Sure, but no rush. We have time at least until mid-May. After that, it would be nice to have the all the BTC in the escrow account so we can launch the order. The sooner we order, the sooner will it ship.

We have 3 guys already building their prototypes. Plus we will have the full schematic of the Avalon device early in May. Even i want to take a shot at it So the answer to your thoughts is YES, we will have boards/devices.

Hi there,
As soon as you go over in the other thread and express your interest, i will have the escrow address open for us. As for vouching, no, unfortunately not. I'm new to the forum and relatively new to bitcoin (discovered accidentally in september, 2012). I've been mining since then and now i want to have my asic finally. I've also ordered a BFL 30 GHash miner at that time, March, and waiting to receive it. I'm using escrow specially because i have no connections yet on the forum.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=189582.0

Hi, you can also head over to https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=189582.0 and order a little piece of the Avalon. With 20 chips you will have about 5GHash/s at 1.66 BTC for the chips and probably 1 more BTC for the device. The shipping date for the complete device is around August. I'm saying this as Avalon, not as BFL. It will probably ship sooner, but expect the worse.

Regards,
Steve

Well, if you're willing to pay the $15000, please do. The point is to spread the chips (and the cost) so that "smaller" wallets can have ASICs too.

Hello to all,

I'd like to announce the opening of a large Group-Buy through escrow, of course, of 10000 Avalon chips. My goal here is to finalize the order and have the chips delivered to eighter: a. You, if you know what to do with it (Check out the DIY threads) or b. a trusted developer, who can assemble a device using those chips and have a fully functional mining device delivered to You.

Some advantages for this group-buy (Question: Why would i order from you? )
- 5% fee for the handling and effort, instead of 9.9% like others have (i do not intend to make competition, my goal is simply to order my chips as well and give time for people to order. I consider 5% for me is enough for me. Period.)(0.083 BTC / chip, orders in increments of 10)
- I will do my best to have a PCB assembled and tested in Romania, for romanian costs. This would ensure a cheaper device overall. If i don't succeed, you can still rest assured that someone will create a device for you. Currently there are at least 3 developers working on separate projects to create miners for us (consider prices of 80-150 EUR per device, excluding the chips)
- My ordering window is by the end of May, but i will try to complete at least one batch by the 15th of May, so our order gets delivered sooner
- I have used the escrow service from John K., so you can rest assured you get what you pay for

If you're interested, please express your demand on my thread --> [Group Buy] Avalon ASIC Chips - Escrow by John K. (Eastern Europe / Romania)

Thank you,
Steve

Hello to all,

Some news and updates: I've decided not to buy anything from e-bay. Why? Because of the simple fact that i can't afford, nor do i want to pay $15000 for an Avalon miner. Call me crazy, but i'd rather build my own.
So, that said, i'd like to announce the opening of a large Group-Buy through escrow, of course, of 10000 Avalon chips. My goal here is to finalize the order and have the chips delivered to eighter: a. You, if you know what to do with it (Check out the DIY threads) or b. a trusted developer, who can assemble a device using those chips and have a fully functional mining device delivered to You.

Some pros for this thread (Question: Why would i order from you? )
- 5% fee for the handling and effort, instead of 9.9% like others have (i do not intend to make competition, my goal is simply to order my chips as well and give time for people to order. I consider 5% for me is enough for me. Period.)
- I will do my best to have a PCB assembled and tested in Romania, for romanian costs. This would ensure a cheaper device overall
- My ordering window is by the end of May, but i will try to complete at least one batch by the 15th of May, so our order gets delivered sooner
- I have used the escrow service from John K., so you can rest assured you get what you pay for

If you're interested, please express your demand on this thread --> [Group Buy] Avalon ASIC Chips - Escrow by John K. (Eastern Europe / Romania)

Thank you,
Steve

Older news from the 1st post:

2013-06-11:
 - Hah!! Wow, i've received some great news! I can't wait to share this but need to keep it a secret for a few days. We will have a few magic "boosters" for this batch. So hold on to your hats and hang in there, we Will FINISH THIS BATCH!
2013-06-09:
 - Today i have ordered 100 pcs of Klondike16 PCBs. Tuesday i'll be driving to the factory and pay the order. More info about the lead time in a few days.
[Edit]: Drove to the factory on Wednesday, ordered and paid for components for 100 pcs of Klondike16 boards. PCB orders still pending.

