Back to the beginning. I rather prefer to avoid clipping the whites that are impossible to recover. Sadly enough the dslrs has no knee control as the high end film cameras.
There is plenty to discuss about the subject but for me one thing is clear: the manufacturers lie or in the best case they hide key information to the user. The specifications are not standarized and each one publish the set of info the suit the better for their marketing. It is not just my words, they recognise it.
I have 34 years in the market and used all kind of cameras and devices running from 35mm, 16mm, consumer video of all flavours and technologies, professional cameras of all tiles, developed masking techniques for planetariums, did extensive work with frame grabbers and diverse sensors using NI LabView, study 5 years cinema, 1 year holography at the American Association of Holography, Study optics and camera mechanical systems at the argentinean Cinema Union, worked in several feature and commercial films in several countries, teaches at SVT, Kulturkraft Syd and Teatro Castro Alves Brazil, did mods in many but many cameras and lenses, study Metrology (the science of measurement) at INMETRO where i developed several measurement techniques including in optical systems, repaired the whole Santa Lucia Eye hospital (more than 80 equipments) including slit lamps, campimeters, surgery lasers for what i had to build many optical pieces by hand, I was part of the American Society for Quality, programmed image treatment software in Assembler, C+ and Visual Basic, was a consultant for 6 years in the field of quality and metrology through latinamerica, developed an optical system to make fertility analysis, and so on.
What i mean with all his is that i am not a newcomer.
I could be wrong in many things, i am sure that i am wrong many times and want to learn from my mistakes.
But one think i am absolutely sure: sensors are not linear whatsoever unless you measure them in a very specific way using monochromatic light source and power calibrated (even though i don't believe that are linear anyway).
How much this affect your result?
well, it very difficult to say. Films are not linear at all and people love its results, so linearity is not a god.
One thing is again clear for me, and that what it was the whole point of this discussion from the very beginning, i will always avoid clipping the highlights if i can.