Hmmm... as I understand it, the biggest enemies to most equipment like this are smoke and dust. Of course it depends on how well the person before you treated it too. If it sat in a hot garage with smoke and dust, I wouldnt buy it. But of course its easy for someone to say it was in a "smoke free studio" all the time.

I'd like to share a story with you, when I bought my macbook pro, it was DOA, I had to send it back and get a new one. The new one has worked perfectly for nearly 3 years now. Its a trooper. My friend bought a macbook pro and had some crazy issue with it. He called apple and got them to send him a new one just like what happened to me. He asked the apple guy if he's ever incountered this issue before, the apple guy responded "no, but I've been working here for a few years now and the one thing I can safely say is when it comes to electronics, anything that can go wrong, will go wrong somewhere"

Long story short, the only thing you can count on in this world are things falling apart, you just never know when or how. Your used interface may serve you well for years to come, or it might break down after a couple months.

In general, things on an interface aren't likely to get "replaced." The boards are VERY tight and if anything at the board level were to fail, it would be more costly to repair than replace. (Unless the company can replace the daughterboard on the cheap).

Also FWIW, I have the RME FF800. It's solid as a rock. I can't imagine any reason why that piece would ever stop working if it's treated even remotely well.

Cheers-
J.

Heat. Its what kill electronics. Even when you short a output, its the heat the cooks the component. Too uch overheating can reduce the life of electronics.

How do you know? you don't...

As for the fireface, yes its a beutiful layout inside. One the most attractive new product pcb layouts I have seen in a while.