Isn't it obvious we all decide for our selves as there is no scuba police?
Yes, we as individual divers ultimately decide every issue about our own diving practices. But my comment was narrower in scope than that. What I was trying to convey is that IF someone is persuaded that sending in their dive computer for service is a good idea, then they can decide for themselves how often to do that. As I see it, our argument started with your objection to Shearwater's two-year recommended service interval. I agreed that it sounded extremely conservative to me, but I also found myself persuaded at some point in this thread that the peace of mind I might gain from sending my 10 year-old computer in for service might be worth the cost to me. I did not come into this thread believing that computers should be serviced at some point in their lifetimes, but I was persuaded.
A regulator is a life supporting equipment, you cannot compare it with a dive computer.
It was only intended as an analogy. No doubt we depend more on our regulators than our computers. Nevertheless, it is mentioned again and again in various threads that we need to have backup plans that take into account regulator failures. So, yes, they are life support and yet, no, they are not. This has been said in many threads, often in the context of mocking a manufacturer's warning not to service regulators yourself.
If a regulator fails, I suspect that unfortunately there will be some divers who would struggle to mitigate the problem. Not everyone keeps their skills sharp and deals with problems fluidly. By analogy, I suspect at least some divers might be caught off guard by a computer failure during a dive. I would like to believe that if my computer suddenly went blank I would remain calm and end the dive in a controlled manner and not spend undue time trying to see if I could turn the computer back on by pressing buttons while losing situational awareness or control of my buoyancy. But who can say for certain. A computer failure
should be no big deal, but for some divers it could be a factor in an incident spiral. Some divers may rely too much on that reassuring computer display. They might want to stack the odds in their favor by having their computer serviced after some number of years.
Beside, all regulators have regular service interval recommendations but not all dive computers have that. You can just buy one without a service interval and be done with it.
When I bought my Petrel, Shearwater had not yet added the service interval recommendation to their manual. I had no idea that anyone ever sent in a computer that was still in working order for preventative service. As I said above, my first reaction to learning this (in this thread) was something like indignation. But upon further reflection, taking into account the age of my Petrel and how convenient Dive-Tronix makes the process, I warmed to the idea. Dive-Tronix has already notified me that my two Petrels have been serviced and are on their way back to me.
Additionally, manual does not say "we recommend 2 years interval but it is ok to delay that". It also does not say, you can choose service intervals between 5-10 years and so on. It is specific. You are drawing you own conclusions based on your risk assessment.
And the regulator manufacturers are just as specific. Yet we know from countless discussions on SB that those 1-year and even 2-year service intervals for regulators are conservative and probably based on averages calculated from data over many years. If I use my reg more lightly than average, maybe I can get away with a longer service interval. Is my logic flawed that someone could base their decision on how often to service their computer (indeed, whether to have it serviced at all) on how frequently they use it? If I were to use my computer only twice a year like some vacation divers do, I don't think I would heed Shearwater's recommendation of 2 years. While it is true that, unlike a regulator, whose IP can be monitored as a way to gauge its health, a dive computer has no outward indication of health that a user can measure, number of dives (or hours of use) might be a useful guide.
I think you do not want to admit that we both are in agreement that SW intervals are total bs, you waited 10years because you knew that computers normally hold way longer and also risk is not high even if they did so.
I believe an interval of 2 years is suspiciously short, as you are not the only person who has had a computer continue to work fine for 10 or even 20 years. I also agree the safety risk is not high, because I feel confident I can deal with a computer failure during a dive. Yet I can appreciate that for some less-experienced divers a computer failure might be a bigger deal, and they might want to do everything possible to ensure their computer does not fail. Maybe Shearwater's 2-year recommendation is directed to them, or at the opposite end of the spectrum, to dive pros who dive every day and prefer to avoid unexpected days without their computer? I "waited" 10 years because I was not aware that it was a known practice to send a computer in for general maintenance--at any time. But apparently it is, and it is surprisingly easy--at least for Shearwaters.
