[ActiveMining] The Official Active Mining Discussion Thread

[N_S]

In all seriousness, fuck right off.

This guy!

[zumzero]

Damn investing in this company seems like a bad idea now, not feeling very good.

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[zumzero]

Guys,  we're on Reddit.

Feel free to jump in and spread the love.

http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1lur6u/easic_announces_24_ths_fasthash_miner/

[drawingthesun]

Damn investing in this company seems like a bad idea now, not feeling very good.

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Someone mentioned here https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=254930.msg3095894#msg3095894 that ActiveMining does not yet have a fab to create the chips whilst all our competitors are using TSMC.

This is a little worrying.

[N_S]

Damn investing in this company seems like a bad idea now, not feeling very good.

expand

Someone mentioned here https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=254930.msg3095894#msg3095894 that ActiveMining does not yet have a fab to create the chips whilst all our competitors are using TSMC.

This is a little worrying.

Wait, am I completely daft or is eASIC not the fab?

[drawingthesun]

Damn investing in this company seems like a bad idea now, not feeling very good.

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Someone mentioned here https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=254930.msg3095894#msg3095894 that ActiveMining does not yet have a fab to create the chips whilst all our competitors are using TSMC.

This is a little worrying.

Wait, am I completely daft or is eASIC not the fab?

Nope, they are a fabless company.

[N_S]

Nope, they are a fabless company.

Interesting. Any ideas where they've been fabricating ASICs in the past?

[drawingthesun]

eASIC is a fabless semiconductor company offering NEW ASIC devices used in the production of customized silicon devices.

[auto2nr1]

Is ActiveMining still taking delivery of the 2 batch of Avalon chips that are still on order or did we request a refund?

[drawingthesun]

Nope, they are a fabless company.

Interesting. Any ideas where they've been fabricating ASICs in the past?

No idea, I am just a little perplexed that we have no physical chips. Everyone is using TSMC and we are still creating designs on computers. No wonder Ken is not around anymore.

I feel like I have made a huge mistake.

[dexX7]

Nope, they are a fabless company.

Fabless means they are outsourcing the fabrication. Due to the nature of eASIC producing structured ASICs I'm convinced they are partnered with a semiconductor foundry and this is already covered.

Structured ASIC is an intermediate technology between ASIC and FPGA, offering high performance, a characteristic of ASIC, and low NRE cost, a characteristic of FPGA. Using Structured ASIC allows products to be introduced quickly to market, to have lower cost and to be designed with ease.

In a FPGA, interconnects and logic blocks are programmable after fabrication, offering high flexibility of design and ease of debugging in prototyping. (...) Every different design [with custom ASICs] needs a complete different set of masks. The Structured ASIC is a solution between these two. It has basically the same structure as a FPGA, but being mask-programmable instead of field-programmable, by configuring one or several via layers between metal layers. Every SRAM configuration bit can be replaced by a choice of putting a via or not between metal contacts.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Structured_ASIC_platform

And also: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=252531.msg3091216#msg3091216

[drawingthesun]

Nope, they are a fabless company.

Fabless means they are outsourcing the fabrication. Due to the nature of eASIC producing structured ASICs I'm convinced they are partnered with a semiconductor foundry and this is already covered.

I am getting the feeling that the nameless semiconductor foundry is remaining nameless for a reason, because TSMC would be far better and the share price would fall even lower if we found out.

I don't understand why the secrecy around a darn semiconductor company, we know that hashfast, avalon, labcoin all use TSMC.

[drawingthesun]

But dex, think of the FUD opportunities!

I will be honest, I have lost over $3000 on this stock so far, I can't even sell to recoup any losses and my only chance to get back is if this company works out. I just don't understand the no information thing.

Why are all of you ok with not knowing the foundry? Every other company discloses the foundry they use publicly.

[madmalkav]

TSMC would be far better

Why?

[drawingthesun]

Nope, they are a fabless company.

Fabless means they are outsourcing the fabrication. Due to the nature of eASIC producing structured ASICs I'm convinced they are partnered with a semiconductor foundry and this is already covered.

