When I saw the title, I thought a silicon chip in Xerox Alto has stopped functioning due to electromigration. Fortunately it was a macroscopic electromigration on its backplane and has an easy fix. I wonder if it could become a serious issue on computer history preservation in the future. Can a 7nm chip today survive an uptime of 30-50 years? Once it burns out, there would be no replacement... Or is this problem negligible compared to EEPROM losing critical firmware and data if you have proper core voltage and cooling?
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When I saw the title, I thought a silicon chip in Xerox Alto has stopped functioning due to electromigration. Fortunately it was a macroscopic electromigration on its backplane and has an easy fix. I wonder if it could become a serious issue on computer history preservation in the future. Can a 7nm chip today survive an uptime of 30-50 years? Once it burns out, there would be no replacement... Or is this problem negligible compared to EEPROM losing critical firmware and data if you have proper core voltage and cooling?