Bitcoin Forum

Butterfly Labs will begin selling bulk chips to individuals and companies starting in June, 2013. Chip delivery schedule is approximately 100 days through end packaging once your order is placed. We will be providing reference documentation, reference design/schematics, and foundry receipt/documentation.

Grade A chips have 16 engines and will do 250 MHz comfortably, equating to 4 GH/s per chip.

Chips will be graded and priced as follows:

Grade A: 16 Engines - $97/chip
Grade B: 15 Engines - $93/chip
Grade C: 14 Engines - $89/chip

Grade D: 13 Engines or less - $83/chip

Our chips will be provided in minimum lots of 100 with the following price structure:

100 - 999 chips - Regular Price
1000 - 9999 chips - 5% discount
10,000 - 99,999 chips - 10% discount
100,000 or more - 20% discount

Chip orders will require 50% down and 50% upon order delivery. Payment can be made via BTC (preferred) or bank wire.

Advantages of BFL chips:

1/2 the power usage per GH as the closest competitor
1/10th the silicon area per GH as the closest competitor (Very high performance density)
You can use off the shelf heat sinks depending on your chip layout due to FCBGA package vs custom underside heat sinks as required on some QFN packages. You don't have to design and manufacture heat sinks!
Proven design currently operating in the field and ready to go.

Greetings Butterfly Labs,

I represent some of the BitcoinTalk.org community members willing to buy your ASIC chips. There is demand and I expect a significant order if we manage to agree on some basic business terms.

We would like you to guarantee delivery date both sites agree on. 100 days for example with a small reserve for unexpected events. To make sure no other delays occur, John K. is willing to 100% escrow the transaction.

You can present your attitude to such conditions and propose your own to the community as email reply or directly by posting in the BFL Chips Group Buy Thread https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=223571

Thank you very much,
Kernel32
BitcoinTalk.org community member

Hi Josh,

Thank you for your answer.

John K. already expressed his good will to do the escrow.

Where I can't get you any hard number on how many chips we will buy, it's certain that the community is willing to invest a lot in this.

To get the most interesting deal possible and all of the potential/undecided costumers involved, you could give them some guarantees, that way they can put any doubts behind. Could we agree on random chip selection hash test attended by our representative before escrow release? Community based board development is also a very good motivation. Are you able to arrange sample chips (even with only some cores working) and chip documentation delivery to (2-3) community lead developers in let's say two weeks?

As the the number of chips could be pretty high, let me please know what proportions of grade A, B, C .. chips are most beneficial for your company.

Thank you Josh,
Kernel32
BitcoinTalk.org community member

No No and No

Come on dude are you joking?  BFL is joke that is all. I will trow my money in garbage but i will never buy a nut from BFL

That is my opinion

Best luck to all of BFL customers though

You are very right, that's why I'm intending to use money as leverage and don't give them a penny on preorder. (As other people did.)

They could accept this if they are in need of money and board manufacturing is the bottleneck.

You would collect the full chip cost and pay BFL half (since they need 1/2 up front for an order), and  the remaining half would be in escrow?

BFL don't make chips as far as i know. So what are you looking to buy from them?

i wouldnt trust them for a dime.

I guess this hypothetical is really geared to ask BFL... They have stated that the terms of the chip purchase is 1/2 up front.

Best to ask on the BFL forum rather than here.  My guess is that they won't be interested in your offer.

My guess is that this line of investigation is a big waste of time (like most BFL threads/discussions).

if chips is what you want, look for avalon group buys, there's a few already shipped here on the forum.
They have at least delivered in the past, and seems to be trusted. (around 300mhash per chip, and 16 chips per board).

if chips is what you want, look for avalon group buys, there's a few already shipped here on the forum.
They have at least delivered in the past, and seems to be trusted. (around 300mhash per chip, and 16 chips per board).

None have shipped, as of last week all monies were still sitting in Bitsyncom's chip buying wallet = ~ 760,000 Avalon chips at Bitsyncom's pricing.

Re: BFL Group Buy[ANY GRADE]
Today at 04:04:57 AM
   
Reply with quote  #12
Just FYI, I'm still skeptical of whether I should escrow BFL chip group buys. :/ I would prefer that the chips were somewhat more confirmed before even starting this as given their track record, 100 days could easily turn into 1000 days... (and I'll need to hold the coins for god knows how long Shocked)

John (John K.)

