Originally Posted by
megalowmatt
I have both. OP - not sure where you live, but given the area I'm in, I don't find the IGH to be any less maintenance free than those with a derailer. From my personal experience, the IGH has been a bit more temperamental than the others, as it developed a "skip" when shifting down from 5th to 4th. It took a while to troubleshoot and I finally just replaced the cable and housing and seems to have gone away. The drawback is if something happens, there's not a lot of user-servicable parts and if it needs to be worked on the whole wheel needs to be sent in.
That's true. It seems the risk depends heavily on the make and the model. Sounds like old SA 3 speeds are pretty bomb proof and repairable. If my Alfine blows up it would suck. A derailleur is a much cheaper replacement and there's only so much that can go wrong.