Is Avalon mining with customer hardware? Answer is here.

[Luke-Jr]

In a business like mining where each past second is more valuable than the future one, I'd say that could be expected that "burnins" would be done against the customers address, especially considering that we are speaking about preorders. I guess the *promise* of profit in ASIC mining its been huge for a limited window, and the companies could get away with it. This is going to change. ROI is going to be very tight for everybody.

Maybe the burning income was counted in the original pricing of the units...? Same net effect as trying to "rebate" via a burnin later.

Doing burnins on mainnet is not in any sense "stealing".
The burnings have to be done anyway, no point throwing that away.

@Luke-Jr:

Here is the difference;

Throwing away would mean that it would otherwise be wasted.

And in the case of burning, it would otherwise be wasted.

Vice: You aren’t doing any mining at all?
Yifu: Nope. Fun fact: none of the Avalon team have their own mining units (outside of test units).

This sounds to me like he's talking about their own personal mining, not what goes on with burnin testing of units they're selling.

[Bitcoinorama]

Vice: You aren’t doing any mining at all?
Yifu: Nope. Fun fact: none of the Avalon team have their own mining units (outside of test units).

This sounds to me like he's talking about their own personal mining, not what goes on with burnin testing of units they're selling.

Perhaps, the questions specifically does ask if he is doing any mining at all directly, to which he answer's, "Nope", before adding the fun fact, so I figured it is worth adding to the convo.

In any case, if Yifu is a man of integrity, i'm sure he will explain.

Would make a great gift to charity if it was used to encourage the main well known charities to openly start excepting Bitcoin donations. No one would deny Bitsyncom that. Plus would make a wise PR move...kind of like a modern day Robin Hood!

[usahero]

So basically Avalon is stealing from all of us using preordered unit. GG scammers

[Hippie Tech]

So basically Avalon is stealing from all of us using preordered unit. GG scammers

Someone is.. Still waiting for proof as to who..

[coinedBit]

See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ASIC_Pre-Order_Scam_2013_(BitCoin)


(check back in early 2015)

[ecliptic]

So 1200 units in Batch #2 and 3# combined?

65Gh/sec * 1200 = 78,000 Gh/sec = 78 Th/sec

Current difficulty is 19,339,258.  Their mining was prior to this.  It was as low as 10 thousand Again, ueber conservative, use this 19 thousand difficulty

78 Th/sec generates 2028 BTC per day.

If they test each unit for 24 hours, at this difficulty they would have made 2028 BTC.

We see ~780 which is something like 9.23 hours-per-unit average.

Take into account the difficulty is lower, and you have more like 7 hours per unit of testing.

take into account they probably are only testing say, half of their units, that's 14 hours per unit of testing.

Now, if there's a second pool with the same amount of coins, that's 28 hours per unit of testing.

Doesn't seem outrageous.  People are forgetting how much fucking hashing power they have.  78 Terahash.

Wait to see what their response is.  But for shipping 6000$ hardware, you want to run some basic tests, it's just good engineering.

[MaGNeT]

So 1200 units in Batch #2 and 3# combined?

65Gh/sec * 1200 = 78,000 Gh/sec = 78 Th/sec

Current difficulty is 19,339,258.  Their mining was prior to this.  It was as low as 10 thousand Again, ueber conservative, use this 19 thousand difficulty

78 Th/sec generates 2028 BTC per day.

If they test each unit for 24 hours, at this difficulty they would have made 2028 BTC.

We see ~780 which is something like 9.23 hours-per-unit average.

Take into account the difficulty is lower, and you have more like 7 hours per unit of testing.

take into account they probably are only testing say, half of their units, that's 14 hours per unit of testing.

Now, if there's a second pool with the same amount of coins, that's 28 hours per unit of testing.

Doesn't seem outrageous.  People are forgetting how much fucking hashing power they have.  78 Terahash.

Wait to see what their response is.  But for shipping 6000$ hardware, you want to run some basic tests, it's just good engineering.

Yup, they are driving up difficulty while testing, so you get less BTC when you receive the device and start mining.

Testing should be done on testnet.

[ecliptic]

So 1200 units in Batch #2 and 3# combined?

65Gh/sec * 1200 = 78,000 Gh/sec = 78 Th/sec

Current difficulty is 19,339,258.  Their mining was prior to this.  It was as low as 10 thousand Again, ueber conservative, use this 19 thousand difficulty

78 Th/sec generates 2028 BTC per day.

If they test each unit for 24 hours, at this difficulty they would have made 2028 BTC.

We see ~780 which is something like 9.23 hours-per-unit average.

Take into account the difficulty is lower, and you have more like 7 hours per unit of testing.

take into account they probably are only testing say, half of their units, that's 14 hours per unit of testing.

Now, if there's a second pool with the same amount of coins, that's 28 hours per unit of testing.

Doesn't seem outrageous.  People are forgetting how much fucking hashing power they have.  78 Terahash.

