I posted this question in a different thread, but it wont be very prominent there. I was just wondering how you prototype owners feel about the possibility of your EPROMs fading over time. Is it hard to justify such a substantial purchase knowing one day there wont be anything left? Has this happened to anyone yet? Or will it just be enough knowing what you have (or had) and just owning something that had such a different history than anything else in your collection? Will there be a cooldown in price if this happens? I really would love to own a proto ANYTHING but cant afford the cost!

I've had a handful of eprom items, all were 10-20 yrs old and I didn't have any problems.

I know that some atari collcetors have had problems with data coruption and such.
Also I know people with arcade boards sometimes have problems with eproms.

It's really a personal opinon. Some people won't touch em with a ten foot pole, other could care less.

IMO, there's not a whole lot to worry about. I've had more production carts die on me than prototypes. I think you should take care not to expose the eproms to UV light or static build-up. I've know people to lose data and I also know people who had eproms that are holding strong after nearly 30 years. If you know what you're doing, you can always back up the data and reburn the eprom if it becomes corupted.

This is the bottom line, well put. This question crops up it seems like once a week on various boards. If you're on boards to ask the question, then you shouldn't be concerned because chances are someone reading your post can provide this service for a nominal fee.

yeah I was skeptical about eventually buying any of the panesian games because of this whole eprom thing, but after I heard this process could be done I wasnt worried worried a bit. Now I just have to come up with the money to pay for them!!!

Even games that were supposedly impossible to be made into a repro a.ka. Airball, have been made. So almost any game or proto can at least have a back up in case it does erase itself.