Bitmain launches the Z9 Equihash miner

[greyday]

How did it drop to 850 USD? The difficulty spiked that much already?

By the time batch two ships, a lot of coins will have forked.

[leowonderful]

No way I will touch batch 2.  GMO just made a big announcement on SHA256 miners running 7nm chips so I can bet we are going to see 7nm sha256 announcements from Bitmain soon.  The S9 is old, hopefully I can use the coupons from the Z9's on that.

24 TH/s drawing 1950 Watts isn’t earth shattering, especially at $1,999.

Exactly my thoughts when I saw the tweet about GMO's new miner announcement on twitter. It still makes more sense to buy two S9is for a better price per TH even without coupons, and you're losing just a bit of efficiency that will be irrelevant in the long run, and you're more flexible with two machines instead of one using 2000W. Bitmain's being smart with GMO right now with the price the GMO miner is set at. They don't really even need to change S9i prices right now and they're still a better choice than GMO the way things stand right now.

[TGJ]

Much to dmwardjr’s chagrin, I pulled the trigger on two more mini’s. A risk I’m willing to take for 600USD a pop.

[madmartyk]

Much to dmwardjr’s chagrin, I pulled the trigger on two more mini’s. A risk I’m willing to take for 600USD a pop.

What was the shipping cost and duties?

[greyday]

No way I will touch batch 2.  GMO just made a big announcement on SHA256 miners running 7nm chips so I can bet we are going to see 7nm sha256 announcements from Bitmain soon.  The S9 is old, hopefully I can use the coupons from the Z9's on that.

There is no way Bitmain will time it like that, there's a reason these coupons expire so quickly...

[TGJ]

Much to dmwardjr’s chagrin, I pulled the trigger on two more mini’s. A risk I’m willing to take for 600USD a pop.

What was the shipping cost and duties?

I chose DHL, it was $99 for shipping. Not sure what duties will be, probably 10%, I’m in Canada.

[bitcoinmoresh]

Much to dmwardjr’s chagrin, I pulled the trigger on two more mini’s. A risk I’m willing to take for 600USD a pop.

What was the shipping cost and duties?

I chose DHL, it was $99 for shipping. Not sure what duties will be, probably 10%, I’m in Canada.

These coupons are un-stackable so you paid for 2 X shipping?

[madmartyk]

Much to dmwardjr’s chagrin, I pulled the trigger on two more mini’s. A risk I’m willing to take for 600USD a pop.

What was the shipping cost and duties?

I chose DHL, it was $99 for shipping. Not sure what duties will be, probably 10%, I’m in Canada.

Just don't have the cash to pull the trigger on more, but it would bring the cost average down a bit

[TGJ]

Much to dmwardjr’s chagrin, I pulled the trigger on two more mini’s. A risk I’m willing to take for 600USD a pop.

What was the shipping cost and duties?

I chose DHL, it was $99 for shipping. Not sure what duties will be, probably 10%, I’m in Canada.

These coupons are un-stackable so you paid for 2 X shipping?

I ordered two, it allowed me to apply both coupons. $99 was for combined shipping.

[greyday]

No way I will touch batch 2.  GMO just made a big announcement on SHA256 miners running 7nm chips so I can bet we are going to see 7nm sha256 announcements from Bitmain soon.  The S9 is old, hopefully I can use the coupons from the Z9's on that.

24 TH/s drawing 1950 Watts isn’t earth shattering, especially at $1,999.

Exactly my thoughts when I saw the tweet about GMO's new miner announcement on twitter. It still makes more sense to buy two S9is for a better price per TH even without coupons, and you're losing just a bit of efficiency that will be irrelevant in the long run, and you're more flexible with two machines instead of one using 2000W. Bitmain's being smart with GMO right now with the price the GMO miner is set at. They don't really even need to change S9i prices right now and they're still a better choice than GMO the way things stand right now.

I disagree. The thing about BTC mining at this point is the downward profit curve is super slow, you're not going to see the drops you're seeing with, say, the A9, because the network is too big to be tanked like that. So the difference in power draw (24TH/s for 1950 (spec) vs 28TH/s for 2640 for the S9) is, in the long run, a loss unless you're getting really cheap or free energy or using self generated renewables or something. At .11/kwh USD, you earn the same amount of coin after electricity at today's rates and you're wasting electricity, environmentally it's a poor choice too, but at any electric rate above .11? You're saving on the initial purchase but losing in the long run, unless BTC climbs significantly (but then, so will difficulty as more miners switch on, get turned back on, etc.). Not to mention the new miner numbers are speculative. I say if you think you can recoup in 4 months or less, go for the S9s but otherwise? You're probably better off waiting and seeing what the next gen looks like...