.......
I doubt they will send a single chip. And do they really do their own?

   

You know if John K chooses to honour such purchases from BFL they could be dead in the water. They need community assistance on this.

I can't see them convincing DIYers any other way, aside direct credit card payment.

I thing First they must fill all orders and after selling chips! This is not fair, this is not right...

I would never sink a penny into this idea for 100 reasons Im not going to bother to list. Im not sure why you think BFL will reserve chips for us with zero upfront payment to them. I don't know how you think your going to convince them to go along.

What do you think the chances are they will deliver in under 100 days? I think your going to waste your time. They won't go for it and this whole thing is a total waste of time for everyone involved. And this whole escrow thing will just tie up everyones money. John K is ready to pass on this and I don't blame him one bit.

Scam. More money for BFL and 0 delivery... one more person to ignore and one more thread to ignore.

What do you think the chances are they will deliver in under 100 days? I think your going to waste your time. They won't go for it and this whole thing is a total waste of time for everyone involved. And this whole escrow thing will just tie up everyones money. John K is ready to pass on this and I don't blame him one bit.

I wonder if this builds confidence in BFL pre-order customers or if that is like the last red sign before driving off a cliff?

I thing First they must fill all orders and after selling chips! This is not fair, this is not right...

Break a leg.


(just to make sure there is no language barrier, don't take offense plz, it's a positive reinforcement)

Idiom meaning, "Good Luck" ;)

I would never sink a penny into this idea for 100 reasons Im not going to bother to list. Im not sure why you think BFL will reserve chips for us with zero upfront payment to them. I don't know how you think your going to convince them to go along.

What do you think the chances are they will deliver in under 100 days? I think your going to waste your time. They won't go for it and this whole thing is a total waste of time for everyone involved. And this whole escrow thing will just tie up everyones money. John K is ready to pass on this and I don't blame him one bit.

Though, I don't think BFL will accept your terms...unfortunately.

But you have my full hearted blessings.

I might be open to do this if there was a set period (say 1 month?) where BFL will have to release more proof on the issue like reference designs/chip examples etc, and a definite period where the escrow get released back to the buyers if BFL still does not ship. (say 100 days like they promised?)

Anyhow, I'm still waiting and watching this. I don't want people to get their coins tied up too long (and me increasing my risks of holding the coins even longer) if BFL keeps delaying. If anyone has a better idea of what's going on I'm all ears.  :)

Don't jinx it! :)

I might be open to do this if there was a set period (say 1 month?) where BFL will have to release more proof on the issue like reference designs/chip examples etc, and a definite period where the escrow get released back to the buyers if BFL still does not ship. (say 100 days like they promised?)

Anyhow, I'm still waiting and watching this. I don't want people to get their coins tied up too long (and me increasing my risks of holding the coins even longer) if BFL keeps delaying. If anyone has a better idea of what's going on I'm all ears.  :)

Just on principle. Why would any buy a BFL product? Simply a NO! Let them rot. This is how you repay them for all the lies and BS. You simply don't buy any more of their products. There is not win win here. Let them rot on the vine.

My favorite BFL low-life scam tactic was the fake 1,000 BTC charity donation "gaurantee".

I think there is no chance that BFL will agree to this - none at all. 

BFL is desperate for cash.  Even if BFL had enough on-hand capital to accept, some existing customers would be tempted to cancel their existing pre-orders and post up with the chip escrow instead.  This whole idea is the direct opposite of what BFL is trying to achieve.

Good luck though.

They are an extremely scummy company and have done many underhanded things, but people are not going to pass up a chance to acquire a money printing machine

Look, one huuuge issue is the lead time in developing a valid PCB and working prototype, seeing as BFL haven't managed one to opensource themselves either...!

They'd need to be supplying advance chips to DIY board developers to make this work in their favour...

F**k they need to do that to complete their existing pre-orders anyway!!

My favorite BFL low-life scam tactic was the fake 1,000 BTC charity donation "gaurantee".

...
He recently admitted on the BFL forums that they missed their power numbers. Plainly stated in no uncertain terms. The only question left is when the Mods and Admins are going to carry out the penalty. It's pretty black and white at this point.

Just on principle. Why would any buy a BFL product? Simply a NO! Let them rot. This is how you repay them for all the lies and BS. You simply don't buy any more of their products. There is no win win here. Let them rot on the vine that is what they deserve. Let them fulfill their contractual obligations and everyone can move on to be better products coming out right now.