2013-06-07:
 - Website working www.AlphaHPC.com - Orders for Avalon Chips and Klondike Boards Officially Open!
 - Payment gateway working
 - Ordering / notifications / customer communication working
 - Automatic status change based on payment (after n confirmations)
 - Newsletter for major updates
 - Blog for minor updates
 - Hope you like the visuals

2013-06-04:
I'm still working on the web site, but i'm also very anxious to share this with you all: The site will be ready in a few moments and i would like anyone who wants to participate in testing this to visit it at www.AlphaHPC.com.

More changes upcoming:
- FAQ page
- Hosting solutions
- Many - many changes i feel i have to to before this site will be good-looking (including changing that Aquafresh logo of mine, it looks terrible)

2013-05-23:
- Batch number one Ordered:
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B4EbABa_SLVRekVtU3k1d2NPazg/edit?usp=sharing
- Batch number two Open. If we move well, we will have the chips in hand by the end of August. I will try to aquire as much funding as i can, to finish the order quick!
- I have a final price of 85 Eur for the Klondike16, 16 chip miner. I still have to get quotation for the heatsinks and fans, but the final price covers all.
- The chips cost 0.083: Why? a:) There is a lot of work managing the order. Also there is responsibility. You can't joke with people's money. I'm putting my unslept hours during the night into all this and i want to make sure you get the device you have paid for. I'm here for the long-run. Also, my identity has been confirmed by John. No funny business, no inexistent addresses.
- I'm opening up the idea of "Hosting". No need to send several kilograms across the globe. You will have the opportunity to leave the miner here in Romania, using cheap electricity, being up 99% and being able to control the miner remotely. I will have a chilled environment, secure location, with two internet providers (one for backup) and dedicated support person in case of any emergency. I'll also post some pictures of the place soon.

2013-05-19:
- A fatal math error was discovered at the chip's cost. This was my mistake and take full responsability for it. John's escrow fee wasn't covered by the final chips price. This is fixed now and if there are missing funds regarding John's escrow fee, i will be providing this out of my pocket. Lesson learned.
- I'm considering the aspects of building smaller, 1 chip USB miners also, based on the K1 project from Bkkcoins. I'll provide updates regarding thsi too.
- I have to create the text content of our website. After this, we can go live, probably during next week.

2013-05-15:
- Quotation received! The Klondike design will cost approximately 85 Eur / board. I will have a non-functioning prototype next week just to be able to touch it and see the cost of all the parts when populating the empty PCB. Will make a video too! After that, we can offer bulk orders or discounts for larger quantities. It it also possible to include everything in a nice (or not, we'll see) box! That will definitely help with the airflow through the heatsinks, but that is a bit far away for now.
- Our website is under development. A beta will be done by the end of this week. One major problem with it is: i have NO IDEA how to name it suggestions?

2013-05-11:
- All the Avalon documentation was sent to the manufacurer to get quotes on each component. We will have production prises and conditions shortly!!!

2013-05-09:
- No "possibility" or "probability"!!!! This is it! I just had a discussion with a friend representing a local company. We will have ready PCBs to drop the chips in. We can make 20 / 40 / 80 chip devices (let's decide later exactly which ones) and We can make 16 / 32 chip devices based on the Klondike project. Also the prices would be extremely competitive, i'll give you that! The chips cost only 0.083 BTC which is one advantage. Second, you won't have to send the chips back and forth. We will have the PCBs ready to be assembled.
-I'm thinking on making a website for all this (Chips / PCBs / fully functioning devices). What do you think? Do we need it or not?

2013-05-03:
- A friend of mine is also discussing the possibilities to have devices created for the chips. This raises the probability of having our own devices made in Romania. Of course, i will personally focus on the quality and pricing of these devices. I want them worldwide competitive.

2013-04-30:
- A small discussion with a company about the devices that will house the Avalon chips. I may have some great news in a few days about this.

2013-04-29:
- I see a lot of people already building designs to house the Avalon chips into them. Very good, people. I can't wait to see the final outcome.
- As this thread is not creating much hype, i've decided to focus more on the final outcome of these chips: the ready product that can mine you the coins. Therefore, i'll be focusing much more towards the DIY threads and post updates here.
- Also i've edited the thread to simpflify things a bit more: Clear info at the top, terms and conditions at the bottom.

