So, only one Bitcoin miner on market right now.

[tablook]

Mining equipment wars have, at least temporarily, ended, and a winner emerged.
BFL, KnC, Spoondolies have all bitten the dust, Bitfury and Avalon are no longer competitive and will probably close the shop too.
Antminer R4 is the only profitable miner on the market right now (R9 are not sold to the public at the moment).

That's not a healthy situation IMO. Do we have any hope for it to change in the future?

[alh]

Mining equipment wars have, at least temporarily, ended, and a winner emerged.
BFL, KnC, Spoondolies have all bitten the dust, Bitfury and Avalon are no longer competitive and will probably close the shop too.
Antminer R4 is the only profitable miner on the market right now (R9 are not sold to the public at the moment).

That's not a healthy situation IMO. Do we have any hope for it to change in the future?

While at this exact instant in time, there aren't any S9's available, I am 100% certain that Bitmain will make more and put them up for sale. I expect the "No S9 for sale" to be a transient condition that reflects their batch sale strategy. The s9 has most assuredly been for sale to the public and will be again.

You could easily see another time when the R4 isn't available, and the S9 is.

Avalon is supposedly going to deliver the A7 (follow on to the A6). Specs and price are unknown. You are correct about KNC, BFL, and Spondoolies. Bitfury might yet come back to life, but that's fairly speculative at the moment.

[unholycactus]

I've always thought companies like Bitfury were just keeping the miners for themselves instead of releasing it to the public.

[karmakeddon]

Why keep it for themselves though? When they can make a killing producing one  from a low cost then put an exorbitant pricetag on it for people to buy. People will still buy them anyway, as long as the miner pushes for more THS than the last one, the buying public will see it and be blind to the price.

[philipma1957]

Why keep it for themselves though? When they can make a killing producing one  from a low cost then put an exorbitant pricetag on it for people to buy. People will still buy them anyway, as long as the miner pushes for more THS than the last one, the buying public will see it and be blind to the price.

You don't go to a gun fight with a knife.

No one really fights bitmaintech with ASIC sales.  So no one has been able to release a better cheaper miner.

So Avalon builds a close miner and sells it at a higher price so as not to offer real competition.

Bitfury builds in house gear and avoids it all together .   The best most competitive way to mine btc is with a gpu rig.

Huh ? Wtf ?
  No way .

Well mine eth or xmr with a gpu rig and convert to btc.

This is what bitmaintech is up against.

Frankly I think it is good for all.

So when Avalon releases the 7
I want it to be a 0.08 to .11 watt miner.  And I want it to be a little more costly then the s-9.

This will help gpu mining .  The last thing we need is a war with bitmaintech. And any ASIC company .

Bitmaintech will simply crush that company and in the process it will hurt the btc price.

Same as when. Bitmaintech did battle with spondoolies.

[leowonderful]

Why keep it for themselves though? When they can make a killing producing one  from a low cost then put an exorbitant pricetag on it for people to buy. People will still buy them anyway, as long as the miner pushes for more THS than the last one, the buying public will see it and be blind to the price.

You don't go to a gun fight with a knife.

No one really fights bitmaintech with ASIC sales.  So no one has been able to release a better cheaper miner.

So Avalon builds a close miner and sells it at a higher price so as not to offer real competition.

Bitfury builds in house gear and avoids it all together .   The best most competitive way to mine btc is with a gpu rig.

Huh ? Wtf ?
  No way .

Well mine eth or xmr with a gpu rig and convert to btc.

This is what bitmaintech is up against.

Frankly I think it is good for all.

So when Avalon releases the 7
I want it to be a 0.08 to .11 watt miner.  And I want it to be a little more costly then the s-9.

This will help gpu mining .  The last thing we need is a war with bitmaintech. And any ASIC company .

Bitmaintech will simply crush that company and in the process it will hurt the btc price.

Same as when. Bitmaintech did battle with spondoolies.

I think this is what's driving people out of bitcoin mining- there's pretty much no more competition left and no more smaller stick or usb based miners made by any official company anymore; GPU mining is a lot cheaper and has a much higher resale value, and Bitcoin's losing quite a few people to altcoins like Ethereum. I'm not jumping ship yet, but the next few months will definitely be interesting. I see bitmain as the only asic provider in the future.

[philipma1957]

Why keep it for themselves though? When they can make a killing producing one  from a low cost then put an exorbitant pricetag on it for people to buy. People will still buy them anyway, as long as the miner pushes for more THS than the last one, the buying public will see it and be blind to the price.

You don't go to a gun fight with a knife.

No one really fights bitmaintech with ASIC sales.  So no one has been able to release a better cheaper miner.

So Avalon builds a close miner and sells it at a higher price so as not to offer real competition.

Bitfury builds in house gear and avoids it all together .   The best most competitive way to mine btc is with a gpu rig...

