I have one of these units since they were introduced, I was waiting for Canon to introduce a “professional” version as per a communiqué with them many months back but obviously nothing to date.
I do have other flash units but the 580EX immediately became the unit of choice, so it endured the lashing rain the bouncing around the floor of the jeep and several drops.
Recently I was doing an advertising shoot, that I really should have used studio light for but the shoot escalated in real time so the 580EX got a real work out, 300 full power shots in about one hour.
My assistant was complaining of a burning smell and sure enough the unit was red hot and the plastic lens was deformed.
But still it worked on. It still worked after I missed my camera bag and dropped it on concrete, it still worked after my assistant failed to catch as I threw it as her and it crashed and bounced off more concrete. Scratched it still worked.
Last week, being late to cover a wedding I was running up the stone steps of a church when the unit bounced out of my pocket and made it to the top of the stone steps before I did. There, in suitably hallowed ground, it died.
From a to-be-professional point of view (graduate student Materials Science & Engineering) I'm curious to find out how the unit looks, post mortem so to say. Or would that be a disrecpectful thing to ask?
Life has so little meaning to some. It came to cheap or maybe it would have commanded more respect. For so little it gave so much, maybe too much. If I were you I would sleep lightly or you might wake up to a blinding light.
You'll get no sympathy here. 