Update on 29.Apr.2013:
- The forum member "burnin" has an interesting design already, for a 20 chips Avalon miner. The cost is estimated at around 100 Eur / PCB excluding the chip cost. Check out the thread:
[Work in progess] Burnins Avalon Chip to mining board service

- The forum member "allten" is gathering ideas and resources to create a PCB out of the Avalon open source schematic that will be released in (hopefully the fist half of) May. Check out the thread:
DIY PCB with AVALON - [OP Makeover - Forming List of Developers]

- The forum member "BkkCoins" is creating a 16 chip miner. Check out the thread:
[Klondike - 16 chip ASIC OS Board - Preliminary]

Multumesc, Cyrus.

Salut,
Am deschis un nou Group-Buy pentru chipurile Avalon!
- 0.083 BTC / chip.
- PCB de la burnin (Germania): 20 de chipuri / PCB @ ~5 GHash/s
- Plata mediata de John K.

Va astept pe thread!

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=189582.0

Salut,

Vroiam sa anunt lumea ca am pornit un nou Group-Buy pentru chipurile Avalon.

Sunt un clujean care a intarziat de la comenzile lui Zefir, asa cum multi alti membrii ai comunitatii.

De ce un nou Group-buy? Pentru ca am mai multe persoane interesate, si am decis sa comand propriul batch de chipuri.

Ce voi face cu chipurile? Daca vreti, le trimit la burnin in germania pentru a fi introduse in PCB-uri facute pentru chipurile Avalon. Daca aveti cunostinte / idei in legatura cu asta, sunt deschis la un proiect roman de PCB-uri pentru Avalon (ar fi foarte avantajos!!) Voi asambla placi complete, populate si gata de minat.

Plata pentru chipuri este mediat de John K., un cunoscut membru al comunitatii.

Va astept pe thread! [Group Buy] Avalon ASIC Chips - Escrow by John K. (Eastern Europe / Romania)

Mai jos gasiti niste informatii traduse in romana:

Cum cumpar?
1. Alege nbumarul de cipuri in multiplu de 16, fara numar maxim
2. Trimite suma totala de bitcoin (BTC = Nr. de cipuri x 0.081) la adresa de escrow (data de John K. mai jos)
3. Trimite un post sau mesaj privat cu urmatoarele informatii: <numele pe forum>; <Nr de cipuri>; <BTC trimis>; <adresa de pe care ai trimis BTC>

Adresa comuna data de John este: 1PWvpmWZcE8TRKkuSzRqjJsby9qLtW86Jb

Statutul comenzilor:

2013-04-28: Crearea de Group Buy pentru primul lot de cipuri
3013-05-23: Lotul s-a umplut in intregime si s-a efectuat plata. Lotul 2 este deschis.

Stiri:
2013-06-07:
 - Site-ul www.AlphaHPC.com este complet functional - Comenzile pentru cipuri Avalon si placi Klondike sunt Oficial Deshise!
 - Portalul de plata este functional
 - Comenzi / notificari / comunicarea cu clientii functionala
 - Modificarea automata a statutului de comanda pe baza platii (dupa n confirmari)- On-Hold -> Processing
 - Newsletter pentru stiri majore
 - Blog pentru stiri minore
 - Sper ca va place tema

Despre oferta de Hardware:
 - Prototipurile (cablajele) Klondike16 comandate (ajung in aprox 2 saptamani)
 - Cotatie ferma si avantajoasa pentru placile Klondike16. Azi am cerut o noua cotatie pentru 1000 de piese. Sunt sigur ca vom putea diminua inca putin costurile.
 - Locatie si resurse umane pentru serviciul de gazduirea placilor (hosting) pentru cei interesati. Comisionul de gazduire este de 10% din puterea de procesare a miner-ului. Acesta este singurul cost pt gazduire, care acopera electricitate, suport, internet (banda dubla), etc.

Daca mai aveti intrebari, monitorizez si acest topic, deci voi avea un timp de raspuns mai bun decat pana acum.