For me, SHA256 isn't a worthwhile algo for home/hobby anymore. If I had solar panels (thanks for fucking that up, Tesla) then maybe, but the cost, environmental and electrical, is too high for the profit margin, even with the much slower dropoff (note that I'm talking about buying now, the S9 brand new was probably the longterm most profitable ASIC ever in hindsight). YMMV, just my opinion.

As for the Z9? It really just depends on who forks and when, but AFAIK there's a sliver of a chance Zen won't and Zcash haven't made an announcement (I'm betting both will eventually, though), everything else currently of worth looks like it will. For comparison, the X3 is still chugging along, but the coins it mines now aren't really worth holding, and without Nicehash it will likely continue to slowly die.

[Searing]

No way I will touch batch 2.  GMO just made a big announcement on SHA256 miners running 7nm chips so I can bet we are going to see 7nm sha256 announcements from Bitmain soon.  The S9 is old, hopefully I can use the coupons from the Z9's on that.

24 TH/s drawing 1950 Watts isn’t earth shattering, especially at $1,999.

With S9 shipping now and the GMO in what 3 months as a pre-order....and the S9 now $720....sh*t...it is a 'rubber duck' now vs a 'rubber duck' later

as the difficulty rises...so see no reason why not to just get the S9 now...same diff IMHO...*unless you are a big miner*

On that note....at 12c kWh average USA electric, is there any ASIC miner of any flavor (sha-256, pow-scrypt, blake2b, or whatever) that makes any

sense to get on the average above electric costs for say a home miner...or if lucky a data hall also at 12c kWh including rent?

Also as to the GMO are they offering ANY other type of ASIC miners? I have a hard time believing that they can beat BTC on Bitcoin sha-256 mining alone...
a
also, no clue on how fast their pre-order ships

Gonna need more than just BTC protocol of sha-256, they need to also do boutique miners and such for the Z9 as well, but the likelihood of such for anything

7nm besides BTC is a long shot indeed for 2018.

later

brad

[TheronB]

Can you run two Z9 minis off one
APW3++?

[crazydane]

Sure.  I plan to run 3 off a HP 1200W Platinum Server PSU I got off ebay for $50 (and another $20 for a 16 x 6 Pin breakout board).

[leowonderful]

No way I will touch batch 2.  GMO just made a big announcement on SHA256 miners running 7nm chips so I can bet we are going to see 7nm sha256 announcements from Bitmain soon.  The S9 is old, hopefully I can use the coupons from the Z9's on that.

24 TH/s drawing 1950 Watts isn’t earth shattering, especially at $1,999.

Exactly my thoughts when I saw the tweet about GMO's new miner announcement on twitter. It still makes more sense to buy two S9is for a better price per TH even without coupons, and you're losing just a bit of efficiency that will be irrelevant in the long run, and you're more flexible with two machines instead of one using 2000W. Bitmain's being smart with GMO right now with the price the GMO miner is set at. They don't really even need to change S9i prices right now and they're still a better choice than GMO the way things stand right now.

I disagree. The thing about BTC mining at this point is the downward profit curve is super slow, you're not going to see the drops you're seeing with, say, the A9, because the network is too big to be tanked like that. So the difference in power draw (24TH/s for 1950 (spec) vs 28TH/s for 2640 for the S9) is, in the long run, a loss unless you're getting really cheap or free energy or using self generated renewables or something. At .11/kwh USD, you earn the same amount of coin after electricity at today's rates and you're wasting electricity, environmentally it's a poor choice too, but at any electric rate above .11? You're saving on the initial purchase but losing in the long run, unless BTC climbs significantly (but then, so will difficulty as more miners switch on, get turned back on, etc.). Not to mention the new miner numbers are speculative. I say if you think you can recoup in 4 months or less, go for the S9s but otherwise? You're probably better off waiting and seeing what the next gen looks like...

For me, SHA256 isn't a worthwhile algo for home/hobby anymore. If I had solar panels (thanks for fucking that up, Tesla) then maybe, but the cost, environmental and electrical, is too high for the profit margin, even with the much slower dropoff (note that I'm talking about buying now, the S9 brand new was probably the longterm most profitable ASIC ever in hindsight). YMMV, just my opinion.

For me personally, the two S9i combo makes more sense as I pay around $0.065/kWh, and I make slightly more per month with such a combo, but I see the numbers do indeed change once you set electrical costs above that to $0.11/kWh or so.

I won't be making a purchase for any Bitmain SHA miners soon and I expect I likely won't ever unless there's a noticeable jump in miner efficiency from them- I think there's likely not a whole lot more that can be squeezed out of ASICs. I'm also phasing out my existing miners for GPUs currently as profit margins continue to sink on SHA256- it's truly unfortunate that the algo has become like what it is now for home miners. Hopefully GMO can help stir up more competition with future miners at the very least.

