Jalapeno question

[Shotgun_WooWoo]

I've done a search already and couldn't find anything too helpful. 

I'm trying to figure what they are exactly.  I know they are a mining rig, but what type/kind?  Is it just a oversided USB dongle, or does it have a full CPU and GPU built in?  It is a 'super computer', so I'm hoping it will run it's own processing units and only use the mother computer for power/transmission.  If anyone could put this into simple terms for me, that would be nice.

[Stephen Gornick]

I know they are a mining rig, but what type/kind?  Is it just a oversided USB dongle, or does it have a full CPU and GPU built in?  It is a 'super computer', so I'm hoping it will run it's own processing units and only use the mother computer for power/transmission.  If anyone could put this into simple terms for me, that would be nice.

Well, they aren't necessarily a "rig" as much as a "device".

Here's a thread that might have some more info for you:

Complete Newbie to mining with questions about the BFL Jalapeno coming out
 - http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=104602.0

The Jalapeno still requires a host, connected via USB.

A number of people who have pre-ordered multiple Jalapenos are revising their orders to buy BFL SC small singles instead.

So the Jalapeno is like the entry-level / starter version.

[Edit: as far as the insides, nobody knows until they ship.  Here's the circuit board rendering for the SC single:
 - http://codinginmysleep.com/first-look-at-bfls-asic-hardware ]

[Shotgun_WooWoo]

But with a 4.5GH/S hash rate, it can mine pretty quickly; I imagine.  What would the BTC average per day be?

[crazyates]

But with a 4.5GH/S hash rate, it can mine pretty quickly; I imagine.  What would the BTC average per day be?

If you could answer that question, you'd be a rich man.

There are many variables that make that hard to answer. As more devices start mining BTC, the difficulty goes up. As the difficulty goes up, each device earns less BTC per day.

This is designed to keep the supply of BTC at a steady 7200BTC/day across the entire network.

2 things will happen in the next 2 months that will affect a Jalapeno's daily earnings:

1) The block reward will half, granting 25BTC/block, rather than today's 50BTC/block. This decreases the daily supply to 3600BTC/day.

2) The difficulty will go up by a large factor when all of the different ASIC manufacturers start shipping. If the total network hashrate is 5x what it is today, it means each device will earn 1/5 of what they would today.

[Shotgun_WooWoo]

It sounds like the mining network needs some 'work'.  Maybe a hierarchy, I know for a fact that it would help if the huge rigs I see in the post your rig thread were kept out of pools with a single jally running in it.  If not for technical help, just organizational.

According to what you just said, there needs to be some balance in order for BTC to sustain and succeed.  I'm not saying it is doing well as is, but it can't work like pokemon cards; always trying to find the best deal/mining rate.  That's probably why pokemon cards lost to baseball come to think of it =)

[Unacceptable]

This is what it's supposed to look like,as of a week or two ago:

[Shotgun_WooWoo]

Looks good, I'll be putting my pre-order in.

[Stephen Gornick]

According to what you just said, there needs to be some balance in order for BTC to sustain and succeed.

The work miners do is necessary service that the bitcoin network requires due to its unique decentralized architecture.  But Bicoin only needs a certain level of this to be performed -- a sufficient amount to serve as a disincentive to any party or cartel wishing to mess with Bitcoin's blockchain.

If those miners find it difficult to make profit, that means there are too many of them and some (those who are mining using the least efficient methods) will drop out.  That doesn't harm bitcoin though. 

[Shotgun_WooWoo]

I should probably make sure now, will this unit be able to run sufficiently on a HP pavillion G7 laptop?  That's the only computer I have atm, but I am looking into getting a new desktop as well.

[crazyates]

You will most likely need 2 USB ports next to each other, which yours has 2 on the right hand side, am I correct?

[Shotgun_WooWoo]

It only has 1 on the right hand side, 2 on the left.  I'm guessing the right one is either 3.0 or 2.0 and the left are one less (ie 1.0 or 2.0).  I can always get a HUB I suppose, although I'm looking at building my own PC so I'll be sure to look out for as many USB ports as possible.  Thanks.

[Desolator]

But with a 4.5GH/S hash rate, it can mine pretty quickly; I imagine.  What would the BTC average per day be?

Given the number of pre-orders, if you're not the first person to get one but you're not the last either, after they've settled in for a couple weeks, you're looking at something in the neighborhood of 0.8BTC/day after the block split to 25.

[Shotgun_WooWoo]

Not bad, not bad at all.  What about the fact that thousands more people will be mining?  Hopefully BTC won't let us newbies down and raise the difficulty...

[dserrano5]

But with a 4.5GH/S hash rate, it can mine pretty quickly; I imagine.  What would the BTC average per day be?

Given the number of pre-orders, if you're not the first person to get one but you're not the last either, after they've settled in for a couple weeks, you're looking at something in the neighborhood of 0.8BTC/day after the block split to 25.

That's assuming a difficulty of 3e6, which won't likely be the case.

[Gabi]

Not bad, not bad at all.  What about the fact that thousands more people will be mining?  Hopefully BTC won't let us newbies down and raise the difficulty...

What? Hopefully what? BTC does what?

Do you know that there is no one behind bitcoin and that difficulty is calculated by an algorithm?

[Kris]

[Shotgun_WooWoo]

I figured that much.  But I assume the difficulty will go up as they want to time out the mining process over a few years.  I'll be fine with .3BTC a day.

[Meatball]

Yeah...things are going to get much worse than that, so you might want to do more research before you pull the trigger and be sure about it.  BFL has already said they have enough orders to increase the network by 10x, and they are not the only ASIC vendors in that have pre-orders.  Couple that with the drop in reward by half and in a few months you'll likely make 1/20th with the 4.5 GH/s that you would be making today.  Which means the 4.5 GH/s that would do about 1.48 BTC/day right now will likely only be producing .07 BTC/day in a couple of months.

There's really no way to be sure what's going to happen with BTC/$ price and other factors, but the difficulty will be going up, so make sure you make an informed decision before you pre-order anything.

[Desolator]

adding up the confirmed pre-orders (the majority are fake or were caused by an unnecessary database UID incrementation) it's around but over $250,000 at BFL.  Combine that with the confirmed pre-order estimate by the other vendors like bASIC and Avalon and you get a bare minimum difficulty increase of around 5-8x depending on which pre-orders are which.  The block split from 50 to 25 is going to happen no matter what too.  So take whatever BTC you think you'll get by mining with one at today's numbers and at the very least divide it by 10.

[dserrano5]

FWIW I'm estimating a diff increase of 30x in my calculations. Maybe it's excessive but I prefer to err on that side rather than the other.