Bitcoin Forum

Hello all.

I have been trying to read and learn about bitcoin and have even played around a little with mining on my PC with a pretty inadequate GPU.  Though the purpose was to figure out the joining of pools, getting a wallet, all the beginner stuff.  I have decided I want to jump in on a bigger scale and start by purchasing an S9 miner (actually two of them).  I have found a pair for a really good price, but it is from an overseas vendor (not Bitmain).  I have communicated with the seller and have set the price, etc.  It will be two S9's with PSU's.  However, past that, I know nothing of the seller and would like to purchase the miners, but want some security in the purchase.

Since the seller takes Bitcoin I thought I would just buy enough to make the purchase then put them in an escrow account.  I have never dealt with a bitcoin escrow account and was hoping to get some input on a good one to use, what other things I should consider, or if what I am considering for the purchase process is not a good way to go.  In the interest of full disclosure, I found the seller on Alibaba.  I came across it searching for S9's and my thought was since they come from overseas anyway, why not cut out the middleman and save a good chunk of cash in the process.  The downside to that is I don't automatically have some of the purchase protection that you might have from buying from Amazon, eBay, etc.  I cannot touch the price this seller is offering via any domestic vendor I have come across, so the incentive is there, but I just want to make sure once I fork out the money, I get the miners.

Any help, insight and wisdom is greatly appreciated.

Honestly i never trust to buy to anyone except for bitmain if you buy direct from them..
If you deal to alibaba i can't guaranteed you that you are safe to deal to someone there because i heard that many scammers out there..
If you are using escrow you should know first the background of the escrow and the only that i know good to be escrow is escrow here in forum.. outside of this forum i don't know who is trusted. but here i think you can ask for help with philipma1957  (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=64507)
he is one the trusted here in forum that can give you some advise about dealing to someone or use him as escrow..

crairezx20, thank you SO much for that insight.  I have been very guarded about purchasing from Alibaba for the very reasons you mentioned but I thought if I could verify or secure my purchase it would be worth it.  I guess you can't really go wrong with Bitmain since they seem to have a good reputation.  I had hoped to save some money and get ROI faster, but as the saying goes, if it is too good to be true...