[Longsnowsm]

The S9 is old tech, there really isn't any point in investing in the S9, it will take 3kw to produce the same hash as the GMO B2. 

Bitmain will counter the competition the way they always do.  Bitmain is overdue to roll out the S11.

[greyday]

Can you run two Z9 minis off one
APW3++?

Yes. You only need 4x 3 pins for the Z9 mini, and it only draws 300ishW...

[dmwardjr]

According to the forum seer of everything all of them.

Does this look like all of them?  There are even more Equihash coins than what I mention here in the following quote:

No, it's not good...  This is looking like X3 all over again.

Bitcoin Private will fork (confirmed by June/July)
Bitcoin Gold will fork (confirmed by June/July)
ZEN will fork (confirmed by June/July)
EXPANSE will fork to PROG PoW (Confirmed by June/July)
ZEC will probably fork (about a 65% chance before September)
Two others will do whatever ZEC will do.

KOMODO will NOT fork (Confirmed)

All Equihash ASIC's will compete on what few Equihash coins not forking.  All of that hash condensed into fewer Equihash coins will not be good for Equihash ASIC's of any kind.  My opinion...  That's why I said earlier that Batch 1 was pretty much your best chance of ROI.  Providing you get it relatively soon.  Bitmain is currently taking their sweet ass time about getting out Batch 1.

[dmwardjr]

Sure.  I plan to run 3 off a HP 1200W Platinum Server PSU I got off ebay for $50 (and another $20 for a 16 x 6 Pin breakout board).

Another alternative to consider is the IBM 2880 or IBM 2980 server grade PSU's.

Here is a link to the IBM 2880, which is rated SILVER:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/39Y7409-39Y7408-IBM-2880W-POWER-SUPPLY-AA23920L-BLADECENTER-H-30-DAY-WARRANTY/263707409263?epid=2283744828&hash=item3d662fbb6f:g:nKAAAOSw3uFbBYrc

Here is a link to the IBM 2980, which is rated PLATINUM:  You are better off with the IBM 2980 over time.  Especially, if your power costs are $0.10 cents per kWh or higher.

https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_trksid=m570.l1313&_nkw=IBM+2980+PSU&_sacat=0&LH_TitleDesc=0&_osacat=0&_odkw=IBM+2880+PSU

Here is a link to the BEST breakout board available for the IBM 2880/2980:  They sale more than just this breakout board.  Reputable site.  [Photos provided below]

http://www.price-technology.com/ibm-bladecenter-2880w-breakout-board.html


Here's some photos of the breakout board connected to an IBM 2880:  [Includes 4 x 3 pin fan connectors, 22 x 6 pin connectors and on/off switch]







This next photos are simply to provide an example of how a 16 inch deep wire shelf can be used in conjunction with the IBM 2880/2980 PSU's.  Keep in mind you can cut the wire shelf to whatever width you need.  Also, the 16 inch deep wire shelf gives you an idea about the size of the IBM 2980/2880 PSU's:



This is a front view of the PSU's and S7's.  You can see there is adequate room for air flow for the PSU's.



A top view to allow you to see the 16 inch deep wire shelf provides plenty of coverage for the PSU's with ample enough space for rigs on top.



Here are some photos with wire shelf cut to width and installed:

Here is a photo of the back side.  I took a close up photo so you can see the back side covered by aluminum duct tape and installed.  The breakout boards on the IBM 2980's you see in this photo are not the one's I previously recommended.  They are lesser quality than the ones I recommended.




Here is a photo of the front side.  You can see I cut places open in the fire retardant sheetrock to allow the IBM 2980's to breath.  A better alternative to fire retardant sheetrock would be insulated duct board.  Here is a link to 1 inch thick by 4 feet wide by 8 feet long:  https://www.lowes.com/pd/Common-1-in-x-4-ft-x-8-ft-Actual-0-9375-in-x-3-875-ft-x-7-875-ft-Expanded-Polystyrene-Foam-Board-Insulation/3365576

[martyroz]

I'm in with you. However I think crypto prices are depressed now, don't wish to sell crypto for cheap. Hoping for $750 Eth/$9000 Btc in the next 4 weeks before jumping in to buy.

Yes, prices are at a lull. But I value the 'first to pay, first to receive' mantra that Bitmain claims to respect.
Also, there is a risk that this batch sells out at this price.

[adaseb]

Some dude on Twitter opened up his Z3 and posted photos of dust found inside

https://twitter.com/KevinMuldoon/status/1002642807889244162

Hard to tell how long it might of been used for since in different areas there are different amounts of dust/dirt.