...
90% our conditions will not be met. We had the balls to argue with BFL. It could prevent somebody else getting scammed. >> I call that a win  ;)
9,9% we make it happen >> Epic win.
0,1% we get scammed by John K., THE government or UFOs >> Epic fail.

I'd call tying up one's money for something which is inflexible and poorly implemented and likely to be obsolete by the time it is delivered even if a miracle happened and it was delivered on time an Epic fail.

Perhaps that is what they are hoping?

lol "let's let the community come up with the board since we can't".

My God,

You are doing everything right! What the hell is wrong with all the other threads that they aren't seemingly even doing half of what you are doing...

I am gonna guess you are the "go to" place for the first BFL batch order. I don't see it happening in the other threads. (Well except maybe with MrTeal.)

Where did you see that "BFL needs the community to produce a mining board or they won't sell ... a single chip." ?

Where did you see that "BFL needs the community to produce a mining board or they won't sell ... a single chip." ?

Stands to reason, they're not selling boards, so *someone* needs to make them. They can't sell chips if there aren't any boards to plug them in. Unless you're in the collector keychain business.

Hi I an new to BTC but I am researching it for the last week , here is the video on YT that I guess most of you saw , but I am wondering if this guy is somehow connected to BFL
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vw7kVfJ5X5Y - Jalopeno teardown by codinginmydream
There is also other video showing Jalopeno in work.
My question is, is this a proof that BFL has developed a working board or this is just a scam , it seems legit to me?

Thanks Kernel32 , what I understand is they have working boards , but they won't sell them, instead they need community to develop opens source boards.
As only few orders are delivered , they are just buying time to mine with already produced units , until Avalon chips started shipping at which time they can start shipping their products - IMHO , and they want to cash in more with BFL chips , hm if they take your proposition of escrow I will throw couple of BTC
Thanks for clarifying !

Where did you see that "BFL needs the community to produce a mining board or they won't sell ... a single chip." ?

What if BFL do deliver chips but:

• They're not working?
• Half of them are dead?
• The reference desigh is bad?
• Something else here...

Besides hand-in-hand trade, I'd recommend the payment to BFL being made after the chips are build into boards that work.

Among other reasons I won't participate in this is that it seems Kernel32 can't communicate without shouting.

This thread is just too noisy for me to read.   :P

Had any response from BIG FUCKING LIES ...lol

Let me guess .ummm...umm..NO

..lol

Hello,

For this particular instance, I would be willing to facilitate a 100% escrow with John K. for this transaction.  How many chips are you wanting and have you cleared this with John K. first?

Thanks,

Josh

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UtVx26LlNXA <--- Yifu Guo of Avalon skeptical of Butterfly Labs


Why would anyone do that?

It's funny how Yifu is your go-to-source for opinions when he is BFL's direct competitor. It's like asking Mcdonald's CEO what he thinks of the Whopper.

Yifu seemed to have a fairly high opinion of ASICMINER.  I do also.  Their 130nm chips strikes me as the most impressive.  Avalon's 110nm second, and the supposedly 65nm one being pawned by BFL is either not 65nm, or is a steaming little piece of shit.  Or both.  I'd certainly be writing this into any escrow agreement although it doesn't actually matter exactly why it sucks so badly I suppose.

If BFL is going to go with 100% escrow, I would say there is a damn good chance that whatever they deliver would otherwise be thrown into the dumpster.

BFL don't make chips as far as i know. So what are you looking to buy from them?
Hm.. i see post now. interesting to start selling chips before selling complete products on wait since june last year.
i wouldnt trust them for a dime.

They do make devices and they have shipped too. Unfortunately they move with the speed of a snail on NOS. Noone trusts them and hell i wouldn't trust them even to hold my beer for a sec. I have thrown out $800 already and now waiting for a device to be shipped on the "40th of April"...
Anyway, good luck with the GB. If anything moves, maybe i'll jump in, but not now.

Not surprising, since ASICMiner doesn't pose a real threat to them in terms of market share. It's easy to be generous with a company that is no serious threat to your own. BFL's chip still consumes less than half the power of Avalon's, so if it's a steaming piece of shit, it's still better than Avalon's, and if it's not really 65nm, then it's REALLY showing Avalon up...

