Alpha Technology Litecoin (Scrypt) ASIC Miner Order Batch 1 Now!

[Starlightbreaker]

there's no product prototyping?

all i see was a fpga unit hashing. I'm not an engineer, but with the experience of butterfly labs, they had FPGA miners out decently okay, but could not made ASICs worth any shit until their 3rd or 4th revision.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     

[Its About Sharing]

there's no product prototyping?

all i see was a fpga unit hashing. I'm not an engineer, but with the experience of butterfly labs, they had FPGA miners out decently okay, but could not made ASICs worth any shit until their 3rd or 4th revision.

This is what their last message stated:

You may note that we had bettered hashing speed per core as compared to last time we published our results in our Prototyping Design Document.

As stated in the following video, our ASIC design POC has not been optimised for any specific FPGA, instead optimised for multi-core scalability with ASIC in mind. That's why it's important we show our core speed and number of cores we are targeting as per the final ASIC chip. Based on this design and global foundries process node, die sizes and the associated costs have been arrived at and we will be going ahead with the fabrication, post final back end verification.

Video link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=69P2RHG2pIA

[vesperwillow]

So let's say there's an epic fail, the design fails, something fails and in the end, the customers will not receive their products.

What protection is there for the preorder folks? Refunds, etc.

KNC was an existing team of established engineers, working with heavyweight industry partners who are also well established. Kinda like to know where the preorder money is going and, more than a youtube video, what reliability and fallback there is.

Also, are there any guarantees of delivery in the timeframe allotted? Perhaps if there's a delay, you will ship additional mining equipment to the batch 1 folks?

[nightengale]

Their whole "30%" down deal is BS. WTF is it good for if you still have to put 70% down 8-10 weeks before shipment? YOU STILL HAVE TO PUT 100% DOWN WAY BEFORE YOU EVER SEE ANY PRODUCT!

The way I see it, the 30% funds the ASIC engineering development. Then the 70% funds the mask set and initial wafer batch (hence the 8-10 weeks which matches an optimistic version of the foundry turnaround time).

The way I see it:

30% of the funds are used for their expenses and manufacturing, this wey they don't have to invest a dime, they will receive the first batches and mine the hell outta them for a few months.
70% Then they receive the rest 70% which is their actual profit, keep mining for a few weeks and then they ship to you when the difficulty is already up and you will just break even a few years later.

LOL at all the idiots that preorder this shit.

The people who preordered the first two batches of Avalon, and the first batch of KnC, are LOL'ing all the way to the bank. You just have to weigh the risk vs. reward, but there's no reason to be a dick about this. If you don't want to participate, then don't. So sick of dealing with all of these pricks whose mommies didn't hug them enough. What is with the impulse to piss in everyone's Cheerios?

[wilson1973]

Their whole "30%" down deal is BS. WTF is it good for if you still have to put 70% down 8-10 weeks before shipment? YOU STILL HAVE TO PUT 100% DOWN WAY BEFORE YOU EVER SEE ANY PRODUCT!

The way I see it, the 30% funds the ASIC engineering development. Then the 70% funds the mask set and initial wafer batch (hence the 8-10 weeks which matches an optimistic version of the foundry turnaround time).

The way I see it:

30% of the funds are used for their expenses and manufacturing, this wey they don't have to invest a dime, they will receive the first batches and mine the hell outta them for a few months.
70% Then they receive the rest 70% which is their actual profit, keep mining for a few weeks and then they ship to you when the difficulty is already up and you will just break even a few years later.

LOL at all the idiots that preorder this shit.

The people who preordered the first two batches of Avalon, and the first batch of KnC, are LOL'ing all the way to the bank. You just have to weigh the risk vs. reward, but there's no reason to be a dick about this. If you don't want to participate, then don't. So sick of dealing with all of these pricks whose mommies didn't hug them enough. What is with the impulse to piss in everyone's Cheerios?

+1

[Starlightbreaker]

there's no product prototyping?

all i see was a fpga unit hashing. I'm not an engineer, but with the experience of butterfly labs, they had FPGA miners out decently okay, but could not made ASICs worth any shit until their 3rd or 4th revision.

