Black Arrow 28nm 100Ghash Bitcoin ASIC from $0.49/GH/s

[BlackArrow Matt]

I can't keep up with this thread. The reading I've been doing has been disappointing. I'd appreciate it if everyone could cut the trolling and flaming and just speak about the issues at hand. Telling each other to F-off looks bad and the off topic conversations causes those with actual questions to get drowned out.

I have no updates at the moment.

Tell us this: which country are you based in? What is your relationship to BA? How come you didn't know the tapeout target was missed? Who made the decision to go ahead with the chip? What was the date of that? Why weren't we told about that decision before it happened?

I didn't know about the tapeout target because I'm not an engineer and I just deal with troubleshooting tickets and trying to answer questions. I am not one of the two or so people who have access to bank accounts or bitcoin wallets. I do not know who made the decision to go ahead with the chip. I'd guess it was the highest level of BA since I wasn't a part of the decision. I don't know the date either.

[Lloydie]

I can't keep up with this thread. The reading I've been doing has been disappointing. I'd appreciate it if everyone could cut the trolling and flaming and just speak about the issues at hand. Telling each other to F-off looks bad and the off topic conversations causes those with actual questions to get drowned out.

I have no updates at the moment.

Tell us this: which country are you based in? What is your relationship to BA? How come you didn't know the tapeout target was missed? Who made the decision to go ahead with the chip? What was the date of that? Why weren't we told about that decision before it happened?

I didn't know about the tapeout target because I'm not an engineer and I just deal with troubleshooting tickets and trying to answer questions. I am not one of the two or so people who have access to bank accounts or bitcoin wallets. I do not know who made the decision to go ahead with the chip. I'd guess it was the highest level of BA since I wasn't a part of the decision. I don't know the date either.

Ok. Then you have nothing and cannot help. I am sorry, but those are the facts. BA still has not levelled with us.

[Lloydie]

I can't keep up with this thread. The reading I've been doing has been disappointing. I'd appreciate it if everyone could cut the trolling and flaming and just speak about the issues at hand. Telling each other to F-off looks bad and the off topic conversations causes those with actual questions to get drowned out.

I have no updates at the moment.

Tell us this: which country are you based in? What is your relationship to BA? How come you didn't know the tapeout target was missed? Who made the decision to go ahead with the chip? What was the date of that? Why weren't we told about that decision before it happened?

I didn't know about the tapeout target because I'm not an engineer and I just deal with troubleshooting tickets and trying to answer questions. I am not one of the two or so people who have access to bank accounts or bitcoin wallets. I do not know who made the decision to go ahead with the chip. I'd guess it was the highest level of BA since I wasn't a part of the decision. I don't know the date either.

Ok. Then you have nothing and cannot help. I am sorry, but those are the facts. BA still has not levelled with us.

Tell us who is running BA? Is it one person? Multiple people? Who pays your wages? And what is the address of the factory in Shenzhen?

[BlackArrow Matt]

I can't keep up with this thread. The reading I've been doing has been disappointing. I'd appreciate it if everyone could cut the trolling and flaming and just speak about the issues at hand. Telling each other to F-off looks bad and the off topic conversations causes those with actual questions to get drowned out.

I have no updates at the moment.

Tell us this: which country are you based in? What is your relationship to BA? How come you didn't know the tapeout target was missed? Who made the decision to go ahead with the chip? What was the date of that? Why weren't we told about that decision before it happened?

I didn't know about the tapeout target because I'm not an engineer and I just deal with troubleshooting tickets and trying to answer questions. I am not one of the two or so people who have access to bank accounts or bitcoin wallets. I do not know who made the decision to go ahead with the chip. I'd guess it was the highest level of BA since I wasn't a part of the decision. I don't know the date either.

Ok. Then you have nothing and cannot help. I am sorry, but those are the facts. BA still has not levelled with us.

Not necessarily true. An engineer answered questions a few days ago:

Posted 31 January 2014 - 03:53 PM
terrorist96, on 29 Jan 2014 - 11:12 PM, said:
 
1. Did Blackarrow lie to us when they said they had their final specs on Jan 3?
 
2. If they've just now taped out, shouldn't it take 49 days (considering Cointerra) to make it to production? It should be done by late March..This makes no sense.. Some explanation on this would be nice.
 
3. Why weren't the customers consulted when Blackarrow knew that the chip would ship with 1.5W/Gh without delay and ASKED us customers if we were okay with that OR delay the shipment 2 months to achieve 0.75W/Gh? If Blackarrow KNEW in early January that there would be a delay, why did you wait until the END of January to tell people? An option of shipping on-time but with the 1.5W/Gh would have been nice since some people have free electricity and don't give a fuck!
 