Based on WHAT (other than your obviously biased contempt for BFL)? You think BFL wants to further damage their reputation by sending out a bunch of non fuctional chips? LOL, the leaps you people will take to justify your BFL hate are incredible.  :D :D

As Yifu points out, such a small advantage going from 110nm to 65nm indicates some serious problems...or deceit.

In fact, by my read of both ~ngzhang's characteristically up-front comments and the numbers, Avalon's chips themselves are kind of a quick-n-dirty hack.  So, using them as a baseline at the 110nm size makes the BFL handled chips look even worse.

Pffft.  How could anything 'damage' BFL's reputation at this point?

Right, it doesn't seem like you should have to take such radical leaps to find something to dislike. Why not just stick with the justified reasons to not like them, like the continuous delays and missed targets? Why does one need to make up additional baseless nonsense in order to justify already justified frustration? That's what I don't get. People are in a 'full-retard' race with each other to come up with the most absurd reasons to be frustrated with BFL, when there are already a couple of perfectly good reasons. Thank you for making my point.

If you want to be angry at BFL, be angry for real reasons. It will lend more credibility to your argument.

I'm not angry at all.  I'm heartily amused by the whole thing.  Lots of us (mostly others) have been very active at saving would-be victims a ton of money over the last year or so, and it seems that some of the newer participants in the economy are recognizing this and appreciating it.

I am pretty disgusted at BFL's business practices.  I see no way to argue that a lot of the crap that Josh has spewed has not been bald-faced lies with no hope of being true.  Similarly, I went all the way to the point of paying for their high-end item with no indication that it was a 'pre-order'.  These guys are scum-of-the-earth in my opinion and anything that anyone does to make their scams less profitable for them is A-OK with me.

The only saving grace that these guys have is that rather then victimizing senile oldsters as in the last rendition of Sonny's scammery, they are victimizing greedy Bitcoin miners.  It still suck though.

Come on, don't support these assholes ::)

100 + 4-6 weeks

You realize that you can get your $800 back by just asking for it, right?  ::)

Chips Ordered: 0

Nobody is :)

As Yifu points out, such a small advantage going from 110nm to 65nm indicates some serious problems...or deceit.

In fact, by my read of both ~ngzhang's characteristically up-front comments and the numbers, Avalon's chips themselves are kind of a quick-n-dirty hack.  So, using them as a baseline at the 110nm size makes the BFL handled chips look even worse.


Pffft.  How could anything 'damage' BFL's reputation at this point?

It's funny how Yifu is your go-to-source for opinions when he is BFL's direct competitor. It's like asking Mcdonald's CEO what he thinks of the Whopper.

If they (BFL) manage to ship real chips I'll be surprised and if they put out a chip spec doc I'll have a look to see if I could design a board for it, but for now I'm working on this one (Avalon )and hoping that Avalon actually does ship samples in a week or two.

Chris.

Looking forward to see how willing they are to send documentation and reference designs when we get any board builder on board.

We are going to be releasing the specs and reference board designs, so someone will develop their own firmware.

The promise is there:

Josh 06-06-2013 06:20 PM in Shoutbox.
But when, who knows.

Hi Josh,

Thank you for your answer.

John K. already expressed his good will to do the escrow.

Where I can't get you any hard number on how many chips we will buy, it's certain that the community is willing to invest a lot in this.

To get the most interesting deal possible and all of the potential/undecided costumers involved, you could give them some guarantees, that way they can put any doubts behind. Could we agree on random chip selection hash test attended by our representative before escrow release? Community based board development is also a very good motivation. Are you able to arrange sample chips (even with only some cores working) and chip documentation delivery to (2-3) community lead developers in let's say two weeks?

As the the number of chips could be pretty high, let me please know what proportions of grade A, B, C .. chips are most beneficial for your company.

Thank you Josh,
Kernel32
BitcoinTalk.org community member

Another scam
 >:(

Seriously man, did you read any part of this thread? Can you explain why do you think this is a scam 67152398 ?

It's a good thing to be careful, but c'mon we have John (not the same person as Josh ;) ) .

Is it just me, that did the math and wondered about the results?

Grade A: 16 Engines - $97/chip  =  6.0625 $ / engine
Grade B: 15 Engines - $93/chip  =  6.2000 $ / engine
Grade C: 14 Engines - $89/chip  =  6.3571 $ / engine

So no one would "order" the Grade B/C chips. I would expect those chips to be cheaper (not absolute, but per engine) so that they can still be sold.

