I read that the iPad 2 will not enjoy future enhancements to its OS; since the mini has the same chip, will it also not be able to be upgraded?
I'm not sure where you read that info, but unless it was from Apple I wouldn't believe it, for 3 reasons:
1. The iPad 2 sold (and is still selling) VERY well, so it is in a lot of households. Also, the iPad mini just came out and it too is selling very well (maybe too well sense I can't find one anywhere
). It would be dumb for Apple to cut off their most popular iPads.
2. Apple has 4 devices that use the A5 and 512mb of ram. These are:
-iPad 2: sold and is still selling well
-iPad mini: selling very well
-iPhone 4S: sold so well it set records when it first launched
-iPod touch 5th gen: selling well
So once again, it would be very dumb for Apple to cut off a good majority of their iOS users.
3. The A5 is still a very powerful chip. In fact in graphical benchmarks, the A5 beat the iPad 3's A5X and the Tegra 3.
IMO the iPad mini (and other A5 based iOS devices) should continue to be supported for at least a couple more years.
That's the nice thing about iOS, it doesn't require a lot of power to run smoothly. I had a top of the line 1.2 GHZ 1gb of ram Android tablet and it still had problems running ice cream sandwich smoothly.