4. When will we see real pictures of production? Otherwise this whole thing just seems like a giant scam. It's easy to promise people more things in the future.
(Yes, I know they've had pictures/videos of the bitfury. I'm talking about the Prospero)
 
5. How can we trust Blackarrow anymore since they've betrayed our trust already? How do we know that it won't get delayed even past May 1? Where are the reassurances?
 
6. The Prospero X-3 has 20 chips inside it. According to the statement put out, "TT corner @ 25C which is expected to run at 120Ghash/sec". Does this mean that in total, the X-3 will have a hash rate of 2400Gh/sec? If so, with the 25% (of 2000Gh/sec would be 500Gh/sec) added for 4 months, one X-3 mining rate would be 2900Gh/sec for the first 4 months, then drops to 2400Gh/sec from then on out. Is this correct?
 
7. What about the option to host Bitfuries for us, proportional to our order amount, starting Feb 24 until the Minion chips are ready to ship?
 
8. It has been mentioned that Globalfoundries are being used to manufacture the chip. However, Globalfoundries does not have any foundries in China. They are located in Singapore and Germany. I thought the chip was being made in China. I understand that VeriSilicon has a location in China though.
 
I think I speak for all your customers when I say we would like all these questions answered.
If anyone else has additional questions, post them here.
 
 
 
 
1. We did not lie on Jan 3. We were planning to tape out before the Chinese New Year. On Jan 3 we were informed that the back end team cannot reach their target and need to try another layout. This meant to do some changes in the RTL code and start back end process all over again. We have immediately announced the worst date we could think of for batch 2 and not announced details about batch one because we did not had them. We just got the final data from the back end team 5 days ago. They have now reached their target and are now 99% sure that they'll tape out 1 week after Chinese new year (15-20 Jan).
 
2. We have looked into our competitors claims together with Global Foundries. GF is obviously not at liberty to discuss the specific projects with third parties but they assured us that it is impossible to finish 28nm in 49days and to cover every step. 28nm is very complicated and DRC/LSV and JDV checking takes at least 14 days. The wafer manufacturing takes 0.8days / layer at their highest speed. Our conclusion is that our competitors have deliberately omitted several steps in their advertising and were only referring to wafer manufacturing.
 
3. The tapeout costs millions of dollars. We do not have a customer that paid that much to make a tapeout just for them. We had to think further than 1 month. 1.5W/Ghash is not only electricity problem. The whole power translates into heat, therefore more things are required: power chips, heatsinks, AC, new case design, etc.
 
4. We cannot produce the PCBs without the exact pin layout of the chip. This has not been yet received.  We could not produce the case without the exact heat estimation.
 
5. Black Arrow is the only Bitcoin ASIC manufacturer that has not betrayed customer's trust. While others let the deadline pass by and did not announce anything we have clearly informed our customers of the situation.
The tapeout is almost complete and the path from here to ASIC is clearly drawn in the industry.
 
6. Yes, we should be able to run at 120Ghash/sec according to our tools and Verisilicon. Verisilicon gives us the SS corner for speed and TT corner for power. FF corner can be even faster.
 
For those who do not know:
SS = slow slow - absolutely lower limit (speed & voltage) where it can run
TT = typical typical - normal usage; note that 28nm is rated at 25C but leakage increases dramatically with the temperature. The real power consumption at 60C is only a guess at this stage.
FF = fast fast - higest speed, highest voltage, also the highest power consumption. - we have no data on this, it's only discovered while testing real chips.
 
7. We only have few Bitfuries left. It would mean to give everybody less than 1% of what they have ordered. This i more trouble than it worths.
 
8. The chip is designed in China, manufactured in Germany, packaged in Taiwan. Finally the Prospero will be assembled in China

http://ecointalk.net/topic/463-we-want-answers/page-3

[Lloydie]

1. We did not lie on Jan 3. We were planning to tape out before the Chinese New Year. On Jan 3 we were informed that the back end team cannot reach their target and need to try another layout. This meant to do some changes in the RTL code and start back end process all over again. We have immediately announced the worst date we could think of for batch 2 and not announced details about batch one because we did not had them. We just got the final data from the back end team 5 days ago. They have now reached their target and are now 99% sure that they'll tape out 1 week after Chinese new year (15-20 Jan).
 
