Any device that powers off fully functional should be able to power on fully functional barring hardware failure. That these steps were nessecary is a stunning indictment of remarkable, even if your tech geek can ssh in and fix it.
After all, my notebooks are perfectly readable four years later
FWIW my RM2 is still running well after 4y, and that includes plenty of abuse. I use it for notes at work, keeping track of little league lineups (and so tossing it in the grass many times), and its still a daily driver for me.
And if you leave it unpowered for a few years? I have a journal from two decades ago. Still readable.
Does your journal have cloud sync? That’s what broke on the device in the article.
The cloud sync is the thing that breaks here, not the device. I'll also point out that Macs at least have the exact same issues. When the clocks get out of sync the certificates start rejecting. Some versions of macOS cannot be installed anymore either because their certificates are misconfigured and expired already.