Structured ASIC is an intermediate technology between ASIC and FPGA, offering high performance, a characteristic of ASIC, and low NRE cost, a characteristic of FPGA. Using Structured ASIC allows products to be introduced quickly to market, to have lower cost and to be designed with ease.

In a FPGA, interconnects and logic blocks are programmable after fabrication, offering high flexibility of design and ease of debugging in prototyping. (...) Every different design [with custom ASICs] needs a complete different set of masks. The Structured ASIC is a solution between these two. It has basically the same structure as a FPGA, but being mask-programmable instead of field-programmable, by configuring one or several via layers between metal layers. Every SRAM configuration bit can be replaced by a choice of putting a via or not between metal contacts.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Structured_ASIC_platform

And also: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=252531.msg3091216#msg3091216

Thanks for this, so its not as hard to produce an active mining asic compared to asicminer and labcoin?

Is it as good? And if so why don't the other companies do this?

[drawingthesun]

TSMC would be far better

Why?

Well apparently TSMC wouldn't be better because the asic design is easier (see post above)

I don't quite understand the difference but it sounds like you don't need a full blown foundry.

[Vbs]

eAsic uses Global Foundries and Fujitsu. http://www.easic.com/migration-to-cell-based-asic/easic-ecosystem/

[Vbs]

My suggestion for the product list is:

1) Bulk chips.

2) PCIe 1x cards, with discounts for bulk orders.

That's it.  The reason is, a PCIe card can basically be produced entirely by an SMT line, with no manual labor at all. When the user gets it they can plug it into any motherboard.   Since they already appear to be doing something like that, that would be the way to go.

You can retail off the shelf cases/back-planes/host controllers etc (something like a PCIe based version of the bitfury m-board) - but those should not be the 'main' products and they would ship separately, etc.

Both are already there, except for the discount on bulk pcie card purchases.

http://virtualminingcorp.com/shop1/index.php?id_product=26&controller=product
Fast-Hash-One Platinum 256 GH/s PCI-E Long Module.  Less than 200 Watts.

Our cards can be used on any regular Intel/AMD motherboard!

They are currently in a design stage, to be built in a single-slot form-factor, similar to the illustration above, but using a blower-type fan assembly that expels the hot air outside your system case.

Connection requirements: the card will support a PCIE x1 connector, so you can fit it into any free PCIE x1, x4, x8, or x16 slot in your motherboard.  Alternatively, it also has an USB connector so you can use it unplugged from a motherboard like any other regular USB bitcoin miner!

Estimated Power requirements:
One PCIE six-pin power connector plus one PCIE eight-pin power connector.

Required software drivers allowing card usage in popular bitcoin mining programs will be release in due time before cards are shipped.

Bulk chips: http://virtualminingcorp.com/shop1/index.php?id_product=14&controller=product

[Stuartuk]

Why are all of you ok with not knowing the foundry? Every other company discloses the foundry they use publicly.

Considering you have that ammount invested have you even looked at the eASIC website where the foundaries they use are shown?

[dexX7]

But dex, think of the FUD opportunities!

BitFunder went below IPO earlier and BTC-TC is on the same level as before the press release (which I declare as very significant). What I think: speculators are already out and those who held ActM before the eASIC deal are now even more confident.

Thanks for this, so its not as hard to produce an active mining asic compared to asicminer and labcoin?

Is it as good? And if so why don't the other companies do this?

As far as I know it is easier, but I think eASIC does finalize the chip design anyway. There are pros and cons using structured ASICs. I assume they might be bit slower due to their overhead (disclaimer: no real knowledge here), though they should be much cheaper and faster to produce.

I will be honest, I have lost over $3000 on this stock so far, I can't even sell to recoup any losses and my only chance to get back is if this company works out. I just don't understand the no information thing.

Why are all of you ok with not knowing the foundry? Every other company discloses the foundry they use publicly.

They deal with eASIC. This does provide much more confidence than "an IC producer who uses TMSC", at least for me. Lame analogy: a meal baked in a perfect oven is not to be guaranteed more delicious than a meal cooked by a professional chef cook.

One additional note: "bucket shop foundries" are most likely non-existent, especially for a transistor size of 28 nm. Wikipedia has a list of fabrication plants, if you're interested in digging deeper: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_semiconductor_fabrication_plants