Topic-ul pricipal in lb engleza din zona "Custom Hardware" este: [Group Buy] 0.081 - Avalon Chips - Escrow by John K. (Europe / RO) + PCB

Topic-ul principal pentru website este: [ANN] www.AlphaHPC.com - Order Complete Miners & Avalon Chips from 2.146 BTC

Multumesc si bafta!

Order status: Closed

---

Status updates:
2013-09-05: Poll added, introducing the hosting option for the entire group
2013-06-20: Chips for batch 2 are secured! Order window closing in 10 days! (30.06.2013 23:59:59)
2013-05-23: Order completed and paid for Batch 1. Batch 2 open for orders.
2013-04-28: Creation of Group Buy with Batch 1

---

News:


2013-09-05 - Hosting:
- Waiting for chips, assembling miners straight away after arrival and starting a mining farm for GB members to recover the expected ROI while investing in the Group-Buy.
- Dividends will be paid weekly based on the number of chips owned in this GB
- Costs will only be for electricity in the first 3 months, the rest of the mined funds will be divided among the GB members. After the first 3 months, there will be the option to receive the miner or continue with the hosting for a fee of 10% out of the total BTC mined
- The hosting will evolve to a shares/contracts organization that will eventually (in the very near future) start investing in other miners as well as other technologies. The mining farm will grow and also share prices will grow.
- Members who want the bare chips can ask for them and receive them right away
- Hosting made possible at several locations here in my town. Cooling made possible with the help and equipment of several of my friends. Net redundancy made possible via two internet providers.
- The miners will be assembled and started asap. The gathered BTC will be divided to the members of the GB, exactly between the members who has explicitly voted for this option. The BTC will be proportionally divided based on chip count owned. Electricity costs will be deducted and exchanged into fiat. The costs will have proof (paper bills) and proof of payment (receipts).



2013-06-20: Good news! I've had a discussion with some people and we've finally managed to secure enough chips for everybody. I will deliver the miners in September, regardless of the batch status.[/b]

2013-06-18: (We) Need to focus a bit on the chips of this batch. We need to finish this. So if you're ever thinking on ordering chips, order now! I cannot guarantee ordering will be possible next week.

2013-06-17:
Sample chips arrived! Check out the video here

Note: I've moved the rest of the older news a bit lower, in my second post

---

Batch No. 2 orders:

---

Batch No. 1 orders:

---

Terms and conditions:

1. Why a Group-Buy?
This Group-buy is giving You the opportunity to order chips in small quantities. The chips will be sent to developers, who will create a fully functional miner for you.

2. Whats new?
- Shipping will be fast and cheap. And shipping to burnin will cost less because the fee can be split among all users that send their chips to burnin. I'm also tackling with the idea of delivering the chips myself to burnin, thus, eliminating one of the first shipping costs.

3. Reminder
Only send payments from an address you control (i.e. you can sign with it). If you send from MtGox or other exchanges, you risk loosing your funds in case of a dispute, since you can't prove you sent them. If you bought chips pay attention that your address is in the list that shows the payments with the correct amount of chips. If something looks wrong you need to prove that you're the owner of that address. You have to be able to sign a message with your sending address to prove that you're the owner of that address.

4. Refunds: [Edited: 13.Jun.2013]
Due to security reasons of the funds and the whole group-buy, there will be no refunds until the batch cannot be filled in any way and i decide to refund everybody. The maximum time a batch can be open is 6 weeks. In case avalon stops selling chips, all collected bitcoins will be transferred back to the senders.

5. Where are you from?
I'm located in romania, Cluj Napoca.

6. Who are you?
Im a romanian member of this community. I live in Cluj, have a wife and a (5 6 months old) son. If you want proof of my identity i can provide my id, but John has already verified my identity: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=189582.msg2209284#msg2209284

7. What to do with the chips?
My intentions are to send the chips to the best developer possible, build a miner for you to have a ready, fully functional device that can mine you bitcoins.
Optionally, you can receive the chips yourself or send them to your favorite developer, I don't mind at all. The idea is to be able to order the 10000 chips.
If you wish to build your own miner, check out the relevant threads of the forum for this.

8. The chip details from Avalon homepage:
The relevant information about the chips is available from Avalon here.

9. Pricing
A: I am asking for a 6% surplus for my efforts. The 10k chips totaled to 782.1BTC, which results to a resale price of 0.083BTC / chip.

