BFL's new "highspeed manufacturing" capability?

[cncguru]

Another very interesting factor I believe is that BFL is about to introduce the very first "High speed manufacturing" to the Bitcoin world.

Just how many units per day will their new facility produce?

Will the guys going on their "magical mystery tour" bring back video's?

I've seen claims of catching up on ALL pre-orders by Christmas which would be truly impressive!

Will we buy them up as fast as they can produce them on into the new year?

And what about ASIC product life cycle?

Interesting times to come indeed.

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[dooferorg]

Mining will likely become a game of 'keeping up with the Joneses'. No matter how fast your own hashing power is, you are always competing for a finite amount of coins and there's always a bigger fish. Those with the means to invest will make more money and those that don't will be on the sidelines.

I was a bit concerned to learn that the ASIC warranty was only 6 months. I sure do hope these things don't go *pop* after only a few months of use, since it will never get to pay for itself if it dies on or after 6 months, 1 day of uptime.

[SgtSpike]

Mining will likely become a game of 'keeping up with the Joneses'. No matter how fast your own hashing power is, you are always competing for a finite amount of coins and there's always a bigger fish. Those with the means to invest will make more money and those that don't will be on the sidelines.

I was a bit concerned to learn that the ASIC warranty was only 6 months. I sure do hope these things don't go *pop* after only a few months of use, since it will never get to pay for itself if it dies on or after 6 months, 1 day of uptime.

Depends on when you ordered.  I have an ASIC order that will definitely ship out in the first batch, and if the price/difficulty ratio doesn't change much from today, it'll pay for itself in 5 days.

I certainly wouldn't count on a new order written up today having a payback less than 6 months though.  But if difficulty only rises by 10 times (which is what some people are projecting), it should *technically* pay for itself within 1.5 months, which still isn't bad.  I just think difficulty is going to rise far past 1000% once all of the ASIC preorders have shipped.  Certainly, if it isn't going to pay back within 6 months, I wouldn't buy it with only a 6 month warranty - too much risk for my taste.

[cncguru]

What I was referring to by asic product life cycle was the time to next "upgrade" as we are just getting started with asics and assuming we are here for the long haul(I hope) then we will be seeing a march down the nanometer ladder with ever more powerful asics.

[biddicoin]

Well - if a company doesn't answer a simple question - what kind of business is that?

Seems like they are not interested in "little" Money by selling some Jalapenos. I asked them how long
it would take until I receive my Jalapenos - NO answer... nothing... (they could say something like "it can take 3-4 month... dunno... but no answer...
what kind of business is that?)

Even if a nother company is a bit more expensive... I go and buy there!

[Frequency]

Very good questions 

They magically produce 3 different types of devices in 1 or 2 months that can magically produce a magically amount of money against a magically low price and were are a lot of proof is magically not given so far ...



 

[YokoToriyama]

i hope they make at least 100 or so a day or 50.

[reeses]

What I was referring to by asic product life cycle was the time to next "upgrade" as we are just getting started with asics and assuming we are here for the long haul(I hope) then we will be seeing a march down the nanometer ladder with ever more powerful asics.

There are several obvious precedents in history.

We have the scramble for the desktop, with MIPS, CMOS, Zilog, HP, IBM, DEC, Intel, Motorola, NatSemi, SUN, and others, wrestling for various slots of the market with different ISAs.  People pretty much settled on x86 for the desktop, with the rest getting pushed to the margins above and below the consumer/business desktop, with a few consolidations (HPPA and Itanium, PPC/POWER, etc.).

Because of a number of factors (mainly Microsoft), the x86 PC platform emerged and a number of variants of ISA compatible clone chips, some licensed and some not-so-much so, were developed by a range of competitors.  AMD, Harris, Cyrix, IDT, Transmeta, VIA, and others have wrestled in this space, to various degrees of success.  Some of that continues today, but we see elimination and consolidation in the space.  It's basically Intel and _AMD.

Other examples of innovation, starvation, and consolidation include mobile platforms, computer audio subsystems, and various GPU cycles, at the high (SGI) and low (Nvidia, ATI, 3dfx, S3, Paradise, Matrox, etc.) ends.  Success has pivoted on application support and maintaining position within the pack.

