems of an old Apple device?

Answer 1

And as far as paying for phone support, here are a few tips:
If you call your carrier first and then they route you to Apple, you usually don't have to pay for phone support.
If you are talking to Apple and they ask you to pay a support fee, ask if you can get an exception this time.  That usually works once, but they keep track of the times you've been granted such an exception.
If you still end up paying the support fee, that fee only applies if it's not a hardware related issue.  In other words, if it can be fixed by just talking over the phone and following Apple's instructions, then the fee applies.  But if your device is deemed to have a hardware failure that caused the issue, then the fee should not apply, and you can ask for it to be waived after the fact.
This forum is free, and almost all of the technical support articles the Apple tech advisors use are available on this website.  Literally 99% of what they can do over the phone is just walking you through the publicly available support articles.  In other words, you're paying the fee to have them do your research for you.  It's like hiring a research consultant to go look stuff up in the public library so you don't have to.  You're capable of doing it; you'd just rather pay someone to do it for you.
It's like Starbucks.  You know how to make coffee.  Everyone knows how to make coffee.  And Starbucks coffee isn't any better than what you could make at home for far less.  But you want the convenience.  So you're really paying a convenience fee.  Milk is more expensive at 7-Eleven than it is at the grocery store... because it's a convenience store.