Are ASICs still worth investing in?

[VirosaGITS]

see with the rising electricity prices i dont think investing in asic miner is worth now.....rising electricty prices is covering up the block reward now.. so its hard now.....however if block reward is increased then it may work...

Could you explain what you mean by "rising electricity prices"? Prices here are not rising at all and at a good electricity rate, the current difficulty with current gen hardware is not much of an impact on income.

Thus beside the overpriced unit that is the S7, there is no problem at all with home mining unless you can't have your hardware placed somewhere with a good price for your electricity consumption.

[Searing]

see with the rising electricity prices i dont think investing in asic miner is worth now.....rising electricty prices is covering up the block reward now.. so its hard now.....however if block reward is increased then it may work...

Could you explain what you mean by "rising electricity prices"? Prices here are not rising at all and at a good electricity rate, the current difficulty with current gen hardware is not much of an impact on income.

Thus beside the overpriced unit that is the S7, there is no problem at all with home mining unless you can't have your hardware placed somewhere with a good price for your electricity consumption.

well my elec bill shows like 8c kwh when i figure out the bill from kwh's used and the $$$ paid it is always between 13.1c to 13.7c kwh (it varies) there is always some kinda
adjustment to taxes/fees/seasonal adjustments and what have you ..always in the upward direction...so best I can figure my price per kwh has gone up between 1.5c to 1.7c
kwh just since jan 2015

so it is misleading to say the least

just saying

[VirosaGITS]

see with the rising electricity prices i dont think investing in asic miner is worth now.....rising electricty prices is covering up the block reward now.. so its hard now.....however if block reward is increased then it may work...

Could you explain what you mean by "rising electricity prices"? Prices here are not rising at all and at a good electricity rate, the current difficulty with current gen hardware is not much of an impact on income.

Thus beside the overpriced unit that is the S7, there is no problem at all with home mining unless you can't have your hardware placed somewhere with a good price for your electricity consumption.

well my elec bill shows like 8c kwh when i figure out the bill from kwh's used and the $$$ paid it is always between 13.1c to 13.7c kwh (it varies) there is always some kinda
adjustment to taxes/fees/seasonal adjustments and what have you ..always in the upward direction...so best I can figure my price per kwh has gone up between 1.5c to 1.7c
kwh just since jan 2015

so it is misleading to say the least

just saying

Ah i see, the prices here have been pretty static, then again its Government owned. But now that you say you pay 13.1c to 13.7c, i'm afraid to agree that it would be hard for you to see ROI with pretty much any hardware at all.

Even cloud mining's overpriced 0.08/kWh would be better for you, and those generally barely break even, so i think mining at home is not for you =/

[mookid]

Where i live (Venezuela) electricity is so cheap that it's better to just buy a bunch of S5 instead of S7. In my case efficiency doesn't matter that much. Of course, if you live anywhere else, it's the main factor to take into account when you buy a miner.

[Amph]

Where i live (Venezuela) electricity is so cheap that it's better to just buy a bunch of S5 instead of S7. In my case efficiency doesn't matter that much. Of course, if you live anywhere else, it's the main factor to take into account when you buy a miner.

it depend if you pay less with s5 as a initial investment, 5 x 350 is around the same of s7, but with a worst efficiency, and more space needed, personally i would go with the s7

or better i would wait for a mini s7 if you can't afford one

[QuintLeo]

see with the rising electricity prices i dont think investing in asic miner is worth now...

 Must be a local to you thing, Electric prices most places are pretty stable with a VERY SLOW (usually small single digit %) increase every year or two.

 Some places probably have been DROPPING the last few months as oil got a lot cheaper, though not a lot of places use oil as their primary electric generation fuel (most of them being OPEC members, small islands, or pretty remote areas).

[VirosaGITS]

see with the rising electricity prices i dont think investing in asic miner is worth now...

 Must be a local to you thing, Electric prices most places are pretty stable with a VERY SLOW (usually small single digit %) increase every year or two.

