Those seeing degradation after pushing 1.6-1.7 V is one thing, and there were some Q9650 owners that killed theirs I thought from high voltage, there is a RIP thread in here from one Q9650 owner. Given intel has lowered the max voltage on these chips to 1.45, degradation from 1.6 to 1.7 would not surprise me, regardless of cooling.

But degradation in a short time from 1.45 volts and less, is a little hard to believe, unless a lot of people report it, and do so using reliable methods such as long prime/orthos runs. Short stability tests can yield variable results that are not repeatable, so I would have a hard time making conclusions. 10-12 hour orthos/prime runs though that shows a significant change in required voltage would be different.