Why can't there be 10 companies who build ASIC miners?

[papaminer]

I mean... now that bitcoin is famous...

there has to be a group of engineers/programmers that can build a LEGIT ASIC MINERS... other than bfl and avalon right?

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[tysat]

Because it's not cheap to design and build an ASIC.

[seleme]

Even this so far is too much. 10 ASIC companies would mean few times more of those who'd throw their money on investment they won't profit from.

[papaminer]

I maybe wrong.. but the way was told is this:

the chips(ASICs) are bought from companies that build.. well.. computer chips...

and PCB's are designed by... the engineers...

the last part is programming... where you need to program those chips to work like this or like that...

so.. if you have 10 jobless engineers... 10 jobless programmers... = you have a group of engineers/programmers  that can build ASIC miners?

[Joshster]

I do find it strange that a company hasn't see the gap in the market.

[eghoff]

I do find it strange that a company hasn't see the gap in the market.

They have, but only very few have the money and experience needed to actually fill it.

[papaminer]

But also.... there is that thought.. that this is already happening... (I mean... a group of people is already creating ASIC miners)...

And are private...

and are not selling the hardware...

instead.. they are just using it to mine and get as many bitcoins as they can...

[shibaji]

I maybe wrong.. but the way was told is this:

the chips(ASICs) are bought from companies that build.. well.. computer chips...

and PCB's are designed by... the engineers...

the last part is programming... where you need to program those chips to work like this or like that...

That's FPGA, not ASIC.

[romerun]

it's easier to fork a coin than to fork a ASIC, so everyone keeps fcuking fork another coin and uses old pc to mine it. 

[Big Time Coin]

see: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=180093.0

I'm working on it, so far all the job applications from electrical and computer engineers have been from indeed.com and craigslist, not from this forum.  I think that the problem is recruiting hardware engineers that are willing to focus on bitcoin mining as a career.  So far there are only a handful that have done that, but I'm going to try to create some more engineering jobs in this bitcoin economy.  Heck, only one engineer (gavin) is getting paid to work on the open-source software for bitcoin itself while several are getting paid to work on bitcoin-related business companies.  So there is a heavy weighting towards software as opposed to hardware engineers at the moment.

[Peleus]

I maybe wrong.. but the way was told is this:

the chips(ASICs) are bought from companies that build.. well.. computer chips...

and PCB's are designed by... the engineers...

the last part is programming... where you need to program those chips to work like this or like that...

so.. if you have 10 jobless engineers... 10 jobless programmers... = you have a group of engineers/programmers  that can build ASIC miners?

Kind of.

In a very broad stroke way, the chips are custom made / designed though, you can't just go out and buy one off the shelf. The biggest hurdle with ASICs is designing this "computer chip" and the large costs involved (design + enough money to do bulk orders for the chip manufacturers to play ball - they don't do little stuff).

[atcsecure]

I mean... now that bitcoin is famous...

there has to be a group of engineers/programmers that can build a LEGIT ASIC MINERS... other than bfl and avalon right?

Once we have the avalon chips there will be plenty of asic miners

[johnyj]

see: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=180093.0

I'm working on it, so far all the job applications from electrical and computer engineers have been from indeed.com and craigslist, not from this forum.  I think that the problem is recruiting hardware engineers that are willing to focus on bitcoin mining as a career.  So far there are only a handful that have done that, but I'm going to try to create some more engineering jobs in this bitcoin economy.  Heck, only one engineer (gavin) is getting paid to work on the open-source software for bitcoin itself while several are getting paid to work on bitcoin-related business companies.  So there is a heavy weighting towards software as opposed to hardware engineers at the moment.

True, the main reason that BFL had huge delay is because their contracted partners are not working with production full time, they have other priorities

But I think there are several companies doing some hidden R&D there to launch other competing products at later part of the year

[CoinHoarder]

ASIC development is expensive and challenging to make.

/end thread

[k9quaint]

There are 10 companies.

[crazyquark]

Hardware design is challenging to say the least. Also, hardware engineers are scarce.

I graduated from the top computer college in my country and I can say that only a couple of people from my generation really knew about hardware - that means designing circuits that don't go boom.

Nowadays chip design is computer assisted with programming languages dedicated to that purpose (Verilog and whatnot) but in my experience it's still very esoteric and convoluted, unlike software programming that is more or less accessible to everyone.

Plus, you need all sorts of hardware to get designing like prototype boards, FPGAs and such. Simulators are OK but they can't go very far.

Software is also expensive for this sort of endeavor. Companies like Xilinix charge for the software quite a pretty penny even if it's quite useless without the hardware.

I think that the few good hardware engineers that exist are immediately gobbled up by companies like Intel, AMD and Nvidia...

There are countless companies that will print your PCBs and assemble your product but you need to know how to make it. I've actually known someone who worked with an Israeli electonics company(it seems to me that there are lot of chips built and sold there) and their community is a lot more closed than the software community that is so open and blooming.

Honestly, I thing the way to go would be to find some sort of chip that is massed produced(like Avalon is doing now) that can be installed on a multipurpose platform. Like, let's say you could buy 50 little PowerVR GPUs and plug them into a board and run them for mining. Or a very basic ARM CPU... But large companies are not interested in Bitcoin mining right now and that's for the best, probably.

The raspberry PI for example is demonstrating that there is a demand for more DIY mass produced hardware out there. Who knows, maybe some day little CPUs will be sold like transistors are today.

We need a platform, like FPGAs that can run a multitude of chips and do whatever task we want it to.

Sorry for the lecture guys... Feel free to flame me

[Carlton Banks]

I don't think we're that far past the stage where people were wondering " Why can't there be 1 company who builds ASIC miners?" 

[Viceroy]

in my sig I am trying to do what the OP desires.  I should retitle it...  looking for jobless engineers... or engineers with jobs who want to volunteer their time.

[minternj]

I don't think we're that far past the stage where people were wondering " Why can't there be 1 company who builds ASIC miners?" 

im at that point

[maqifrnswa]

I maybe wrong.. but the way was told is this:

the chips(ASICs) are bought from companies that build.. well.. computer chips...

and PCB's are designed by... the engineers...

the last part is programming... where you need to program those chips to work like this or like that...

so.. if you have 10 jobless engineers... 10 jobless programmers... = you have a group of engineers/programmers  that can build ASIC miners?

10 jobless engineers + 10 jobless programers + $1-5 million = ASIC miners

or

10 volunteer engineers + 10 volunteer programers + Avalon Chips = https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=161715.0