I suspect we'll see the same sort of thing with BTC ASICs.  We're seeing an evolutionary step with the first gen, from new architectures to masked FPGA descriptions that are burned in silicon.

What happens next can follow a number of paths.

First is the evolutionary migration to smaller transistor sizes, which will permit faster, lower-power operation, higher hasher density per die, etc.

Second, macro-scale architectural innovations may be applied to gain much more significant advantages.

Third, software support will be critical.  A great piece of hardware is only as good as how much power it can put onto the network.

None of these may happen (I'm looking backward to point forward) or all of them may happen.  They're expensive.  Generally, a leader will emerge at some point.  Because software makers usually want to target the largest market, you'll start to see less-supported platforms either adopt the interface (if not the architecture) of the leader and attempt to differentiate themselves somehow, whether it be price, clock speed, improved availability, or marketing.  Those who don't follow consolidation in such a small market will exit the market.

While I'm interested in seeing what the first generation does, it's really not that important.  New players may emerge or others may fail completely out of the gate.  No one has even demonstrated a prototype yet.

What I am excited about (ok, strong language) is what generations two and three look like.  Once everyone has an ASIC in their hands and the market is validated, it's going to get sexy.  I would say that any of the current ASIC makers who don't have their next gen chips in the pipeline (hah!) will probably not survive, even if it's just a process improvement "tock".

[cncguru]

Also looking back to see forward I wonder just how quickly we will move through the product iterations. Will we see ~18 month cycles like AMD/Nvidia have shown in the graphics cards sector? What will we do with each lesser generation?

 And what about future product integration? Seeing as these units will be basically plug-n-play, where will we imbed them in our lives?

How about having the main unit integrated into oh, say, our refrigerators? including, of course, the fast becoming ubiquitous wirelessly connected touch screen interfaces we(you) are running (y)our lives with these days.

But I am seriously wondering just how quickly these magic little money making(Pandoras) boxes will catch on in the general populace.

 SO WHEN ARE WE GOING TO BE ABLE TO ORDER AN ASIC MINER AND RECEIVE IT LIKE WE ORDERED IT FROM NEWEGG?

     
 

[kano]

Regarding the topic:

I don't really consider 'in-sourcing' production very much related to 'highspeed manufacturing'

Tom, bASIC, provided a whole bunch of info (as he usually does quite openly) about how they are producing their hardware:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=79637.msg1238806#msg1238806

Reading that sounds much more like the topic heading, not BFL

[dooferorg]

Also looking back to see forward I wonder just how quickly we will move through the product iterations. Will we see ~18 month cycles like AMD/Nvidia have shown in the graphics cards sector? What will we do with each lesser generation?

I'd say we'll never see that since I really doubt bitcoin mining will ever go 'mainstream' like graphics cards are. The sort of money we're talking about with manufacturing ASICs is peanuts compared to what AMD and NVidia spend on developing hardware. There just isn't the money in the market to warrant big expenditures.

Once everyone and their brother who is actually WANTING to mine bitcoins (and this is a FAR smaller amount than the market for other computer products) has an ASIC, the market will be saturated. The difficulty will go up and the only way to 'be profitable' will be to buy yet more and faster ASICs.

So it becomes an arms race and those with the biggest pockets will 'win'.

Therefore, it'll be like 'keeping up with the Joneses', like I said before.

[Jack1Rip1BurnIt]

I agree with you about having to spend more and more money just to keep up. Right now someone can spend just over $1000 and possibly get some pretty good returns in the end(depending on where you are in line). With this difficulty increase we have coming, I don't see $1000 worth of mining equipment being enough in a year or two. Interesting indeed

[SgtSpike]

Also looking back to see forward I wonder just how quickly we will move through the product iterations. Will we see ~18 month cycles like AMD/Nvidia have shown in the graphics cards sector? What will we do with each lesser generation?

I'd say we'll never see that since I really doubt bitcoin mining will ever go 'mainstream' like graphics cards are. The sort of money we're talking about with manufacturing ASICs is peanuts compared to what AMD and NVidia spend on developing hardware. There just isn't the money in the market to warrant big expenditures.