Wait to see what their response is.  But for shipping 6000$ hardware, you want to run some basic tests, it's just good engineering.

Yup, they are driving up difficulty while testing, so you get less BTC when you receive the device and start mining.

Testing should be done on testnet.

How does the equation for difficulty adjust if they 'spike' say, 30 units at at time or 1.95 Th/sec for 1 day of a 7 day week?  Does it just get calculated as an integral/average hash rate/block time over 2016 blocks or something?  I thought people sometimes back off mining prior to diff adjust to artificially lower it?

iirc it doesn't look like they're running these even close to full time.

Also, does testnet have acceptable difficulty for this much hash power?  or would it just find blocks every few seconds.. not familar

there's also the chance they're the nicest people ever and donate their BTC from testing to everyone who ordered.. seems like that would be a fair thing to do if this is the case.

[ninjaboon]

Today I finally received my units from Feb. 2 order. One unit was almost clean, while other one is moderate dusty. After checking all connections and desoldering F1 fuse, I started to configure units. First unit has been tuned to ozco.in and that is not surprise, cos same config was on my unit from batch one. Second unit has more interesting config:
http://puu.sh/3hrak.png
As you can see, first pool is eligius.st and most important is address: https://blockchain.info/address/1AYdAw8CcrQ2wx55LTbFHRn5bxgNZhaRLW?offset=0&filter=0
716.40851602 BTC was mined from April 22 by various units. And only gods know, how much was mined on ozco.in.
So, regardles what said Yifu, the answer is: YES, Team Avalon is mining with customer units.

PS: I'm don't have any problems with fact, that Avalon is mining with my units, if this is burn test and not introducing shipment delays.

Don't forget, this units came from China and it could possible that a dishonest staff could have done the mining himself/herself.

[Swapster]

This is dead easy... any mined Bitcoin on a machine paid for by you should be forwarded to your wallet - less the cost of electricity if you want to be fair. These machines and the benefit they provide belong to the owner. No one else... not even the builder.

Imagine if you were mining gold and bought a bulldozer or some heavy machinery, and the company that built them went to your site and used the machines you paid for, then delivered the used machines at full, as new, price. Would never happen.

Dudes are stealing bitcoin and need to return it to the rightful owners.

[Loredo]

Yup, they are driving up difficulty while testing, so you get less BTC when you receive the device and start mining.

Testing should be done on testnet.

Many ways this, if true, can be considered slimy, but this isn't one of them.  If the test add to network, and then drops off, it is difficulty-neutral except for negligible averaging effect in the next reset, and not at all after that.  Even though it hasn't been observed recently (if ever?) in bitcoins, it is possible for difficulty to drop.

[ecliptic]

Also not sure but if testnet is normally say, maybe 100 Gh/sec -- if you mine with terahash the difficullty skyrockets, when it goes away, nobody can mine blocks and it takes hours if not days to find them, to get to 2016 and readjust takes forever

some of the shittier scamcoins (altcoins) had this, hashrate jumps from 50 MH/sec to 2500 MH/sec, difficulty goes up orders of magnitude, prices drop, everyone stops mining, nobody can get blocks and the coin is fucked until enough blocks are mined that difficulty readjusts.

[matt4054]

Also not sure but if testnet is normally say, maybe 100 Gh/sec -- if you mine with terahash the difficullty skyrockets, when it goes away, nobody can mine blocks and it takes hours if not days to find them, to get to 2016 and readjust takes forever

some of the shittier scamcoins (altcoins) had this, hashrate jumps from 50 MH/sec to 2500 MH/sec, difficulty goes up orders of magnitude, prices drop, everyone stops mining, nobody can get blocks and the coin is fucked until enough blocks are mined that difficulty readjusts.

No, "if no block has been found in 20 minutes, the difficulty automatically resets back to the minimum." (source)

You just have to mine n blocks where n is the difficulty retarget window (i.e. 2016) to get the difficulty to a descent level for the hashrate you are testing with. As far as I am concerned I don't see any point *not* to use test net for testing. If a company or individual wants to earn mining revenue while testing on main net, it should be in the contract with the ones who finance the production, i.e. the owners. I thought this would be obvious to anyone without having to justify why it should be so...

Now if another company who did not finance its production with pre-orders wants to do that, and that the goods are not sold as 'new' but as 'used', I'm okay with that. Or that would really need to be just testing purposes (like testing for 2 hours, not 2 weeks), and that using main net vs test net is their "cherry on top" to lower the price tag, it would at least need to be transparent and clearly stated.

[coinedBit]

http://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/9148/do-these-new-asic-miners-really-pay-for-themselves-in-5-days?rq=1#comment12016_9149

[kano]

Also not sure but if testnet is normally say, maybe 100 Gh/sec -- if you mine with terahash the difficullty skyrockets, when it goes away, nobody can mine blocks and it takes hours if not days to find them, to get to 2016 and readjust takes forever

some of the shittier scamcoins (altcoins) had this, hashrate jumps from 50 MH/sec to 2500 MH/sec, difficulty goes up orders of magnitude, prices drop, everyone stops mining, nobody can get blocks and the coin is fucked until enough blocks are mined that difficulty readjusts.