This is what their last message stated:

You may note that we had bettered hashing speed per core as compared to last time we published our results in our Prototyping Design Document.

As stated in the following video, our ASIC design POC has not been optimised for any specific FPGA, instead optimised for multi-core scalability with ASIC in mind. That's why it's important we show our core speed and number of cores we are targeting as per the final ASIC chip. Based on this design and global foundries process node, die sizes and the associated costs have been arrived at and we will be going ahead with the fabrication, post final back end verification.

Video link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=69P2RHG2pIA

....basically no guarantee on what's going to happen.

yeah, good, they can produce fpga, but ASIC is a whole different beast.

i'm calling they're gonna pull a BFL, failed the first two iterations.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           

[Its About Sharing]

Their whole "30%" down deal is BS. WTF is it good for if you still have to put 70% down 8-10 weeks before shipment? YOU STILL HAVE TO PUT 100% DOWN WAY BEFORE YOU EVER SEE ANY PRODUCT!

The way I see it, the 30% funds the ASIC engineering development. Then the 70% funds the mask set and initial wafer batch (hence the 8-10 weeks which matches an optimistic version of the foundry turnaround time).

The way I see it:

30% of the funds are used for their expenses and manufacturing, this wey they don't have to invest a dime, they will receive the first batches and mine the hell outta them for a few months.
70% Then they receive the rest 70% which is their actual profit, keep mining for a few weeks and then they ship to you when the difficulty is already up and you will just break even a few years later.

LOL at all the idiots that preorder this shit.

The people who preordered the first two batches of Avalon, and the first batch of KnC, are LOL'ing all the way to the bank. You just have to weigh the risk vs. reward, but there's no reason to be a dick about this. If you don't want to participate, then don't. So sick of dealing with all of these pricks whose mommies didn't hug them enough. What is with the impulse to piss in everyone's Cheerios?

LOL with reason and wit - thx for that. Well said.

[wilson1973]

there's no product prototyping?

all i see was a fpga unit hashing. I'm not an engineer, but with the experience of butterfly labs, they had FPGA miners out decently okay, but could not made ASICs worth any shit until their 3rd or 4th revision.

This is what their last message stated:

You may note that we had bettered hashing speed per core as compared to last time we published our results in our Prototyping Design Document.

As stated in the following video, our ASIC design POC has not been optimised for any specific FPGA, instead optimised for multi-core scalability with ASIC in mind. That's why it's important we show our core speed and number of cores we are targeting as per the final ASIC chip. Based on this design and global foundries process node, die sizes and the associated costs have been arrived at and we will be going ahead with the fabrication, post final back end verification.

Video link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=69P2RHG2pIA

....basically no guarantee on what's going to happen.

yeah, good, they can produce fpga, but ASIC is a whole different beast.

i'm calling they're gonna pull a BFL, failed the first two iterations.

The only thing guaranteed in life is death !

[Mr.V]

I'm not sure if this was asked before. By the time they deliver the units, wouldn't the difficulty rate be at a point which would render the 5mhs or 25mhs you're getting useless?

The asics will not provide and exponential hash rate increase like we've seen with sha-256. In fact GPU's will be able to compete as far as hashing power goes, but the Asic will win on less energy consumption so the electric bill wont be so astronomical.

[vesperwillow]

I'm not sure if this was asked before. By the time they deliver the units, wouldn't the difficulty rate be at a point which would render the 5mhs or 25mhs you're getting useless?

The asics will not provide and exponential hash rate increase like we've seen with sha-256. In fact GPU's will be able to compete as far as hashing power goes, but the Asic will win on less energy consumption so the electric bill wont be so astronomical.

^-- This is the best reason for these machines. If I can cut down from using 100amps of power and get the same--even more--hashrate.. I'd be super thrilled.

[ninjaboon]

there's no product prototyping?

all i see was a fpga unit hashing. I'm not an engineer, but with the experience of butterfly labs, they had FPGA miners out decently okay, but could not made ASICs worth any shit until their 3rd or 4th revision.

