I am very new to this. In fact this is my second post...

I have a Anker USB 9 port hub (12v 5a Power). Plugged in I have been running 2 ASIC erupters @ 330 MHz and 3 ASIC erupters @ 336 MHz.

I've been wicked pleased watching my workers go and do there thing. But at Christmas I was given a couple of gift certificates that I turned into 3 Antminers @ 1.6 Ghz... How could I not? Going from 1.66 MHz to 6.4 MHz for free? (well free to me).

Last night the Ants showed up and I got them plugged in. I mine with Bitminter. I got the five other miners working just fine, but I was getting errors when it came to the Ants. (I've got the errors written down at home, but not here at the office.)

I've done everything I can to get them going, what am I missing?

Well, I'm a fairly new miner.
I got my first taste purchasing some mining hours on Ebay. My notes are a little sketchy, but I believe the total was 168 hours at 22 GHz, I went through three vendors (2 x 10Ghz, and 1 x 2 Ghz) for a total of $55. (I know the cash amount is right, I'm not real sure of the GHz.) Those purchases were made on 10/23.

After about an hour of watching the work via Bitminter, I went ahead and made my first miner purchase. I bought the following:
1 Raspberri Pi basic starter kit
2 ASIC Block erupters @ 330 MHz
3 ASIC block erupters @ 336 MHz
Anker USB 3.0 9 port hub
Artic Fan
Total cost was: $287.87

I love my set up, but I went right into an old laptop vs. using my Pi. I just don't have the tech where with all to be able to go through all the steps to get the Pi up and running.

Once I got everything plugged in and running, I quickly learned the joys of the difficulty changes! OYE! I also learned about the volatility of the market.

When I jumped in the BTC was around $130, then it was $1010, now it's $665. Wow.


So my two questions for the forums are these:
There's a company called ASIC Products out of Germany (I live in the states) that is offering the Blue and Red Furys. Are they trust worthy? (I used some of my mined BTC to purchase a blue fury and was curious if that was wise.)

While I'm opposed to the idea of pre-paying for equipment that'll come out sometime in Jan., Feb., or 1st quarter next year, is it wise to spend money on "slightly used" miners that can be picked up on Craigs List, Ebay, or Amazon? (I've had NO issue with my first set of erupters.)