I replaced mine last winter on the B2000 at 9 years old, just for preventive maintenance. My experience with my full-sized pickup and my motorcycles have been similar. Always had good luck with batteries, through bitter experience growing up on a farm.
There we replaced batteries all the time. Lousy battery connections, charging systems issues, lights left on, etc meant we did a lot of boosting. I found out later that when a conventional battery goes flat it loses around half it's capacity, so half of a half of a half means it doesn't take long before there is not a lot of battery left.
So on my stuff I keep the battery/ground/starter connections cleaned and greased, put a volt gauge in the dash to make sure charging is ok and install a beeper so I can't forget my headlights on. The batteries last a long time.
For people who can't avoid battery drain the answer seems to be marine/deep cycle batteries. Somewhat more expensive, usually bigger, not quite as powerful if everything goes right but last far longer under adverse conditions.
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