B: A small fee for shipping chips to the developers will be charged (specially if there are more chosen) + there is the shipping cost needed to ship your miner device to the location you want it at. You can chose the type of shipment when there is a choice to choose between security and higher price. This fee is not per order but per shipment. I think thats fair enough. It will be around 30 - 40 Eur / total chips shipped to a certain location, which is not much.

C: In the case that the shipment from avalon is stopped by customs and a fee has to be paid to get the chips back, all buyers of the batch pay the needed fee to free the batches according to the amount of chips a buyer owns in the batches. No additional fee is taken for this. Proof of customs paperwork will be provided, if it is the case.

D: The fiat fee will be paid once the chips arrive and i got your target address. It doesnt have to be paid in fiat, Bitcoin is fine too. Its only calculated in fiat to be independent from bitcoin exchange price.

10. Reservation
No reservations. If you pay and give me the details you're in. Reservations wouldnt be fair against the others. And as long as its possible to order chips there will be a new batch created everytime. The blockchain is the indisputable proof of your payment.

11. Ordering
Only send from an address you can sign a message with. Otherwise a dispute cant be won. How to sign messages. Make sure you copied the correct address before clicking on send. Compare first, last and some middle digits of the copied address to prevent errors.

12. How to buy
A: The buying window opens now and ends whenever the batch is full or latest the middle of June. It would be great to order as soon as possible, so the chips will arrive sooner. Please consider this too and order as soon as possible if you choose to have chips.

B: If there is enough demand to order an additional 10k chip batch, I'll do so (given they are in stock). If the last batch is not filled up, we can discuss what do with the funds. Eigther we make an effort to fill it, or I refund all the payments from that batch. We can discuss that later on.

13. Escrow
I have contacted John K. to escrow the payment

14. Shipment
The chips will be forwarded to your desired address as soon as I receive them and you paid the fiat component mentioned above. I will collect the target adresses after you've made the order for the chips. Delivery within Europe will usually take less than a week; overseas will take what it takes. You will be given the option to select shipment method on time and resolve custom specific issues. Because the shipment price has to be paid you can chose the kind of shipment. I guess insured shipment would be the best choice for your investment. Please note that although the thread's name suggests "Eastern Europe", i can send the chips wherever on the globe you might be. It doesn't cost much from Romania to send a few packages less than 5 kg, for example.

15. Communication
I live in Romania (GMT + 2). Ill try to communicate as fast as possible. I have a daytime job, but i will be online to collect order data and answer all questions / requests as fast as possible. Please be patient when im not around for some time.

Thank you!
Steve

Thank you, Zefir. you've taken a huge worry off many of us.

t13hydra; 10; 0.86; 16dAyPsi5qe81UU5DqvtFyhYS5SkJ23nPM

Absolutely a great lesson! Thanks for that, domnu'. I will freakin' bookmark this thread and put it in the middle of my Desktop!

Stefan (CJ)

6ohRzQhMwfKxQRzZ2UmHNbA148CjcKDyf4

Thanks!

About the payment, we can figure out a btc payment via escrow. There is a John K person here that already solved a task like that.
About the payroll, Kate, we can eighter share the profits based on initial payment (budget of a person), in percentage, or we can set-up a funding entity on btct.co and have shares which bring an incentive (dividend) every round. We can also trade those shares later. i see many BFL devices for sale besides Avalon. I'm not sure if we can raise the funds for an avalon (roughly $30000). What do you guys think? Shall we raise the money first and then think of options to spend it?

Steve

Yes,
Escrow for payments would be fine. If that helps you feel more confident, i'm good with it. After all, the idea is to buy the Avalon. Great idea, BTW. Thanks

Hi there.
Newbie here on the forum. But not for Bitcoin.
A question to all: would anybody be interested in a group-buy for an Avalon? The numbers are: ~3000 shares at $10 each. The device was ordered on the 18th of February (Batch 2).
This is the link to the payment:  https://blockchain.info/tx/582d7aa7a530e6496cb11391b0474f1a60875c0cc0a3574343155d5eb90f3938

For the beginning, i can have a list of shares with people through a shared google docs. The payment can be made via paypal or BTC through escrow. When we receive the device, we clear the BTC payment.

Let me know what you think, if anybody's interested.

Steve

Because it was a group-buy.