Once everyone and their brother who is actually WANTING to mine bitcoins (and this is a FAR smaller amount than the market for other computer products) has an ASIC, the market will be saturated. The difficulty will go up and the only way to 'be profitable' will be to buy yet more and faster ASICs.

So it becomes an arms race and those with the biggest pockets will 'win'.

Therefore, it'll be like 'keeping up with the Joneses', like I said before.

I don't quite get your statement of "those with the biggest pockets will win"

What is your definition of winning?  What is your definition of losing?

I don't really see how people with different levels of investment will be that far from each other in terms of ROI.  A guy investing $1M in ASICs might see a 200% ROI, while a guy investing $150 in ASICs might see a 160% ROI.  And the guy with $150 loses?

So, enough vague statements - tell me how the little guy will lose in this arms race.

[cncguru]

@ kano
Yes, I was using the term "highspeed manufacturing" very loosely and agree fully that's Tom's level of communication is refreshing and informative.

As far as this market depth and where it will reach, well I am very curious to see how that plays out.
I am reasonably sure that the vast majority of people will not even consider buying an asic until someone has them as at least very close to "off the shelf" items.

And for the ROI/profitability issue people could compare it to parking money in a CD or savings account and looked at that way you are getting way better returns than what's available in the mainstream banking industry.(or a nice little revenue stream for the small players as supplemental income?)

As for the difficulty question, who knows where we will end up and that might just put many people off that are looking for some pie-in-the-sky unrealistic return based on how things have been up until now.

Thanks everyone for your comments!

     

[kano]

...
As far as this market depth and where it will reach, well I am very curious to see how that plays out.
I am reasonably sure that the vast majority of people will not even consider buying an asic until someone has them as at least very close to "off the shelf" items.
...

When you say "the vast majority of people", I presume you are talking about people not already 'into' bitcoin.

People are already throwing money left, right and centre at ASIC for the obvious reason.
It is the next performance step for BTC - just like GPU was back in the CPU days once that avenue opened up.

[cncguru]

Yes, I meant all those out there that have yet to be introduced to BTC.

 Hell, I am a firm believer and I have not pre ordered anything and will not until I can see items shipping. I will buy as many as I need to keep things interesting. I don't care about the windfall profits that the first receivers will get( they deserve it for taking the risk)

I do believe that since asics are very "user friendly" (don't require much skill and no big power bills)the adoption rate could possibly skyrocket but then again maybe not, time will tell.

If I wasn't happily retired I would be very tempted to start an asic company and "do it right" i.e.
Hey people 100GH stand alone device/100W/$1499/ next day delivery available!

And that would be the first "announcement"

     

[reeses]

Reliable sources say this is where the highspeed manufacturing will take place.

http://preview.topgear.com/au/photos/bloodhound-ssc-strand

[cncguru]

@reeses

LMAO I love it

But I have my own fuel sipping version!

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/71042493/Acabion_Sunset_02_1920%20(2).jpg

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/71042493/Acabion_Sunset_05_1920%20(2).jpg


Only 300kph but 37mpg LOL!


       

[reeses]

@reeses

LMAO I love it

But I have my own fuel sipping version!

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/71042493/Acabion_Sunset_02_1920%20(2).jpg

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/71042493/Acabion_Sunset_05_1920%20(2).jpg


Only 300kph but 37mpg LOL!


       

Where can I buy?  Is there a Hayabusa engine hiding in there?

[cncguru]

Here's the one you want reeses


http://gizmodo.com/346802/acabions-750bhp-gtbo-motorcycle-blazes-at-340mph

[cncguru]

Well back on topic it looks like we have moved out of speculation and on to posting stock photos of the new oven and pick-n-place machines that they have in another thread started so I will just link to it here.


https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=115521.0


       

[senseless]

I don't quite get your statement of "those with the biggest pockets will win"

It's quite simple. If the total network hash rate is 200TH/s and you have 1TH/s you will receive roughly 0.5% of all bitcoins generated.