Ralf

So I haven't been following all of the BFL drama over the past however long, but I have another concern that might be of note to this group buy.

We know that they have actual chips that work, they've shipped (a few) Jalapenos. But from what I've seen of the tear down of these devices they have 2 working chips on a board designed to house 8 chips, with a pretty beefy heatsink and fan on those two chips. They've stated they missed their power numbers, and thereby the chips run hotter than they intended. Is it possible (me not being much more than a hardware layman) that these chips run too hot for any reasonable cluster size on a PCB?

If so, then BFL could ship the chips, fully complying with the terms of the group buy, and have the money released from escrow, only to have the buyers holding chips that overheat constantly and have to be throttled or have fewer chips placed per board than intended. I think it was a surprise to a lot of people (myself included) that Josh agreed to the full escrow deal. Maybe this is why? They have a ton of chips and can only use a few per board? It would only make sense to sell them and get all the money they could out of their (our) investment at that point.

Chips are sold in mixed grade lots.

why they plan to sell mixed grade lots?

That would certainly explain why they have not released the Singles or Mini-rig prototypes. Those are supposed to be densely populated boards. Perhaps the chips cannot be kept cool. Very hard to say until they release specs and samples.

Guys, what's the need to hurt yourself? Is greed so blinding, really?

Let it go. We got in the arse with BFL. We suffered, and now we accept we will never get our Singles, Mini Singles and Mini Rigs.

Don't add insult to the injury. So now they sell their chips in order for the community to find out how to design units from them? And you BUY?

Seriously guys. Have a little bit of self-respect at least.

Because with their previous pricing and allowing people to pick their grades, they would never sell anything but grade A chips. Now they don't have to worry about demand for one type being higher than the others.

will the chips in the mixed lots be specifically labeled with "A", "B", etc?

will the chips in the mixed lots be specifically labeled with "A", "B", etc?

No. Each chip will be labeled with a custom code and a set of clues, leading the purchaser through a set of puzzles each more devious than the last. It is only when you've gone through every challenge and survived an epic plot twist that the final grade will be revealed.

I would start work on a custom BFL-chip board once i'm done with the Avalon development.
(I am sure can recycle some design aspects which should speed things up)
But It would need encouraging news from them that indicate that we can really expect them to deliver + documentation on the chips.

...........
Seriously guys. Have a little bit of self-respect at least.

........ and now we accept we will never get our Singles, Mini Singles and Mini Rigs.

BFL itself is the scam, get real.

Zero products shipped from the revised BitForce line (Jalepenos are older and no longer offered, Little SC was supposed to replace it, none have shipped at all in over one year)

Now offering chips that are just as much vaporware as their ghost machines

And they are apparently wasting time on their own charity thing?

BFL and all of their cronies earned a scammer tag here, that should be enough to kill this thread right here and now.

Exactly. I might suggest to the group buy that previous to the escrow being released they are able to test a fully populated board with sample chips that are running at full speed and on all cores in order to be able to see how much heat they're putting out and work out a suitable cooling solution if one exists.

They can't handle the board manufacturing and that's where community can take over and profit. That is a business opportunity to me.

It seems the 65 nm chips are generating a lot more heat, than BFL expected. Where being unable to put 8pcs of 4 GH/s chips on few square inch board may discard some cute-black-box designs, for most of BTC miners the size of the board is not as crucial. (Remember GPU rigs?) They are not to keep on the desk anyways.

I thought it was more board design problems than getting them made, but dont want to troll so...

Almost all of the talk in burnin and bkk's threads is over my head but they seem like very smart people, who I would have confidence in to get them working and in production fairly quickly.

That presents the problem, avalon can sell chips because they aren't making any more hardware. If BFL release all the details needed and the guys above get a board working it would surely decimate BFL's order queue.

So what is their reasoning ?

...........

The easy solution to make somebody else overtake board design and convert most of the pre-orders to chip sales seems probably very appealing to BFL right now.

They could come up with a motivation instrument for pre-order costumers. For example chip discount. That could make the magic happen, giving the fact those costumers are still interested in mining by not getting refunded already

Please note, that most of this is only my wild speculation.

