I speak as a miner who has been making decisions (mining/buying/holding/selling) since when the whole network was ~100 Ghash/s... and I have told you this before, but you grossly underestimate how fast the network is going to grow in the next few months and years. "2x per year", yeah right. For reference, the network's mining speed was growing by 100x every ~6 months when GPUs were introduced. Yes. Not 2x, but 100x.

(I also think you overestimate BFL's ability to ship in merely 4 months IMHO). Because of that I don't think that anybody can assert with good confidence that one of the options is definitively more profitable than the other.

This is why I think betsofbitco.in is superior to bitbet.us. Early betters make more than late betters, but everybody is guaranteed to receive 100% of their initial bet, because betsofbitco.in takes the fee out of the losing side of the bets, not out of both sides.

No answer? If I were a shareholder I would want to know to be able to infer operational costs that are bound to increase in the near future.

May I suggest that you bet against them at http://betsofbitco.in/item?id=665 (disclosure: I submitted it)

Reducing voltages? Using superconductivity? Using photons instead of electrons? If I knew, I would be founding the next "Intel" company!

The next step is making chips comprised of millions of silicon layers, as opposed to just 10 or so. With each "layer" being a few nanometers thick, that leaves us a relatively big margin to improve performance (30 years of Moore's Law).

Just quoting this for reference. I wonder why BFL deleted this post.

That is correct. BFL originally said that refunds would be allowed "60 days past target", that is 60 days past Oct 31, that is after Dec 31:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=87934.msg993703#msg993703  (the only reason I have the link is because I had saved it)

Strangely, the above post was deleted(!), but some users, like streblo, have quoted it:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=102040.msg1117586#msg1117586

Actually getwork + rollntime + high static diff (120 or higher) would easily support ~10 Thash/s or more. For example this can be done using eloipool, which I use myself, and recommended to jgarzik, who confirmed this was pretty much the only stable solution for him to mine solo with his Avalon.

12 Thash/s translates to merely 23 getwork/s (with 120 diff and rollntime window of 120 sec).

As a solo miner myself, I strongly believe that mining solo with fallback on a pool is a more robust solution overall, as it shields you from all the pool issues (DDoS which sometimes affect multiple pools at once, etc). It is very logical: the software stack of a pool is a lot more complex than a local bitcoind+eloipool, therefore the sheer elimination of this complexity makes solo mining more robust. Also, a pool infrastructure is public, but your own infra is private and nearby, reducing network issues and exposure.

Cut your condescending tone.

The amount of BTC cannot grow by more than 2x (as I said, we have already mined half the coins).
If Bitcoin continues to succeed, the economy will obviously grow by a lot more than 2x (which is why I mention an economy growth of 10x, 100x -- it has already grown by more than 100x over the last 2 years).

My answer was assuming a long-term investment (5-10 years). Whereas you seem to focus on the short term. In which case I agree that mining is safer strategy to maximize short-term profits, except I am saying right now is the worse time to invest in ASICs (see below).


Pretty much, yes. More precisely, the profits difference is so huge between being first or last in line of the ASIC preorders, that I think it would be utterly stupid to place an order today Feb 24. If you can wait, say 6 months, until a vendor slashes prices or announces a more power efficient chip, then wait, and order the day this announcement will be made. Being the first in line of the next technological advancement is always going to be the optimal time to invest in mining equipment (whether you are the first to mine on GPUs, or first on 110nm ASICs, or first on 65nm ASICs, etc).

Also, yes, I do think the "profitability decline per year" of 0.61 used by that mining calculator grossly underestimates the tidal wave of ASIC developments that is about to hit the Bitcoin mining industry.

Actually, what is almost guaranteed to happen is either (1) Bitcoin fails completely and drops to $0, or (2) Bitcoin continues succeeds and naturally continues to appreciate in value to $100, $1000, and more. The chance that the exchange rate remains stagnant, say between $5-50, in the next decade (we are talking long term investment here) is almost zero. Mark my words, it will be either scenario (1) or (2).

It's basic math. If Bitcoin succeeds, and if its economy grows by 10x, 100x, etc, then its exchange rate should increase by 10x, 100x, etc, because there is a predetermined finite number of coins. (Except that we have mined only half the coins up to this day, but you get my point). The question is how quickly will Bitcoin succeeds? Will it significantly rise in value over 0.5 years, 1 year, 3 years, or more?

My personal advice, with $120k: at this very moment I would buy some BTC and keep the rest to either buy more BTC if its exchange rate drops (to average down), or to be first in line when ordering the next generation of ASICs (eg. when a vendor announces 28nm, or significantly cuts the prices of current devices). It is already too late to order the current generation of devices. Customers in front of you in the line will spike the difficulty up. One of the flaws in your math assuming a difficulty of 100M is that you assume it will stay constant at 100M for a straight 6 months while you are recouping your MiniRig investment. It will instead continue to rise during these 6 months because vendors will slash prices, offer better hardware, etc.

Friedcat, would you mind sharing power consumption numbers (Mhash/Joule) of your chips? Do they match what you initially estimated?

The answer to your question is: no. For the same reason, if "BFL delivers something like a bitcoin mining ASIC" after numerous delays and even after outsourcing everything, then no, it does not make them scammers. For the 3rd or 4th time: this is why you are so under-appreciated on the forums: you use a word "scam" that does not mean what you think it means. You would be correct to describe BFL as "late" or "incompetent planners" (I would not disagree), but not "scammers".

Yup. Whether you look at the 3- or 7- or 14-day average, we clearly went from 21-22 to 30+ THash/s in 1.5 months. Hardly unchanging, but clearly a nice +50% mining increase.

becoin, you are ridiculous. You said word for word "BFL is going to deliver something like a bitcoin mining ASIC", which contradicts "BFL is a scam" (because everybody except you interprets it as meaning "BFL will deceive by not delivering anything").

In your very own vocabulary, "is a scam" seems to mean "is late". If that is what you want to complain about then use the adjective "late", not the noun "scam". How many times do I have to explain this?

You contradict yourself, again, because you admitted here that BFL will deliver "something", hence making them not a scam. Being late in delivering a product makes them, at worst, incompetent, but not scammers.

Besides, what financial incentive would the "scammers" have to be late? The later they are, the more the competition steals customers from BFL, and the less money they make (which is kind of the objective #1 of "scamming", ahem...). Gosh, I wish you and others would be more careful in your use of the english language. These misplaced "scam!" accusation are becoming tiring and repetitive.

Bottom line, if you are upset that BFL is late then say "BFL is late!" not "BFL is a scam!".

I am simply showing you that ASICMiner produced 60-40 Ghash/s per $1k, which you doubted was feasible.



Every time another Avalon is delivered, you are losing more and more credibility. AFAIK you are the only one claiming that jgarzik, the Foundation, and all others who have received units are "part of the scam". I would be interested to enter in a personal bet with you that batch 1 will be shipped by some date.

001sonkit, your sig says "10000 Satoshis (0.00001BTC)" this amount of BTC is actually 1000 satoshis.

Thanks, I recovered the coins.