This is what their last message stated:

You may note that we had bettered hashing speed per core as compared to last time we published our results in our Prototyping Design Document.

As stated in the following video, our ASIC design POC has not been optimised for any specific FPGA, instead optimised for multi-core scalability with ASIC in mind. That's why it's important we show our core speed and number of cores we are targeting as per the final ASIC chip. Based on this design and global foundries process node, die sizes and the associated costs have been arrived at and we will be going ahead with the fabrication, post final back end verification.

Video link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=69P2RHG2pIA

....basically no guarantee on what's going to happen.

yeah, good, they can produce fpga, but ASIC is a whole different beast.

i'm calling they're gonna pull a BFL, failed the first two iterations.

The only thing guaranteed in life is death !

death and taxes.

[BrewCrewFan]

I'm not sure if this was asked before. By the time they deliver the units, wouldn't the difficulty rate be at a point which would render the 5mhs or 25mhs you're getting useless?

The asics will not provide and exponential hash rate increase like we've seen with sha-256. In fact GPU's will be able to compete as far as hashing power goes, but the Asic will win on less energy consumption so the electric bill wont be so astronomical.

^-- This is the best reason for these machines. If I can cut down from using 100amps of power and get the same--even more--hashrate.. I'd be super thrilled.

Yeah great at what expense though? That is a hefty price to pay for a cut in the energy bill, upfront, and who knows where the price will be next year.

[vesperwillow]

I'm not sure if this was asked before. By the time they deliver the units, wouldn't the difficulty rate be at a point which would render the 5mhs or 25mhs you're getting useless?

The asics will not provide and exponential hash rate increase like we've seen with sha-256. In fact GPU's will be able to compete as far as hashing power goes, but the Asic will win on less energy consumption so the electric bill wont be so astronomical.

^-- This is the best reason for these machines. If I can cut down from using 100amps of power and get the same--even more--hashrate.. I'd be super thrilled.

Yeah great at what expense though? That is a hefty price to pay for a cut in the energy bill, upfront, and who knows where the price will be next year.

If I examine it purely from an electric bill standpoint, the unit would pay for itself instantly as soon as it began mining. How could you not see the benefit? Even if the machine only mined at half the estimated speed and took up 1,000watts, it's still ahead of the game. At least for me. I use scryptmining to pay for its electric bill, and to still provide profit. Something like this is a benefit, despite the cost.

[ymer]

I'm not sure if this was asked before. By the time they deliver the units, wouldn't the difficulty rate be at a point which would render the 5mhs or 25mhs you're getting useless?

The asics will not provide and exponential hash rate increase like we've seen with sha-256. In fact GPU's will be able to compete as far as hashing power goes, but the Asic will win on less energy consumption so the electric bill wont be so astronomical.

^-- This is the best reason for these machines. If I can cut down from using 100amps of power and get the same--even more--hashrate.. I'd be super thrilled.

Yeah great at what expense though? That is a hefty price to pay for a cut in the energy bill, upfront, and who knows where the price will be next year.

If I examine it purely from an electric bill standpoint, the unit would pay for itself instantly as soon as it began mining. How could you not see the benefit? Even if the machine only mined at half the estimated speed and took up 1,000watts, it's still ahead of the game. At least for me. I use scryptmining to pay for its electric bill, and to still provide profit. Something like this is a benefit, despite the cost.

You are all assuming that the company will deliver and will stand behind their promises. If they do deliver then yea, you will double your profit because you won't pay astronomical electric bills.

On the other hand but you are paying upfront 2-6 months in advance and that money isn't mining while you wait, meanwhile you could purchase GPUs and start mining, and by the 4 month mark your rig will have paid for itself even with the electric bills.

Keep funding them with your money for a promise that doesn't even have such a good return/risk ratio

[wasubii]

^This!

[barruka]

preorders going on... http://alphat.emux.fr/

hope they dont lie...

