Next difficulty ~4,000,000,000? Tracking difficulty since 145,000,000.

[Puppet]

I missed your thread and was operating on bad guesses. Sorry.

Though - if 1TH/s = ~$140 retail after chip, PSU, shipping, cables, and whatever else - and it consumes, say 500W (this assumes it's significantly more efficient than babyjet2s, which I don't think an unreasonable assumption. It'll probably be much more efficient than my grim guess) - 6-12 months out (6-8 months out might be okay), and it's hard to justify the cost even if electricity's dirt-cheap (say, $.05/KWh after taxes/fees) - especially if everyone else is going to be mass-ordering these chips, too. At the end of the day, we're all chasing a piece of a 3.6kBTC/day pie (+~100BTC in fees) until the next halving, which is probably significantly less than three years away with the rapid increase of hashpower put on the network. We may not even have much more than two years if upfront costs drop dramatically and the pre-order hysteria keeps up.

-So what do you see in, say, 18 months? Near-complete mining centralization in a small handful of geographic locations with sub-$.05/KWh electricity?

Well, based on assumptions like you just wrote you can calculate where its headed,  just not how fast it will head there. Your guess is as good as mine.
But yes, I do expect the majority of mining (and all of profitable mining)  to eventuallyt move where electricity is cheapest.

And there are some pretty extreme low (subsidized)  prices to be found. In Kuwait the price is fixed at $0.01 per KhW:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-20644964

In russia apparently you can buy electricity for $0.025 per KwH

Those tariffs cant  last forever, as that is well below cost but even if its only for a few more years, its not unreasonable to assume someone will set up shop there and Kuwait would effectively subsidize bitcoin security

[baritus]

http://bitcoindifficulty.com is now showing a similar number. This is immense, 112-149..

[Puppet]

Getting crazier by the minute. According to blockchain we are at ~1300 TH now. 60 days ago we were barely over 200 TH
https://blockchain.info/charts/hash-rate?timespan=60days&showDataPoints=false&daysAverageString=1&show_header=true&scale=0&address=

The scary thing is that this is before the real onslaught of 28nm asics has even begun.
Cant wait to read the sob stories of monarch customers in a few months.

[Buffer Overflow]

Cant wait to read the sob stories of monarch customers in a few months.

LOL  Gotta love those sob stories. Gonna be plenty.

[wpgdeez]

Miners have fucked themselves. So much for electricity savings of the ASICS and decentralization of the network.

[Puppet]

Miners have fucked themselves.

Thats quite possibly the shortest yet most accurate description of the current mining market Ive read so far

So much for electricity savings of the ASICS and decentralization of the network.

"Electricity savings" per GH is of course still true. But if anyone thought migrating from GPUs & FPGA's to ASICs would lower the overal's networks electricity use, then they didnt think it through. Its quite the opposite: since ASICs are so cheap to produce, the bulk of the miners cost would inevitably  shift from hardware purchase / write off to electricity. GPU's and FPGA were never going to become as cheap "per watt" as bitcoin asics eventually will,  because they are in demand for other applications.

As for decentralization, Im not sure we are headed towards a problem in that regard. At least not in the long run, in the short run it might be possible for someone to grab a non trivial % of the network, but since pretty much all those 28nm chips are primarily being sold to miners, Im not too worried.

[blub]

looking forward for winter 2014/15. Ill have free power and it looks like you'll get aisics for the scrap value

[Puppet]

They will cost about the same as an electrical heater, and earn you about as much

[Nemo1024]

We'll hit 148.255.918 today, so the OP's projection was not that much off. What's next? 200.000.000? 

[af_newbie]

Miners have fucked themselves. So much for electricity savings of the ASICS and decentralization of the network.

Same idea as electric cars.  Suppose to solve a problem, instead it creates more, different problems.

Electricity draw by ASICs went through the roof, decentralization?  Well, look at what Avalon, ASICMiner and now bitfury has done to
decentralize the network.

I was happy mining with my three 7970s last year, pulling 500W from the wall, now I pull >5000W with the ASICs.
Is the network any better, safer?

[Nemo1024]

I was happy mining with my three 7970s last year, pulling 500W from the wall, now I pull >5000W with the ASICs.

Network decentralisation is measured by the number of pools/solo miners, not by the number of ASICs.

However, the more hashing power is pushed into the network, the harder it is to mount a 51% attack for any single party, so yes, security has grown.

As for power. I too had 3x7970 + 3x6770 + 6570, pulling ~1125Watts (3x250+3x95+90) for 2400MHs
I now have 145 BEs, which cumulatively pull ~370W for 48575MH/s, while still generating more coins than the GPUs did at the beginning of this year.

How many ASICs have you mounted to pull 5000W? 

[Nemo1024]

We've just hit 148.819.199!

[abacus]

How accurate would you say that is?

We've just hit 148.819.199!

Well, pretty accurate then...

[HellDiverUK]

Phew, 149M.  My daily income dropped from a feeble BTC0.13 to a even more feeble BTC0.9.  

[Puppet]

Fun fact. Even if hashrate remains stable at the current ~1200TH, so BFL, AM, BF and others stop shipping and deploying, next difficulty will be ~168M.
But its not so much the next one Im looking forward to, as the one after that. Assuming KnC stays roughly on target.

[Patel]

Its better to buy Bitcoin, wait for it to appreciate, and then buy a mining rig. So technically you spent less USD on the rig, and hardware power $/terrahs will also get cheaper over time

[Abdussamad]

Phew, 149M.  My daily income dropped from a feeble BTC0.13 to a even more feeble BTC0.9. 

That would be an increase then

[PaperClip]

Difficulty is increased because of added new mining devices.
As I know - mining devices now are produced and shipped in big quantity only by BFL.
Last 4 increases all were around 30% (29.4% - 32.22%). This coincidence (almost same percentage increase 4 times in a row) never happened before.

Does it mean that BFL specially ships devices not in their full potential, but in specially calculated quantities to keep this 30% increase ratio?
And, possibly, all who are now still waiting for their BFL device - could have them delivered month ago if only BFL would ship all at their full potential?

[Abdussamad]

Difficulty is increased because of added new mining devices.
As I know - mining devices now are produced and shipped in big quantity only by BFL.

What? Isn't BFL the one that screwed everyone over?

[PaperClip]

Difficulty is increased because of added new mining devices.
As I know - mining devices now are produced and shipped in big quantity only by BFL.

What? Isn't BFL the one that screwed everyone over?

Nope. They were wanking for more than a year, but now everything is somehow in delivery stage. Last time I have checked - everything from year 2012 is already shipped to customers, so they have only nine months of orders to deliver . And they constantly ship devices, all this is legitimate, nobody is screwed. Except fact that nobody who will receive now their device will make ROI. I am sad for guys who ordered 500GH/s device :/

But still, they have huuuge amount of TH/s to deliver, and they can keep difficulty increase on any level they want. This sucks.