To those who are so concerned with heat dissipation, why not just go water-cooled. I don't really care about having a small cute little case that sits on my desk. I think we'd probably be fine using standard heatsinks on each pair of chips. This would require a slightly larger board area, but we're all going to be doing custom cases. If it turns out that we need more heat dissipation than we can get with heatsinks, throw a water block or two on there, and call it a day.

Ultimately, I see it as virtually a non-issue. The question now, of course, is whether it's worth paying the same $/hash to get these chips. I'm thinking BFL needs to come off their price by roughly $25/chip at a minimum. If they can come down to $50, they'll sell like hotcakes.

Encased in a mineral oil bath?

Encased in a mineral oil bath?

Zomg, I agree with Wrenchmonkey about something. One heatsink + fan per chip, or a waterblock per 2-4 chips should handle the heat problem. Unfortunately, that raises the price of a unit by $15 - $35 per chip used (including copper sinks/blocks, pump & plumbing). That sort of expense shreds BFL's bang for the buck.

We will be dropping the price for the chips to ~75 bucks each or so. Not guaranteed on that price, but it'll likely be close to there.

To move the heat away from the chip,:
One should use copper. Copper has far higher thermal conductivity than mineral oil (like 50x). So, more chips will need more copper sinks in contact with them.
To move the heat away from the copper:
If you go with water blocks (or mineral oil blocks), then you can use less copper and move the heat away from the copper faster with water (or oil). I don't think you will save money or power consumption that way since the plumbing adds cost and complexity. A bit more copper with some fans for each cluster of 2 chips should be sufficient.

I would simply buy a Corsair H60 or H110 and use thermal adhesive to mount the block once I was satisfied it could do the job. I mounted a H55 to my 7870 using zip ties and it never went above 57C at 1225mhz  core (tahiti chipped version) so I already have experience with conditions that aren't exactly ideal and it worked out just like my custom water loops have and honestly took far less time but once the adhesive is used and sets there is no going back.

Small update from Josh (shoutbox):

FFS man,
when they raise the price = they're evil,
when they lower the price = they're evil.

Whatever they do, is not good enough for some.

When they fail to ship and lie about many aspects with regards to their build and timelines they are not evil, they just lack morality and ethical boundaries the most of us in the community find reprehensible.

They haven't done anything...

Where are the units?

Where are the chips?

Where are the documents for someone to actually design a PCB?

If you actually think these people at BFL can be trusted to put all the necessary information out and have working "grade A" chips the you are delusional. Seriously what does price have to do with anything given their track record. No one is going to design anything for these chips it would be a waste of time. They can't even design a board and they have had 11 months! Also who wants to buy from BFL at all? They pretty much slit their own throats and as a community no one especially PCB designers should come to their aid. Let em rot.

If trusting BFL is delusional, then I am delusional and that's my problem, please don't try to cure me. So far they delivered 6 units to me, so I am OK with being delusional.

Who wants to buy from BFL? I am pretty sure they will and have lots of customers (but then again, I am delusional).

Let them rot?
  ;D ;D ;D
Man, you have issues or really love theatricals.

Where are the fucking the miners?
Where are the fucking chips?
Where are the fucking design specs to make a PCB work with the chips?
Which kind of fucking chips will they ship grade D?

I'd be interested in around 1,000 chips towards the group buy.


https://products.butterflylabs.com/65nm-asic-bitcoin-mining-chip.html

It looks like they are for sale now. $75/each (Much better price) What is the status of this thread?

I did hear that prior to the price change they would be giving discounts based on quantity, hopefully this translates into even better prices for the group buy.

Butterfly Labs will begin selling bulk chips to individuals and companies starting in June, 2013. Chip delivery schedule is approximately 100 days through end packaging once your order is placed. We will be providing reference documentation, reference design/schematics, and foundry receipt/documentation.

Grade A chips have 16 engines and will do 250 MHz comfortably, equating to 4 GH/s per chip.

Chips will be graded and priced as follows:

Grade A: 16 Engines - $97/chip
Grade B: 15 Engines - $93/chip
Grade C: 14 Engines - $89/chip

Grade D: 13 Engines or less - $83/chip

Our chips will be provided in minimum lots of 100 with the following price structure:

100 - 999 chips - Regular Price
1000 - 9999 chips - 5% discount
10,000 - 99,999 chips - 10% discount
100,000 or more - 20% discount

Chip orders will require 50% down and 50% upon order delivery. Payment can be made via BTC (preferred) or bank wire.