If you have 1x 4.5GH/s unit at 200TH/s network rate would receive 0.00225% of all bitcoins generated.

If people with a large bank book purchase more hardware it can offset those with a smaller amount of hardware if those with less hardware do not purchase more.

Lets say after the network hash rate 10 people decide to purchase 10TH/s. It will raise the difficulty to 300TH/s. If the 1x 4.5GH/s user does not increase their hashing power they will now only be receiving 0.0015% of all bitcoins generated.

..

Bitcoin is a battle of who invests the most money and the length of the ROI period investors are willing to accept. The amount of currency generated is always the same, which is what the investors are battling over (obviously).

[Gatorhex]

Just how many units per day will their new facility produce?

I posted this a while ago in the Newbie section...

BLF said..

"if needed, weekends and 24 hour shifts can keep the production line moving to satisfy quick delivery of customer orders. To this end we've purchased an entire SMT assembly suite and hired a capable team to run it. These units are currently being installed in our new facility."

"BFL_Office - 10-05-2012, 09:47 AM
The setup has a conservative capacity of 300 units per 8 hour shift or 900 units in a 24 hour day."

https://forums.butterflylabs.com/content.php/120-BFL-Invests-in-Assembly-Equipment

So I pondered, if they can churn them out at 900 per day, why bother with a pre-order?  

[SgtSpike]

I don't quite get your statement of "those with the biggest pockets will win"

It's quite simple. If the total network hash rate is 200TH/s and you have 1TH/s you will receive roughly 0.5% of all bitcoins generated.

If you have 1x 4.5GH/s unit at 200TH/s network rate would receive 0.00225% of all bitcoins generated.

If people with a large bank book purchase more hardware it can offset those with a smaller amount of hardware if those with less hardware do not purchase more.

Lets say after the network hash rate 10 people decide to purchase 10TH/s. It will raise the difficulty to 300TH/s. If the 1x 4.5GH/s user does not increase their hashing power they will now only be receiving 0.0015% of all bitcoins generated.

..

Bitcoin is a battle of who invests the most money and the length of the ROI period investors are willing to accept. The amount of currency generated is always the same, which is what the investors are battling over (obviously).

Isn't this how ANYTHING in the world works though?  Those who make the largest investments receive the largest return.  And that is somehow wrong in your mind?  Or... what's your point?

Just how many units per day will their new facility produce?

I posted this a while ago in the Newbie section...

BLF said..

"if needed, weekends and 24 hour shifts can keep the production line moving to satisfy quick delivery of customer orders. To this end we've purchased an entire SMT assembly suite and hired a capable team to run it. These units are currently being installed in our new facility."

"BFL_Office - 10-05-2012, 09:47 AM
The setup has a conservative capacity of 300 units per 8 hour shift or 900 units in a 24 hour day."

https://forums.butterflylabs.com/content.php/120-BFL-Invests-in-Assembly-Equipment

So I pondered, if they can churn them out at 900 per day, why bother with a pre-order?  

I certainly wouldn't at this point in the game.  The difference between preordering now and ordering after all of the preorders are filled would probably only be a few days worth of production.

[Aseras]

which really makes you wonder why in the hell would they bother. They could make all the hardware they are capable of selling in a year in just under a couple weeks production capacity.

No business does such a thing.

[SgtSpike]

which really makes you wonder why in the hell would they bother. They could make all the hardware they are capable of selling in a year in just under a couple weeks production capacity.

No business does such a thing.

You also have to consider labor cost savings.  If the machines cost $50,000, and they can do the same work that 10 people @ $20,000/year can do, then it's a good move for the company, even if it does mean they have way more production capacity than they really need.

[scrybe]

Very good questions 

They magically produce 3 different types of devices in 1 or 2 months that can magically produce a magically amount of money against a magically low price and were are a lot of proof is magically not given so far ...



 

You are reading too much JK Rowling.

[Frequency]

Very good questions 

They magically produce 3 different types of devices in 1 or 2 months that can magically produce a magically amount of money against a magically low price and were are a lot of proof is magically not given so far ...



 

You are reading too much JK Rowling.

Nope...Tolkien ""Lord of the ASIC tales""