norm8332 wrote:One side has actual scientific studies as well as first hand testing and in my case decades of experience. The other has a theory and are referring to spec sheets
It doesn't hurt if you name the 'sides'!
for a 5 year design life.
Where are you taking that figure from? I'm just asking.
Have you spend at least some thoughts, that the papers you refer to apply to nowadays chips? The chips today have a much larger thermal design power, if you operate them without the specified heatsink, and they have no internal throttling measures - they can literally
explode and punch holes into your computer!
Compared to this, the chips in the early 80ies had structures that can be made out with just a magnifying glass, so to speak. It takes much more for any conceivable ageing effects to show. When the chips aren't operated, there's nothing of electromigration, etc. be had.
And let's face it: what operating time does the typical VIC-20 get nowadays? Do you switch on each of your VIC-20 daily, for more than 4 hours a day - as was maybe typical in those days? No? I won't want to speak for others, but the uptime of my VIC-20 is maybe once every 2 months, for 2 hours in each session. Mostly, to check what I've programmed lately in emulation indeed works on real h/w. I don't think the total operating time since I got my VIC-20 out of the closet in 2007 is ever going to surpass the time it spent switched on between 1983 and 1986.
I have stated my point - there are much more pressing reasons why the chips in a VIC-20 can fail. One first ought address these (and in the case of "moisture creep+bad die passivation", there's not much one can do about this), and when these measures have been exhausted, then it's sensible to put heatsinks on the hottest chips.
...
That being said, I have no interest to turn this into an extended argument. We two have different judgements about one detail what's best to prolong service life of our friendly computer. Nothing worth to pick a quarrel about, really.