I'm a noob here so feel free to correct anything I say. Also forgive the grammar mistakes and spelling, just off surgery and painkillers and typing don't go together.
Question 1: Does anyone know the size of Batch 1 production run? (In other words how fast is the network going to explode with centralization and difficulty through the roof)
Question 2: Does anyone know when the Batch 2 Production run will be available and its size? (Are they doing reserves? in small stock (IE I don't buy 100 of em))
Comments and analysis on the Hashnest offer. I looked at the contract (and going over legal contracts is part of what I do for a living).
I'm agreeing with most other people on the Hashnest deal. That's basically a loan so you can finance their capital costs on revamping/retooling their own data centers (probably with beefy miners we haven't even seen yet), and perhaps production operations. While doing that you get a small 'bonus' (in the financial world we call that interest) in the meantime until that principal is paid back. And the 'bonus' is variable rate they are paying YOU for that loan is a lot lower then what a bank would give them (variable interest/bonus rates they are letting a volatile market decide). And they have the ability to STOP paying you if bitcoin takes a crap, their costs skyrocket, or some other disaster happens. Which is a big no no.
Go to a bank and try taking a short term business loan out. Tell the bank you want the clause put in that if your business model becomes unprofitable and you haven't paid them back after 120 days that you stop paying them back and they do not get any accrued interest or principal payments during that time period. But should your model recover, you will start payments again. Oh and that YOU not the bank gets to decide when that period starts and stops, and that it can start and stop at multiple times. And the stopping can include the time period of forever. IE Never paid back with no collateral. See how fast you get laughed out of the building, if not escorted out by security. Hench why they are trying the cloud mining contract deal. Sucker born every minute as they say.
Second thing, or are we at three at this point (Hell I don't know):
I also did a quick comparison between their second hand S5's they are selling (of which I just purchased two literally a day ago). And the new S5+ All these things are from the bitmain post or their own website.
First Warranty: Second hand unit, (don't know what they it through) Only get 30 days. | S5+ New unit, 90 days. However these are Solid State devices. If taken proper care of they should technically last forever. (We all know that's not true but you get the point.)
Hash Rates:
S5: 1155 GH/s 70.4 or so dB fan (AKA Loud as F)
S5+ 7722 GH/s 6x70.4 or so dB fan (AKA Data Center Unit, Loud as F x 6 Never gonna be a home miner unless you got a sound proof basement)
Only good thing is the cooling system of individual sinks seems much more efficient on the S5+. That's also probably partly why the operating conditions increased from 35C to 40C as a maximum over the S5 as well. It also means the product can likely stand up to a lot more wear and tear before components start giving out due to heating and cooling. IE they just improved their manufacturing processes.
Price to GH/s:Second hand: $351 (when I got it, now 348 today, but I'll work these off my price.)
S5+: $2375 On their website
Now remember this is basically 6.5 S5 miners or so strapped together, units with three boards each. So lets to a Gh/S to $ comparison. Also I'm looking at a brand spanking new unit vs a second hand, but both do have at least some warranty coverage and can be tested and nailed out of the box.
$351 gets me 1155 GH/s
$2,375 gets me 7722 GH/s
$351 goes into $2,375 = 6.766x (I know you cannot buy a .766 of a miner but humor me)
So I could buy 6.766 S5's for the price of an S5+ Simple math 1155 Gh/s x 6.766 = 7815.17 Gh/s Then let us do the math of that between the two: 7815 Gh/s / 7722 Gh/s = 1.012
[b
]IE You're actually getting 1.2% better return on Gh/s for $$$$ spent with the simple S5 over the S5+.[/b]
Power efficiency comparison: (I'm not doing power consumption comparisons because where I'm at that's irrelevant. Maybe where other people are that is important. Efficiency is the key for me.)
Now here is the bright spot where the S5+ seems to really shine though and where all those engineering dollars went.
S5: unit is 0.51W/GH
S5+: unit is 0.445W/GH
Math: .445W/GH / .51W/GH = 0.8725
This means you're using almost almost a full 13% less power from an S5+ than running multiple S5's.
12.75% less power to be exact. 
That would be a significant impact on your electrical bill if you're in a high kW/h area. Then again, if you're looking for a fat tax write off because you're smash and grab bitcoin seller paying ordinary US tax rates (which will be most home people) and you're working this as a cottage business in your basement, that's a business write off you're going to lose.
PS: Regardless I'd take the lower operating costs, but this is definitely for people who have committed space for serious mining operations.
Overall Summary: GH/s ain't that great for the price, but the 12.75% discount on the power usage isn't too shabby. Someone mentioned breaking these up into multiple units. I'd have to see the specs and re-run the analysis over on that single unit to see i that was worth it. Especially at the price of $800 per single unit they quoted, which is a slight premium over the 3 stacked units.
Cniht
