Scrypt mining is not profitable.
Odd, I'm making more out of my current Scrypt mining setup than out of my Bitcoin mining setup - with an almost identical investment into both setups.
I also anticipate making a LOT more over time out of the Scrypt miners, as my Bitcoin gear is starting to get kinda marginal for making ANY profit at all.
There's a REASON I'm trying to sell off my Bitcoin mining gear - it's the only prayer I have of ever achieving RoI on the stuff. even though it's NEWER gear than the A2's I use on Scrypt.
Do you mind elaborating on your setup and what you mine?
Currently have 5 A2 units, 4 of them 110 Megas the other an 88, mining Litecoin.
Currently have 5 Antminer S5 and a Spondoolies SP20, but just sold one of the S5s (will be shipping it out later today) and working on selling the rest of that gear.
Investment in the Bitcoin gear (not counting power supplies, which I can recycle to next-gen gear) was about $3600.
Investment in the Litecoin gear was about $3700, though I had to replace one power supply in one of the A2 Megas which added about $200 for a good Seasonic X1250 unit bringing the total in the Litecoin gear to about $3900.
I consistantly bring in a little more than 4 Litecoin a day over the last 2 months (appx. $14 at recent pricing) with small variation due to the diff bouncing around a little.
Bitcoin is somewhat more variable but has been averaging about 4 days to generate 0.1 Bitcoin over the last couple weeks (about $45 at recent pricing) but the last diff increase will drop that about 10%.
While the KNC Titan is the most efficient Scrypt miner in existance right now, the reliability on those things tends to be VERY problematical - many many reports of cores DYING even when not overclocked.
I'd definitely go for an A2 unit over a Titan even though the A2 is somewhat less efficient.
The Alcheminer 256 is almost identical efficiency to the A2, I'd consider getting one of those if the price/MH was comparable or less AFTER including the cost of the power supplies to run the unit.
There are *2* companies that have announced they are working on next generation Scrypt miners - Innosilicon and Alcheminer.
The Innosilicon project is quite a bit further along, and while both companies have good records of actually delivering hardware Innosilicon has a better record on that score.
Technically, SFARDS still has that SF100 dual-miner thing of theirs supposedly available, but it's not actually been buyable (except PERHAPS for large industrial-scale purchaces) for quite a few months now.
Chinese mining farms do NOT have "free" electric, though most of them seem to have VERY VERY CHEAP electric.
The hashrate didn't drop because most of the hashpower is on A2 units THAT ARE STILL PROFITABLE EVEN WITH NOT ALL THAT CHEAP ELECTRIC.
The A2 will still be profitable if you have 3c/KWH or cheaper electric even if the hashrate tripled (it would be break-even at appx. 4x the current hashrate) as long as pricing on Litecoin stays in the post-halfing $3+ range.
This is a very BAD time to invest in SHA256 ASIC hardware - the probability of ANY of the currently-available gear ever achieving RoI is pretty much zero, unless you have VERY VERY cheap electric and even then it's iffy. I'd WAIT 2-3 months for the next gen gear to start hitting the market on anything SHA256-based.