 Some places probably have been DROPPING the last few months as oil got a lot cheaper, though not a lot of places use oil as their primary electric generation fuel (most of them being OPEC members, small islands, or pretty remote areas).

Mhmm. The price here did raise marginally here so it was inaccurate of me to say they don't at all, but they have been simply keeping up with the inflation rate, so i have to say Hydro here is a very good source of cheap electricity and its the sole reason i'm doing so well with mining.

I mean even my S1 are still earning a bit of profit... But next difficulty increase or maybe two, they will not earn anything anymore over what i pay. =/

[Mickeyb]

see with the rising electricity prices i dont think investing in asic miner is worth now...

 Must be a local to you thing, Electric prices most places are pretty stable with a VERY SLOW (usually small single digit %) increase every year or two.

 Some places probably have been DROPPING the last few months as oil got a lot cheaper, though not a lot of places use oil as their primary electric generation fuel (most of them being OPEC members, small islands, or pretty remote areas).

Mhmm. The price here did raise marginally here so it was inaccurate of me to say they don't at all, but they have been simply keeping up with the inflation rate, so i have to say Hydro here is a very good source of cheap electricity and its the sole reason i'm doing so well with mining.

I mean even my S1 are still earning a bit of profit... But next difficulty increase or maybe two, they will not earn anything anymore over what i pay. =/

For the most experienced miners like you, I see mining still as profitable. But for the new people that are looking to get into mining, I don't know. It is very risky. It will work if your electricity costs are very low. OP if you are somewhere on the margin, I wouldn't get into all of this. You are better off buying coins directly as an investment.

This is at least what I have decided the last time I looked into mining.

[pjsonowal]

If you are going to invest on high end asiic miners then sure it will be profitable... Mining has only one criteria.... Huge investment high returns... Low investment low profit or maybe loss...

[VirosaGITS]

If you are going to invest on high end asiic miners then sure it will be profitable... Mining has only one criteria.... Huge investment high returns... Low investment low profit or maybe loss...

You don't need high end ASIC, not to be confused with ascii.  Mining has only one true criteria imo and that is your electricity price. For instance if you have electricity for near free, like some country or some people that have some deals, you could buy 10000 Antminer S1 for like 100k and make total bank.

Of course it would be a silly endeavor since there would be more manageable investment, but it show in concept what the true common denominator is.

[QuintLeo]

There are actually 3 criteria.

 Electricicy cost
 Efficiency of miner / power supply setup
 Cost of miner + needed power suppl(ies)y

 I would call electric cost the single most important factor but they ALL matter.


 If you invest badly, "high investment" can lose HIGH amounts, it's not a guarentee at ALL that more invested = more profit.

 Amount invested has pretty much ZERO effect on profitability - just affects how MUCH you're going to make or lose.

[VirosaGITS]

There are actually 3 criteria.

 Electricicy cost
 Efficiency of miner / power supply setup
 Cost of miner + needed power suppl(ies)y

 I would call electric cost the single most important factor but they ALL matter.


 If you invest badly, "high investment" can lose HIGH amounts, it's not a guarentee at ALL that more invested = more profit.

 Amount invested has pretty much ZERO effect on profitability - just affects how MUCH you're going to make or lose.

I guess that if you are completely oblivious to the mining scene, you'd have to add that as a requirement before mining.
You will need to know what's the going $/gh rate. Knowing this is such a fundamental that it doesn't come to mind as a criteria to me.

If you know what you are doing, then the only mechanical requirement that is up to you is electricity cost. If your electricity is free, you can grab a bunch of S1 for dirt cheap and ROI like mad, if you went and paid 500$ per S1, then you will still profit but you're horrible at investment.

Its your electricity cost that dictate what you can pay, so it all revolve around it. If you start adding caveats, then you'd also need to add BTC having a price as a requirement, difficulty to not go up like crazy as another requirement. That the world won't end. Etc.