Advantages of BFL chips:

1/2 the power usage per GH as the closest competitor
1/10th the silicon area per GH as the closest competitor (Very high performance density)
You can use off the shelf heat sinks depending on your chip layout due to FCBGA package vs custom underside heat sinks as required on some QFN packages. You don't have to design and manufacture heat sinks!
Proven design currently operating in the field and ready to go.

An H110 would almost certainly do the job, but that is an extra $130 per chip cluster. That cooling expense drops BFL's price/performance below Avalon's.
Plus, scaling chip clusters would be hard with all the extra plumbing required.

I can provide you with sample chips prior to the chip purchase, yes. It would obviously be a limited number of chips, but we can certainly spare a few of course.

How are you proposing to do the random chip selection hash test prior to release?  In principal I don't have a problem with this, however there are some practical pitfalls here, chiefly what if you don't have boards or a test rig ready to do a proper test of the chips, do we then wait until you are ready?  

I hope to have the reference documentation done this week.  We are pretty time crunched getting the singles and MR ready to ship, which should also start this week.  Once that starts rolling we can focus more on the technical documents.  

By now, I'm sure you've seen the new pricing and the fact that the chips will be shipped as a mixed lot, so it probably renders your final question invalid.  If not, let me know.

I have to say that I am almost blown away by the amount of butthurt! Yes, we get it. You haven't gotten your BFL miners yet, cry cry. The chips are a PROVEN design, delivered by GLOBAL FOUNDRIES! BFL and their development delays have nothing to do with it. Jeez, you cry all over the forum, how about sticking to one of the other 1000 threads about BFL orders?

I have to say that I am almost blown away by the amount of butthurt! Yes, we get it. You haven't gotten your BFL miners yet, cry cry. The chips are a PROVEN design, delivered by GLOBAL FOUNDRIES! BFL and their development delays have nothing to do with it. Jeez, you cry all over the forum, how about sticking to one of the other 1000 threads about BFL orders?

I don't see the problem with this group buy...best case scenario we get miners that are superior to avalons 100 days from now, worst case scenario we get our money back

Worst case you've locked up your money for 3+ months and have to pay John's escrow fees.

@Kernel32 who are you? You have few posts and you only joined in April this year. Why should anyone trust you?

If they come straight from the "fab" won't they still need to be "bumped" & "packaged"??

So you need to send them to another place or two........................or will the "fab" handle this??

BFL arranges the bumping and packaging at their contracted facilities, it's not handled by GloFo.

The only bumping being done by BFL consists of white powder going into their noses, conveniently purchased from silkroad with all of your BTC. It's only a matter of time until josh goes out Scarface style.

Whats the status?

Especially board development.
Chips alone are worth nothing. At least for me.

The documentation for the chips is going to take two more weeks  :P

Just wondering , what 100% escrow deal?

Just wondering , what 100% escrow deal?

Why then the order is not open

65 nm efficient BFL chips Group Buy under the conditions:

- BFL delives sample chips and datasheets to board developers on time previously agreed on. (two weeks- pending)

- BFL delives ordered chips in quality and on time previously agreed on. (100 days - accepted)

- They don't get the money if they don't deliver ON TIME. (100% ESCROW by John K. - accepted)

UPDATE 1: Josh/BFL accepted our escrow offer [June 06]

STATUS: GB not open yet, Refining deal with Josh, discussing board development options with burnin, Chris/BkkCoins (Klondike), allten and other community developers


We have now three lead community developers - burnin, Chris (Klondike) and allten - considering BFL chip board. Under some conditions of course. We may have the power to make this happen. (Or not.)


Random selection of BFL chips will be put trough hash test previous to ESCROW release. My Group Buyers either get quality on time or money back from John K. I know the idea of actually recieving a BFL product seems ridiculous, but two days ago a lot of people laughed at me about 100% escrow with BFL. The approach used now is different. No upfront, no shit policy.
Remember BFL needs the community to produce a mining board or they won't sell ... a single chip.[/b]

Original message by Josh:


Funds would be probably gathered in BTC as order takes place and incrased/decrased based on BTC to dollar fluctuation before hand-to-hand payment. No cost (full refund) bailout.

Let me know what do you think. I can try to negotiate our terms of deal if there is enough willing people behind me.

EDIT 1: I described the situation and conditions to BFL sales. Awaiting reply.

EDIT 2: Josh/BFL agreed.

