IMS issues are way overblown, failures are actually fairly rare, and permanently fixed by swapping out the bearing when you do the clutch, which is easy to do and doesn't cost much. Mine already had an LN Engineering retrofit kit when I got it, as do most of the used cars I've seen for sale.... but I've sometimes seen them with 200-300k miles on the original IMS as well.

My main issue with the early watercooled flat 6 Porsche engines is that they are just so complex and costly to rebuild. They will easily last several hundred thousand miles of hard use, but when they do need a rebuild, doing it properly can easily cost $10k just for materials to rebuild it yourself properly.

I just thought it was a funny retort to a seeming assertion that they were extremely reliable.

Although I think I only got $9k for my old Boxster, so a $10k rebuild seems a bit painful... I imagine they go for more now. I didn't love the car, unfortunately.

That issue, while valid, has one of the highest ratios of "talked about on the forums divided by frequency of occurrence". If I had a 1997-2005 affected engine, I don't think I'd do the preventative maintenance work proactively until it came time to replace a clutch anyway.