I think this is what's driving people out of bitcoin mining- there's pretty much no more competition left and no more smaller stick or usb based miners made by any official company anymore; GPU mining is a lot cheaper and has a much higher resale value, and Bitcoin's losing quite a few people to altcoins like Ethereum. I'm not jumping ship yet, but the next few months will definitely be interesting. I see bitmain as the only asic provider in the future.

Yeah I have 5 s-9 cost me over 8k

I have 21 gpu's Mining ETH and XMR. I Spent less then 8k . I use 1/2 the power  and right now I am earning more by the gpus then by the asics.

I have a foot in both camps. And can shift either way.

[hajimasan]

Mining equipment wars have, at least temporarily, ended, and a winner emerged.
BFL, KnC, Spoondolies have all bitten the dust, Bitfury and Avalon are no longer competitive and will probably close the shop too.
Antminer R4 is the only profitable miner on the market right now (R9 are not sold to the public at the moment).

That's not a healthy situation IMO. Do we have any hope for it to change in the future?

you have the right information about the r4 and r9 but i think r9 will not be easliy available for the public it is because to maintain the the rate of the bitcoin price . stilk the increase price of butcoin is a result of less mining of btc .

[Bitsaurus]

If the purpose of mining is to support the network then yes the Bitcoin network is losing support by losing viable mining options.

Most of the alt-coin mined by GPUs is converted to BTC or fiat I would imagine since people need to pay their credit card bills.

[Kevin77]

I've actually sold off some of my miners for GPUs, they are usually more profitable with coins like Ether and resell for a pretty good price, even if they get outdated, unlike ASICs that are nearly useless when they become unprofitable.

[upsidedown75]

16-14nm is going to be current technology for quite a while until we shift to 12nm or whatever the next step will be, power and performance gains will be very minor in the future, and ASICs should have a marginally longer life than they currently have. That said, it's your choice, and I actually don't recommend mining right now.

[Dalkore]

I think Antminer won out and at this point, people should be thankful they are still committed to making sure miners are available on a retail basis for the public.    If another company won out, likely that would not be the case at this point in mining.

[bitcapitalist]

Mining is not worth now so all companies would be out of business soon. This is how it works

[Bitsaurus]

I think Antminer won out and at this point, people should be thankful they are still committed to making sure miners are available on a retail basis for the public.    If another company won out, likely that would not be the case at this point in mining.

Although not entirely thrilled with them I would say they have been one of the best in the miner hardware business (when compared to the behavior of of companies like BFL/Avalon/KNC).

[Dalkore]

I think Antminer won out and at this point, people should be thankful they are still committed to making sure miners are available on a retail basis for the public.    If another company won out, likely that would not be the case at this point in mining.

Although not entirely thrilled with them I would say they have been one of the best in the miner hardware business (when compared to the behavior of of companies like BFL/Avalon/KNC).

Yeah, we did have a lot of bad eggs in the batch with these other players. Bitmain won by just not playing the preorder and greed game.

Agree with both of you.   Think about a BFL-lead mining market (yuck).    I am pretty happy about where we are now and its really promising that GPU mining has taken off again with a few legitimate coins that have pros and cons to sit alongside Bitcoin.

[Eyedol-X]

Mining equipment wars have, at least temporarily, ended, and a winner emerged.
BFL, KnC, Spoondolies have all bitten the dust, Bitfury and Avalon are no longer competitive and will probably close the shop too.
Antminer R4 is the only profitable miner on the market right now (R9 are not sold to the public at the moment).

That's not a healthy situation IMO. Do we have any hope for it to change in the future?

I hear what you are saying, this is kind of like Taco Bell surviving the franchise wars in Demolition Man.

[Turbo2]

Currently yes there is only 2 miners for sale from 1 company (Bitmaintech), however, things will change shortly...

Rumor has it the Avalon7 will be released soon that should compete with the S9 and R4. Hope it does soon so we can get some competition choice and price wise....

[Johnyloco]

It would be better to see more mining equipment. What is actually letting people down to bring them on the market? Since in most places the cost for electricity is high, so why are there no other solutions?

Before we had these usb sticks, there is an bitmain router, though it is old equipment and not profitable nowadays, why is it all gone?

[Bitsaurus]

It would be better to see more mining equipment. What is actually letting people down to bring them on the market? Since in most places the cost for electricity is high, so why are there no other solutions?

Before we had these usb sticks, there is an bitmain router, though it is old equipment and not profitable nowadays, why is it all gone?

It's not profitable because multi-million dollar corporations have set up shop in countries to get rates that are unimaginable for the little guy.  Little guys should still mine to support the network and possibly turn a profit or break even but the days of easy money are gone.

[oser41eric]

I thinking that mining is not worth now so all companies would be out of business soon.