[Group Buy] BFL Chips. as low as 0.53 BTC per Chip 4 GH/s by Dabs

[Dabs]

2013-06-17 Update: Accepting Chip Credit Discounts for Lower Pricing. Chip specs and reference designs are also available.
2013-06-12 Update: Website now live for chip purchases.

Update:

Chip grades:  Chips come in four grades of performance.  Chips are sold in mixed grade lots.  A grade has 16 engines, B grade has 15 engines, C grade has 14 engines and D grade has no less than 12 engines.  All chips run at a minimum of 250 mhz.  Higher grade chips will run up to 294mhz.  The percentage distribution in each lot is 60% Grade A, 20% Grade B, 15% Grade C and 5% Grade D.

Ok, so people might be asking what is this doing in this forum instead of the Custom Hardware forum? Well doing any sort of business with ButterFly Labs is going to be gambling.

The risk is so high, you might as well be gambling. So they say. Mods, if you feel this is in the wrong forum, you may move this to the Custom Hardware Forum. I think I'll get more eyes in the Gambling forum though, and the people here probably have a BTC or two to "gamble" on this.

The short of it: BFL announced they are selling their mining chips. Here is their thread on their forum:
https://forums.butterflylabs.com/announcements/3014-butterfly-labs-announces-bulk-chip-sales.html

Butterfly Labs Announces Bulk Chip Sales

Butterfly Labs will begin selling bulk chips to individuals and companies starting in June, 2013. Chip delivery schedule is approximately 100 days through end packaging once your order is placed. We will be providing reference documentation, reference design/schematics, and foundry receipt/documentation.

Grade A chips have 16 engines and will do 250 MHz comfortably, equating to 4 GH/s per chip.

Chip orders will require 50% down and 50% upon order delivery. Payment can be made via BTC (preferred) or bank wire.

Advantages of BFL chips:

1/2 the power usage per GH as the closest competitor
1/10th the silicon area per GH as the closest competitor (Very high performance density)
You can use off the shelf heat sinks depending on your chip layout due to FCBGA package vs custom underside heat sinks as required on some QFN packages. You don't have to design and manufacture heat sinks!
Proven design currently operating in the field and ready to go.

We will allow you to convert current orders with us into chip orders if you would rather design your own.

If you would like to place an order, please email chipsales@butterflylabs.com

Here is another web page that shows orders vs deliveries of their products
http://bfl.ptz.ro/

Here is a picture of their Jalapenos:





I am looking at the minimum order of 100 chips priced at $75 each and charging 9.9% on top of that for a per chip resale price of 0.77 BTC.

I will order 100 chips. We don't know what we will get, life is like a box of chocolates.

Here is my proposal to all you GAMBLERS / MINERS out there:

Send me any multiple of 0.77 BTC up to a maximum of 77 BTC to this address:

1Mnfk1RqbUKxKu4UUGXGVRGi935z5Th2q8

Here, let me sign that with my GPG key.

Code:

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

1Mnfk1RqbUKxKu4UUGXGVRGi935z5Th2q8
Address for BFL Group Buy by Dabs
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v2.0.17 (MingW32)

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And let me sign that with my bitcoin client:

Code:

1Mnfk1RqbUKxKu4UUGXGVRGi935z5Th2q8
Address for BFL Group Buy by Dabs
IE/g3jGRbRls4DnV2n9iCiRRBvgu4pVMoiBvkIDdigI1P9zIiKFgS+jDF0Z2p9BCZofvQ81ud+yWp4qPstpDT34=

Then please post here or PM me the following information:
1. Your forum nick.
2. Number of chips.
3. BTC sent for those chips.
4. The bitcoin address you used, or any one of them if you used more than one.
5. The transaction id hash.

Please use this format (examples):
Dabs; 1; 0.77; 1DabsXmraEr18jdEryck8jzcFku873xmRf; xxxxcbe5720a781a78f6xxxxx

That one line is for an order of one chip.
The following are examples for more than one chip.

Dabs; 2; 1.54; 1DabsXmraEr18jdEryck8jzcFku873xmRf; xxxxcbe5720a781a78f6xxxxx
Dabs; 3; 2.31; 1DabsXmraEr18jdEryck8jzcFku873xmRf; xxxxcbe5720a781a78f6xxxxx
Dabs; 4; 3.08; 1DabsXmraEr18jdEryck8jzcFku873xmRf; xxxxcbe5720a781a78f6xxxxx
Dabs; 5; 3.85; 1DabsXmraEr18jdEryck8jzcFku873xmRf; xxxxcbe5720a781a78f6xxxxx
Dabs; 10; 7.70; 1DabsXmraEr18jdEryck8jzcFku873xmRf; xxxxcbe5720a781a78f6xxxxx
Dabs; 20; 15.40; 1DabsXmraEr18jdEryck8jzcFku873xmRf; xxxxcbe5720a781a78f6xxxxx
Dabs; 30; 23.10; 1DabsXmraEr18jdEryck8jzcFku873xmRf; xxxxcbe5720a781a78f6xxxxx

I will require you to sign the message with your bitcoin address if there are disputes or someone else attempts to claim your chip. So please, use a wallet that allows you to sign with your bitcoin address. Bitcoin-Qt works for this purpose.

Once I collect 77 BTC, I will order 100 BFL Chips.

Then we wait 100 days.

Once the chips arrive, I will post here and you can PM or email me your address, I will send your chip to you by courier. 1 chip will probably fit in a decent size envelope so I can save on shipping costs. If you are in the Philippines or nearby, you can come pick it up personally from me.