[Finksy]

Quint, I agree on all points but the last.  Amount invested does impact profitability because of purchasing power.  More so on the used equipment market than purchasing new (Bitmain requires upwards of 200K in sales to consider price breaks!), but buying in volume decreases the amount you spend on shipping, decreases unit cost, etc for both miners and PSU's. Same goes for infrastructure, having an electrician come in to install 1 240V circuit as opposed to wiring a whole building, you are getting better value for volume, and lowering your overall costs.  Same can be said for electricity rates, call the LDC about rates for your home farm as opposed to a 1mW facility, and you'll find much better rates by investing more in the infrastructure. 

Whether or not these costs can be re-couped in a reasonable amount of time, however, is not always a given. Bigger may not always be better in the long run, which is why everyone has to come up with some reasonable models and understand their own tolerance to risk to determine how much to invest in the most efficient way possible. There is no yes or no answer, newbies need to educate themselves in how to make these decisions for themselves, given their own circumstances.

[QuintLeo]

buying in volume decreases the amount you spend on shipping, decreases unit cost, etc for both miners and PSU's.

 Sometimes, when you CAN get a volume break, you can save a little on cost through bulk buys.
 I doubt it would be make the difference between making RoI and not though, unless someone was right on the edge already.


 I did say that amount invested has "pretty much", no "no" effect on profitability after all.
 At most it's a very minor consideration compared to the other 3 - and is largely covered by my criteria 3 when it comes to the bulk purchace aspect anyway.

[Amph]

If you are going to invest on high end asiic miners then sure it will be profitable... Mining has only one criteria.... Huge investment high returns... Low investment low profit or maybe loss...

you forgot big loss in the case your huge investment fail, i remember a guy that go allin with gpu mining for altcoin, and in the end if failed to do roi and was forced to do a big discount on his big gpu farm, with a loss that was not indifferent

i would simply invest what you can afford to lose and i would try to not have a roi that is above 6-12 months, otherwise leave it

[VirosaGITS]

buying in volume decreases the amount you spend on shipping, decreases unit cost, etc for both miners and PSU's.

 Sometimes, when you CAN get a volume break, you can save a little on cost through bulk buys.
 I doubt it would be make the difference between making RoI and not though, unless someone was right on the edge already.


 I did say that amount invested has "pretty much", no "no" effect on profitability after all.
 At most it's a very minor consideration compared to the other 3 - and is largely covered by my criteria 3 when it comes to the bulk purchace aspect anyway.

You can get small volume breaks too by picking up deals from local people wanting to hand off their miners easy, quick and cheap. I got a S4 for 425$ that way, a S5 and looking at a couple more right now.

The amount of good deals are very limited, so only suited to someone with time but only a small miner capacity.

[Searing]

buying in volume decreases the amount you spend on shipping, decreases unit cost, etc for both miners and PSU's.

 Sometimes, when you CAN get a volume break, you can save a little on cost through bulk buys.
 I doubt it would be make the difference between making RoI and not though, unless someone was right on the edge already.


 I did say that amount invested has "pretty much", no "no" effect on profitability after all.
 At most it's a very minor consideration compared to the other 3 - and is largely covered by my criteria 3 when it comes to the bulk purchace aspect anyway.

You can get small volume breaks too by picking up deals from local people wanting to hand off their miners easy, quick and cheap. I got a S4 for 425$ that way, a S5 and looking at a couple more right now.

The amount of good deals are very limited, so only suited to someone with time but only a small miner capacity.

yeah if you have elec costs on the low side you can make a killing by getting used equip ...in the midwest usa where I'm at the elec rate is fixed at around 13.5c kwh (xcel) this of course includes all fees/taxes. you only can get a better rate (and it an't much maybe 3c) if you use over 3.5kw a month (I have 2 titans plus house currently using 2.55kwh)

so i suspect their is a great movement EAST to Oregon and China etc of a lot of used scrypt and sha-256 equip

the circle of asic life....chip to doorstop with space heater as a side effect