... or you just fire up your own bitcoind and lock it into it's own network ...
Took me a couple hours to do it last time I needed it ... I'm sure anyone with experience can do it in less

[Franktank]

We have yet to hear from Yifu's half but honestly, what is going to happen? He could basically just shrug and say "What are you going to do about it?" Caveat emptor for the "supposed batch 4"

[GGGGG]

Jumping in to this from the reddit thread.
I prepaid for a batch 2 unit, I got that unit delivered (finally). Thats all I care about and all the business of Avalons I have the right to be involved in. If they didn't scam me of exactly what I paid for then I'm fine with them. However they chose to run their business before I get my box is their business and there was a very likely risk I wouldn't even see my box that I accepted. They don't owe you anything, they haven't committed fraud regardless of what your layman's grok of law makes you think.
Upset?

Hire a lawyer sue them, otherwise stop wasting everyone time with your complaining. When you bring a product to fruition and ship as promised in 9 months beating your competitors maybe then I'll have some sympathy for your opinions. For now you just sound like a whiny rabble.

Jesus, what's with all the apologists in this thread?

Once upon I time, I needed to dig a big hole, as a foundation for a building that I needed to build in a timely manner. Unfortunately, all the excavation equipment available at that time was not powerful enough to get the job done in time. Thankfully, along came this company called Mavalong, who said they were developing the next generation of excavation tools. All they needed was for me to pay in advance and they said they would be able to deliver my excavator within a few weeks. They had even proved that they had these new machines by delivering a few to early customers, but they needed funds to continue production as planned.

A few weeks go by, the originally promised delivery date has passed, and my Mavalong excavator still hasn't arrived. I tried contacting Mavalong several times to see what the hell was going on, but they ignored every attempt I made at contacting them. Other Mavalong customers all around the world had the same experience. The Mavalong CEO ignores everyone's attempts to contact him, but he still attends trade shows where he publicly promises that Mavalong is NOT using their customers machines to dig holes of their own. He ignored any questions about his business, but sometimes he would respond to attacks on his personal character, because heaven forbid someone calls him names on the internet.

One day, more than four months later, my Mavalong excavator finally arrives. Only, it's covered in mud, the tire treads are already worn, and the excavator scoop has been weakened from months of use. I use it to start digging my hole, but the deeper I dig the less efficient the machine becomes. Now it looks like it will never even be able to finish digging my hole. Meanwhile, all original financial projections I made are ruined due to the behavior of this company, and my competitor down the street who decided to go with another excavator company (run by an enigmatic CEO known only as FriedBat) has already completed his building and received all the business contracts in the area.

How can one argue that Mavalong did nothing wrong? Sure, you can say that I was just buying their excavator machine and that they eventually delivered, but I look at their lack of communication, missing of delivery targets, the fact that I basically loaned them the money to produce the machine, that they used the product that I paid for for their own personal gain, the fact that the financial calculations I did when I purchased it (even when accounting for potential shipping delays) were now totally off-base, that I purchased a new machine and received one in used condition, etc., and realize that I have been screwed over.

But still, some internet trolls will try to tell you that Mavalong's CEO, Beefu Doe, is a hero who deserves to be commended for his great work

[Arcas]

If this was BFL you people would be all torches and pitchforks in this thread, but everyone is making excuses.

[DoomDumas]

not suprised at all.every company will test their machines.maybe one week,maybe few month,who know

They should be using a testnet or sending the coins to the purchasers bitcoin address.

+1

Bought in february, was expecting units mining in my basement at least between mid april and mid may.  That's a lot of coins I'll never see the color of..

I also believe Bitsyncom when he told us about production delays out of their control, so I think we dont have to be mad against them.. They seem pretty loyal to bitcoin AFAIK, and I like their philosophy as told by Yifu !

Go Avalon team, after all, you've been first to deliver Asic to customer, you still the winner, and hope you'll be winner again for Asic v2 !

[tinoki]

not suprised at all.every company will test their machines.maybe one week,maybe few month,who know

They should be using a testnet or sending the coins to the purchasers bitcoin address.

+1

Bought in february, was expecting units mining in my basement at least between mid april and mid may.  That's a lot of coins I'll never see the color of..

I also believe Bitsyncom when he told us about production delays out of their control, so I think we dont have to be mad against them.. They seem pretty loyal to bitcoin AFAIK, and I like their philosophy as told by Yifu !

Go Avalon team, after all, you've been first to deliver Asic to customer, you still the winner, and hope you'll be winner again for Asic v2 !

We all know they deliver about on time for the 1st batch, but 2rd and 3rd some delays. Now they were found(until proven guilty) using our miners for their own mining, not days, but weeks and months. The most you need to test is 3 days on the average. If they are using for their own mining would they tell you? Yifu seems humble and honest but you don't know the inside and those around him?