[Its About Sharing]

I'm not sure if this was asked before. By the time they deliver the units, wouldn't the difficulty rate be at a point which would render the 5mhs or 25mhs you're getting useless?

The asics will not provide and exponential hash rate increase like we've seen with sha-256. In fact GPU's will be able to compete as far as hashing power goes, but the Asic will win on less energy consumption so the electric bill wont be so astronomical.

^-- This is the best reason for these machines. If I can cut down from using 100amps of power and get the same--even more--hashrate.. I'd be super thrilled.

Yeah great at what expense though? That is a hefty price to pay for a cut in the energy bill, upfront, and who knows where the price will be next year.

If I examine it purely from an electric bill standpoint, the unit would pay for itself instantly as soon as it began mining. How could you not see the benefit? Even if the machine only mined at half the estimated speed and took up 1,000watts, it's still ahead of the game. At least for me. I use scryptmining to pay for its electric bill, and to still provide profit. Something like this is a benefit, despite the cost.

You are all assuming that the company will deliver and will stand behind their promises. If they do deliver then yea, you will double your profit because you won't pay astronomical electric bills.

On the other hand but you are paying upfront 2-6 months in advance and that money isn't mining while you wait, meanwhile you could purchase GPUs and start mining, and by the 4 month mark your rig will have paid for itself even with the electric bills.

Keep funding them with your money for a promise that doesn't even have such a good return/risk ratio

Such is the gamble. Speak with your wallet.
We get it, it is a no for you. It is a yes for many of us. We are taking the chance.
Being in Cryptos is a HUGE chance anyways for most people, getting into ASIC SHA256 mining is a chance on top of that and now into Scrypt mining (the FIRST one), is an even huger chance.
I like the chance. I like being a part of history, regardless of the results.
Such is life.

[wilson1973]

I'm not sure if this was asked before. By the time they deliver the units, wouldn't the difficulty rate be at a point which would render the 5mhs or 25mhs you're getting useless?

The asics will not provide and exponential hash rate increase like we've seen with sha-256. In fact GPU's will be able to compete as far as hashing power goes, but the Asic will win on less energy consumption so the electric bill wont be so astronomical.

^-- This is the best reason for these machines. If I can cut down from using 100amps of power and get the same--even more--hashrate.. I'd be super thrilled.

Yeah great at what expense though? That is a hefty price to pay for a cut in the energy bill, upfront, and who knows where the price will be next year.

If I examine it purely from an electric bill standpoint, the unit would pay for itself instantly as soon as it began mining. How could you not see the benefit? Even if the machine only mined at half the estimated speed and took up 1,000watts, it's still ahead of the game. At least for me. I use scryptmining to pay for its electric bill, and to still provide profit. Something like this is a benefit, despite the cost.

You are all assuming that the company will deliver and will stand behind their promises. If they do deliver then yea, you will double your profit because you won't pay astronomical electric bills.

On the other hand but you are paying upfront 2-6 months in advance and that money isn't mining while you wait, meanwhile you could purchase GPUs and start mining, and by the 4 month mark your rig will have paid for itself even with the electric bills.

Keep funding them with your money for a promise that doesn't even have such a good return/risk ratio

Such is the gamble. Speak with your wallet.
We get it, it is a no for you. It is a yes for many of us. We are taking the chance.
Being in Cryptos is a HUGE chance anyways for most people, getting into ASIC SHA256 mining is a chance on top of that and now into Scrypt mining (the FIRST one), is an even huger chance.
I like the chance. I like being a part of history, regardless of the results.
Such is life.

Well said that man.

[wilson1973]

preorders going on... http://alphat.emux.fr/

hope they dont lie...

I'd take this with a  pinch of salt. Considering orders didn't start until the 48** range there is already someone telling a porkie ;-)

I doubt that the 10 & 20 orders were legit either, but who knows.

[notNigel]

Well, i did ask for a PoC video, and there it is!

So did I, but I was wanting to see a more finished product before thinking about spending so much.
It's a start, but parting with money for something still in development is not for me.

I can't see their shipping date, BTW