I like the mining idea as long as prices are relatively high. But, who knows now that there is an orderly market. I like Ethereum too given the smart contracts focus, and maybe someday we'll see a flippening, but I haven't seen any rigs aside from PandaMiner. I put in an RFQ through Alibaba for Trade Assurance, but I'm not sure if i'll get any play. I'm 99% sure i'll wait until Bitmain rolls out their next batch or potentially look into the DragonMint rigs (16TH/s) with heavy hitters in the industry verifying authenticity through Twitter instead of using a reseller. But, I certainly wouldn't pay 3.5x the cost although some people may if there is a market on eBay. More power to you if you get some bids and want to sell them versus use them.

P.S.: Hopefully I don't get banned for referencing "Ethereum" and "flippening" in this sub-section ..

Where did you get these from?

I think you are correct, which is certainly unfortunate. Everyone agree with this?

I am looking to purchase some Bitmain S9 rigs. Since the original manufacturer has sold out of their January 2018 batch I am looking for an alternative vendor/reseller as i'd prefer not to wait until March 2018 or April 2018 for DragonMint (Halong Mining). However, I don't want to pay double the cost for something I can alternatively wait a few months for.

Does anyone have any legitimate vendors that they have used to purchase Bitmain S9 rigs from? I was looking at Bitcoinware.shop, but I am unsure given some of the feedback I have seen on this website.

Thanks so much in advance.