2. We have looked into our competitors claims together with Global Foundries. GF is obviously not at liberty to discuss the specific projects with third parties but they assured us that it is impossible to finish 28nm in 49days and to cover every step. 28nm is very complicated and DRC/LSV and JDV checking takes at least 14 days. The wafer manufacturing takes 0.8days / layer at their highest speed. Our conclusion is that our competitors have deliberately omitted several steps in their advertising and were only referring to wafer manufacturing.
 
3. The tapeout costs millions of dollars. We do not have a customer that paid that much to make a tapeout just for them. We had to think further than 1 month. 1.5W/Ghash is not only electricity problem. The whole power translates into heat, therefore more things are required: power chips, heatsinks, AC, new case design, etc.
 
4. We cannot produce the PCBs without the exact pin layout of the chip. This has not been yet received.  We could not produce the case without the exact heat estimation.
 
5. Black Arrow is the only Bitcoin ASIC manufacturer that has not betrayed customer's trust. While others let the deadline pass by and did not announce anything we have clearly informed our customers of the situation.
The tapeout is almost complete and the path from here to ASIC is clearly drawn in the industry.
 
6. Yes, we should be able to run at 120Ghash/sec according to our tools and Verisilicon. Verisilicon gives us the SS corner for speed and TT corner for power. FF corner can be even faster.
 
For those who do not know:
SS = slow slow - absolutely lower limit (speed & voltage) where it can run
TT = typical typical - normal usage; note that 28nm is rated at 25C but leakage increases dramatically with the temperature. The real power consumption at 60C is only a guess at this stage.
FF = fast fast - higest speed, highest voltage, also the highest power consumption. - we have no data on this, it's only discovered while testing real chips.
 
7. We only have few Bitfuries left. It would mean to give everybody less than 1% of what they have ordered. This i more trouble than it worths.
 
8. The chip is designed in China, manufactured in Germany, packaged in Taiwan. Finally the Prospero will be assembled in China

http://ecointalk.net/topic/463-we-want-answers/page-3
[/quote]

Why was there no notification on jan 3 that tapeout targets could not be met? Even if jan 3 target was met, based on the current timeline, the feb 24 target would have still been missed. This was not disclosed to us. Why?

Do you know that the BA chip will be two months later than the AM 40nm chip and have worse performance? Why are we continuing with this?

PCB layouts will soon be out or are already out for AM chips.

BA kept from us knowledge that the jan 3 target was missed. That affects trust. We could've at that point in time mitigated our losses if given full disclosure and options.

You still haven't answered questions re: who runs BA at the top, who pays your wages and the Shenzhen address?

[BlackArrow Matt]

Tell us who is running BA? Is it one person? Multiple people? Who pays your wages? And what is the address of the factory in Shenzhen?

Multiple people run the company. I don't know the address of the factory. That's a better question for Bobsag. I've never been to the factory.

[Lloydie]

Tell us who is running BA? Is it one person? Multiple people? Who pays your wages? And what is the address of the factory in Shenzhen?

Multiple people run the company. I don't know the address of the factory. That's a better question for Bobsag. I've never been to the factory.

Who pays you?

[Lloydie]

Tell us who is running BA? Is it one person? Multiple people? Who pays your wages? And what is the address of the factory in Shenzhen?

Multiple people run the company. I don't know the address of the factory. That's a better question for Bobsag. I've never been to the factory.

Who pays you?

Please feel free to chime in here bobsag3 aka Matt Carson. You met with these guys, you are their US reseller. Level with all of us.

[BlackArrow Matt]

Tell us who is running BA? Is it one person? Multiple people? Who pays your wages? And what is the address of the factory in Shenzhen?

Multiple people run the company. I don't know the address of the factory. That's a better question for Bobsag. I've never been to the factory.

Who pays you?

Since you're so insistent on this, I'll level with you. I won't get paid till after the release of the minion. I have a different full time job and I do this because I want to help Black Arrow. I don't want to get paid till the release of the minion so all funds could be used for development. So it's not just customers who are affected by this delay. I hope that answers your question.

[terrapinflyer]

BAMatt have you discussed we all feel the 25% free hosting is not acceptable as compensation? I think we would all like to know the context of the meeting you had with bobsag this weekend. Also can you let people know how to go about starting the refund process that you offered the other day?  

[Lloydie]

BAMatt have you discussed we all feel the 25% free hosting is not acceptable as compensation? I think we would all like to know the context of the meeting you had with bobsag this weekend. Also can you let people know how to go about starting the refund process that you offered the other day?  