EDIT 3: Awaiting another reply to following proposal:

FWIW I've paid for an order of chips and have requested developer chips and reference docs. When I get those I will post the docs here and then send the chips to whichever dev's have the community's support and can put the time into actually producing an actual working board.

*Note - I don't want to hear how this is a stupid purchase. I've done my risk assessment and think this is a good commercial opportunity. If you disagree with that then please keep it to yourself.

Or, if people think it is a bad purchase they could post it here and you could refrain from reading it. Unless you work for the NSA that is.  ;D

when will Reference documentation be released to open source?

FWIW I've paid for an order of chips and have requested developer chips and reference docs. When I get those I will post the docs here and then send the chips to whichever dev's have the community's support and can put the time into actually producing an actual working board.

*Note - I don't want to hear how this is a stupid purchase. I've done my risk assessment and think this is a good commercial opportunity. If you disagree with that then please keep it to yourself.

*Note - I don't want to hear how this is a stupid purchase.

*John is still looking from the sidelines*

It seems that 75$/chip isn't the lowest value for the chips.

https://forums.butterflylabs.com/announcements/3272-customer-appreciation-chip-credit-program.html

Can you stack the discounts in a single order?

In Josh's post on the the bfl forum he mentions $75 per chip. So have chip prices been reduced already?

Man, that was a stupid purchase! ::) Nah, just kidding (you were asking for it :) )

There is often a very fine line between stupid and brave :)

Chip data.

https://forums.butterflylabs.com/announcements/3014-butterfly-labs-announces-bulk-chip-sales.html

BFL SC  firmware.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=235312.0;topicseen

Kaboom , this may work.

What does FPGA firmware/bitstream have to do with ASIC?

FWIW I've paid for an order of chips and have requested developer chips and reference docs. When I get those I will post the docs here and then send the chips to whichever dev's have the community's support and can put the time into actually producing an actual working board.

*Note - I don't want to hear how this is a stupid purchase. I've done my risk assessment and think this is a good commercial opportunity. If you disagree with that then please keep it to yourself.

.......
I am worried that BFL is going to send us the defunct lot they are using right now instead of the brand new lot that will be baked at the Fab. I don't want yesterdays revision that has caused so many problems (let them deal with those). I want the latest revision fresh from the Fab.
......
Could you get in contact with BFL and clarify this point?

Credit program will be incorporated into the group buy?

What are we still waiting for? I think that we have all we need. Well only chips are not with developers jet. All else has been meet... So could you open GB?

EDIT: Unless we have some guarantees that we will receive them first... Time is BTC

Documentation.

Chip data.

https://forums.butterflylabs.com/announcements/3014-butterfly-labs-announces-bulk-chip-sales.html

BFL SC  firmware.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=235312.0;topicseen

Kaboom , this may work.

Wasn't that published?
I'm not registered so I can't download PDF... But I thought that was that...

For those who aren't registered in BFL forums: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/50609214/BFL%20SHA2%20Spec%20Rev2.2%20-%20Release-1.pdf

Yes, I looked through the PDF and as far as I can tell it actually looks like a fairly detailed technical documentation with pinouts, level specifications and timings.

For those who aren't registered in BFL forums: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/50609214/BFL%20SHA2%20Spec%20Rev2.2%20-%20Release-1.pdf

The only bumping being done by BFL consists of white powder going into their noses, conveniently purchased from silkroad with all of your BTC. It's only a matter of time until josh goes out Scarface style.

Lol :D This company seriously has gone off the deep end.  One thing is for certain, their goal is to remain profitable as long as possible, do you think that can be achieved by flooding the market with ASICs?  Nope.

It is likely that their highest achievable profit margin is splitting right now, unless some wild new tech is being developed by their assembly ninja in a super secret underground development facility. The source of all their shipping delays is likely their ceaseless work on the development of the Schwarzgerät, which will be installed in the mysterious jet black 1.5 petahash miner housed in an erotic Imipolex G case with serial number 00000.

I was at BFL today to drop off payment for my group buy's chips.
Company is legit, I met Dave and Jody, who by the way is super sweet and very nice, so please be nice to her!!!
People were there working away. I thought that the office space/location was very appropriate given the current growth/stage of BFL: not unnecessarily fancy and also not in a low cost location, just about right.

I wonder if giving them money made them 'super sweet and very nice'?  Did Dave show you his knife?