PS3 and PS Vita stores no longer closing

[haxxiy]

OTBWY said:

haxxiy said:

A bit much my dude. CDs and DVDs can go up to about a 100 years. As well as tapes, which are known to have exceptionally long lifespans... but it all depends on use, wear and such. So it is up to an individual to how long something can last. And if you ask me, 100 years is a long time and i'll be dead before any of my games are I reckon.

Also, transistors and such can always be replaced. They can still make the electronic parts you need to fix your cartridges (and put the rom back on the cart pretty much). Cartridges from decades ago still work as well, but again, it depends on use. Lastly, the 15 to 20 year number for Switch cartridges is based on nothing. 

The first generation of CDs is already rotting and dying.

Also, I'm not sure if we are talking about the same thing in your second paragraph? The data is physically encoded into the chip in mask ROM, the layout of the gates themselves is how the data is stored. As soon as the first bits are lost when the transistors fail, the software is corrupted and rendered useless. I'm not addressing an element on the board visible to the naked eye like a replaceable capacitor.

We also know for a fact that the Switch cartridges won't last as long as the ROM type described above because they use a proprietary kind of flash memory developed by Macronix instead of software masks. So, eventually, it will lose its charge, as it happens to flash memory, and all the 1s inside the cartridge will revert to 0s, resulting in complete data loss.