I think it should be made clear that BA intends only to refund you if a new customer displaces your purchase.

[BlackArrow Matt]

BAMatt have you discussed we all feel the 25% free hosting is not acceptable as compensation? I think we would all like to know the context of the meeting you had with bobsag this weekend. Also can you let people know how to go about starting the refund process that you offered the other day?  

Everyone knows that the 25% extra hashing was not well received. We're all trying to come up with better options. I'm not sure how long that'll take to figure out but we're discussing it. I have never met bobsag. The first step to a refund would be to submit a ticket. It may be worth while to wait a few weeks till we can figure out a better compensation plan though.

[terrapinflyer]

BAMatt have you discussed we all feel the 25% free hosting is not acceptable as compensation? I think we would all like to know the context of the meeting you had with bobsag this weekend. Also can you let people know how to go about starting the refund process that you offered the other day?  

Everyone knows that the 25% extra hashing was not well received. We're all trying to come up with better options. I'm not sure how long that'll take to figure out but we're discussing it. I have never met bobsag. The first step to a refund would be to submit a ticket. It may be worth while to wait a few weeks till we can figure out a better compensation plan though.

Thanks, pretty much what I was thinking. Sorry I was under the impression bobsag was meeting the team this weekend to discuss the latest developments. Please try to keep us posted as things develop, Im sure we all agree that lack of communication has lead to some pretty upset people and some wild allegations 

[Lloydie]

You still have not addressed why jan 3 announcement was not made.

Also, it would've apparent to management that feb 24 target would be missed even if jan 3 target was met based on current timeline.

Who made decision to go ahead knowing targets would be missed, especially in light of the fact that difficulty increases is rising exponentially?

Until you tell us who is responsible, BA has not levelled with us in my eyes.

Also, who will be paying you in event minions are launched?

[BlackArrow Matt]

You still have not addressed why jan 3 announcement was not made.

Also, it would've apparent to management that feb 24 target would be missed even if jan 3 target was met based on current timeline.

Who made decision to go ahead knowing targets would be missed, especially in light of the fact that difficulty increases is rising exponentially?

Until you tell us who is responsible, BA has not levelled with us in my eyes.

Also, who will be paying you in event minions are launched?

I'm sorry you feel that way. I do not have those answers.

[Lloydie]

You still have not addressed why jan 3 announcement was not made.

Also, it would've apparent to management that feb 24 target would be missed even if jan 3 target was met based on current timeline.

Who made decision to go ahead knowing targets would be missed, especially in light of the fact that difficulty increases is rising exponentially?

Until you tell us who is responsible, BA has not levelled with us in my eyes.

Also, who will be paying you in event minions are launched?

I'm sorry you feel that way. I do not have those answers.

Then BA has not levelled with us. The chip designer should've understood the ROI implications of his announcement. Which implies BA is in a tight spot, which means they're unlikely to come good. Matt Carson better have some real answers, else the wrath of dz coop will fall on him.

[jimmothy]

You still have not addressed why jan 3 announcement was not made.

Also, it would've apparent to management that feb 24 target would be missed even if jan 3 target was met based on current timeline.

Who made decision to go ahead knowing targets would be missed, especially in light of the fact that difficulty increases is rising exponentially?

Until you tell us who is responsible, BA has not levelled with us in my eyes.

Also, who will be paying you in event minions are launched?

I'm sorry you feel that way. I do not have those answers.

Then BA has not levelled with us.

Why don't you just submit a refund request?

What do you expect to get out of bitching and moaning?

[terrapinflyer]

You still have not addressed why jan 3 announcement was not made.

Also, it would've apparent to management that feb 24 target would be missed even if jan 3 target was met based on current timeline.

Who made decision to go ahead knowing targets would be missed, especially in light of the fact that difficulty increases is rising exponentially?

Until you tell us who is responsible, BA has not levelled with us in my eyes.

Also, who will be paying you in event minions are launched?

I'm sorry you feel that way. I do not have those answers.

Then BA has not levelled with us.

Sadly I have to agree, I think that you all have some tough questions to answer here and without direct action by your management team the trust of BA will be lost forever.

[terrapinflyer]

Why don't you just submit a refund request?

What do you expect to get out of bitching and moaning?

I think he is expecting to get answers.
Just because he is asking questions does not mean he wants a refund, I know personally I want the equipment I paid for. I think most of us want to see this project succeed not die in the water but some people have to take responsibility for these missteps and lack of transparency.

[BlackArrow Matt]

If we can organize a list of questions, I can try getting answers.