Final note: No refunds when I have already ordered. In essence, I am also the escrow service for this Group Buy.

For reference, I have also an open Group Buy for Avalon ASIC chips, but that seems to have stalled since the minimum is 10,000 chips.

BFL only needs a 50% downpayment, but I will not refund you if I have already ordered since I will use that for the full payment 100 days later. (Or when ever ... this is part of the gamble.) Which is probably some time in October. Or November.

For comparison:
Avalon chip = 282 Mh/s at around 2.5w per chip (based on 66.3 Gh/s miner at 600w) at $9.36 per chip
BFL chip = 4 Gh/s at around 12.8w per chip at $75 per chip
14x the hashing capacity at only 5x the power consumption and 8x the price


If you can afford 77 BTC, you might as well buy it yourself. But if you only want to buy 1 or 2 or 3 chips, then this is "shared" gambling.

If I get more than 77 BTC, I will order 1 batch of 100, then continue collecting orders for a second batch of 100. Or I can refund those after the 100th chip.

The buying window opens now and closes by the end of next month, or July 31, 2013.
Timer removed. End time: 2013-07-31+23:59:59UTC

P.S. While BFL will publish reference designs and specs, I am not a developer and I don't know one nearby. So it's up to you to send your chips to someone who will make a final working miner. That, or you can sell it to someone else for a profit.

The chips are unmarked, I don't have any way of testing what grade each chip is. I will just get your order quantity and ship to you (or to any other address you want) your specified number of chips. If you want a higher chance of getting a higher grade of chip, simply order more.

[Dabs]

Reserved for whatever reason. Maybe other details or order confirmations or something.
Orders confirmed here will only include your bitcoin address. To be anonymous, PM me with your order.

[Dabs]

Update:

Chips are sold in mixed grade lots.

https://products.butterflylabs.com/65nm-asic-bitcoin-mining-chip.html

[hasher87]

so i buy the chip, maybe 2 i guess, then what's next? how's the assembly of it? 

[Dabs]

so i buy the chip, maybe 2 i guess, then what's next? how's the assembly of it? 

Ok. That's part of the gamble. But, there are individuals out there (check the Custom Hardware forums) like burnin and BkkCoins and others who are currently working on plans / designs / schematics for Avalon chips. They have said, their next project will be BFL chips. They will probably use some of what they learn from designing Avalon miners to make BFL miners.

[Dabs]

Date: Sun, 9 Jun 2013 17:41:23 -0500
Subject: Re: Chip Sales BFL different Grades
From: Chip Sales <chipsales@butterflylabs.com>
To: Dabs

Hello Dabs,

We will be packaging chips in different grades already as we have changed
the way we are selling them.
Here is the website that gives more information about the chips and will
also be the place to purchase them once it goes live:
https://products.butterflylabs.com/65nm-asic-bitcoin-mining-chip.html

Regards,
Anthony Fast
Marketing Manager
Butterfly Labs Inc.

I got a reply from them when I asked about the chip distribution. They are just confirming what is already posted.

[Dabs]

2013-06-12 Update: Website now live for chip purchases.

[Dabs]

Date: Fri, 14 Jun 2013 14:53:00 -0500
Subject: Re: Chip Sales BFL different Grades
From: Chip Sales <chipsales@butterflylabs.com>
To: Dabs

Hello,

They will not be marked by grade. As it states on our website:

   - Chip grades:  Chips come in four grades of performance.  Chips are
   sold in mixed grade lots.  A grade has 16 engines, B grade has 15 engines,
   C grade has 14 engines and D grade has no less than 12 engines.  All chips
   run at a minimum of 250 mhz.  Higher grade chips will run up to 294mhz.
   The percentage distribution in each lot is 60% Grade A, 20% Grade B, 15%
   Grade C and 5% Grade D.Regards,

Anthony Fast
Marketing Manager
Butterfly Labs Inc.

[vit1988]

guess nobody has faith in bfl any more

[Dabs]

There's another Group Buy for the same BFL chips with 100% escrow by John K. However, I couldn't get quite the same deal with BFL. Actually, I didn't even try. There's also a couple more Group Buys for BFL chips.

However, I believe I have the lowest BTC price per chip. I only guarantee the order and delivery to you, from me, AFTER BFL ships.

[Charles999]

will u assemble and deliver a working unit?  i don't want tod eal with shipping to someone else to assemble..etc

[Dabs]

P.S. While BFL will publish reference designs and specs, I am not a developer and I don't know one nearby. So it's up to you to send your chips to someone who will make a final working miner. That, or you can sell it to someone else for a profit.

I don't know how to do the assembly to make it into a working miner. This Group Buy is just for the raw chips.

If someone does know how, I can send your chips to the developer. You'll have to pay them separately for their service, and to have the final product forwarded to you.

[Dabs]

Update: BFL has sent some chip credit discounts through their customer appreciation chip credit program. If you send me your chip credit when you order from me, I will apply it to your chips. The discount is $25 off, but since I am accepting BTC, I will subtract 0.24 BTC from your order.

So, instead of 0.77 BTC, your price will become 0.53 BTC per chip, with every chip credit.

Reference Thread from BFL Forums:
https://forums.butterflylabs.com/announcements/3272-customer-appreciation-chip-credit-program.html

Chip Specs and Schematics
https://forums.butterflylabs.com/announcements/3295-bitforce-sc-pcb-schematics.html