What if mining gets less expensive?

[Kais]

EDIT:I was going to put this in the Mining category, but I think it's more about the actual bitcoin community than mining itself. Let me know if you don't agree

I am actually asking this question for a discussion. I'm not very well-versed in bitcoin mining or economics or anything, but I was just thinking about the growing difficulty of mining, and I'm pretty sure that mining will not be getting too much more expensive.

We all know how fast technology advances. And I know that mining started with CPUs and now it's GPUs. So I 'm sure that there will be a new way to mine, which is less expensive and has a higher return for the investment.

Like I said, I don't know much about it, so I don't have a lot to say about it, but I thought it would be good for people to think about.

What do you think?

[1713955401]

1713955401

[1713955401]

1713955401

[caston]

I think the difficulty will keep increasing to keep up with technological advances. 

[NothinG]

I can see it now...
You first thought "Free money with your CPU"?
Then it was "Little bit of money to buy a decent GPU"??
Now it's "FREE MONEY FOR "

Oh yeah, MIND POWER!
Our brains have something that computers won't have...
Understanding, we can see patterns.

Oh, what's that?? You say computers can do that as well??
Who designed the pattern reader?? o.O

--Sorry, tired...

[Sukrim]

Who designed the pattern reader?? o.O

Your mom

(finally a legit answer... )

[Meni Rosenfeld]

Hashing/Integer ASICs will do to GPU mining what GPUs did to CPU mining.

The difficulty will increase to keep the cost of mining bitcoins more or less the same.

People will no longer be able to mine on existing hardware, but if dedicated PCIe cards are mass-produced it may be viable to add mining cards to an existing computer.

[ctoon6]

i have been doing some research into nearly free energy generation.

it works by using mirrors to reflect light on a central point http://www.engadget.com/2007/05/04/spanish-solar-tower-could-eventually-power-an-entire-city/

instead of using traditional heat water and drive turbine type thing, i would opt for a Stirling engine.

the flywheel on the engine would generate electricity and spin a flywheel for energy storage.

or you could skip the last step and use the flywheel on the Stirling engine for storage, assuming it was efficient enough to store energy for long periods, or you do not need any storage.

i have herd the figure of 1366 watts per square meter.(solar constant i think.)

i have no idea what that means exactly (would that be enough for a high end system like a miner?)

i would also guess you loose over half of that through a bunch of inefficiency issues. energy would be lost via friction in the engine and the in the flywheel for storage. a very good flywheel has "98% efficiency", but i have no idea what that means.

but if everything worked good, you could probably run a 500 watt system for free, after everything was paid for. it would also be scalable. just slap another mirror on the system. if you and your neighbor shared a system and had mirrors on both properties, you would save a bunch on start up costs.

in a nutshell

sun-->light-->reflect-->hit Stirling engine and make heat-->spin the Stirling engine flywheel-->use rotational energy of the flywheel to make electricity--use electricity for work or take the electricity to produce rotational energy in a vacuum free floating flywheel-->use the energy out of the system when the sun is not out

[caston]

You are possibly talking about parabolic solar e.g. http://www.technologystudent.com/energy1/solar3.htm

There are schemes that include molten salt thus allowing generation 24/7

[ctoon6]

You are possibly talking about parabolic solar e.g. http://www.technologystudent.com/energy1/solar3.htm

There are schemes that include molten salt thus allowing generation 24/7

that is kind of like what i describe, however all my mirrors would point at a single point, and thus increase scalability at smaller, less than industrial scales.

this is a design that includes a Stirling engine like a dish http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:SolarStirlingEngine.jpg

A parabolic solar dish concentrating the sun's rays on the heating element of a Stirling engine. The entire unit acts as a solar tracker.

however i want something like this
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PS10_Solar_Power_Plant
except i want to use a sterling engine instead of a salt core, simply because 1 or 2 or even 10 mirrors at only 1 square meter each will not melt salt.

more info on this kind of technology in general
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concentrated_solar_power

other weird stuff
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gemini_house

[ctoon6]

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

Rotating an entire house seems a bit overkill and a waste of energy if you ask me. Why couldn't he just rotate the panels?  

I am totally following this thread now because I too am fascinated by the prospect of free energy. I refuse to buy another car if it runs on gas for starters.

not really, if it was easy to rotate, you could do it (slowly) with a motor the size of (larger) desk fan through the use of gears (make a bunch of smaller energy move a really large mass, although at a reduced speed)

edit: you would be surprised at how easy it is to move fixed objects in a simple rotation, you could probably do it by hand with not to much effort.

[Meni Rosenfeld]

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

I am totally following this thread now because I too am fascinated by the prospect of free energy.

... Or you could start a thread in Off-topic about evolutionary advances in solar power extraction.

[ctoon6]

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

I am totally following this thread now because I too am fascinated by the prospect of free energy.

... Or you could start a thread in Off-topic about evolutionary advances in solar power extraction.

nah, were talking about stuff that would make mining FREE(along with anything else that uses electricity), in addition to decentralizing electrical power delivery.

[Meni Rosenfeld]

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

I am totally following this thread now because I too am fascinated by the prospect of free energy.

... Or you could start a thread in Off-topic about evolutionary advances in solar power extraction.

nah, were talking about stuff that would make mining FREE(along with anything else that uses electricity), in addition to decentralizing electrical power delivery.

Except of course for the cost of the solar device, and the mining equipment (which depreciates with Moore's law), and maintenance, and a location for the rig where the heat/noise won't be a nuisance...

[ctoon6]

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

I am totally following this thread now because I too am fascinated by the prospect of free energy.

... Or you could start a thread in Off-topic about evolutionary advances in solar power extraction.

nah, were talking about stuff that would make mining FREE(along with anything else that uses electricity), in addition to decentralizing electrical power delivery.

Except of course for the cost of the solar device, and the mining equipment (which depreciates with Moore's law), and maintenance, and a location for the rig where the heat/noise won't be a nuisance...

thats always obvious, and why i never said it was free to mine, however, once everything is set up, you only have to do small maintenance for the most part. this would mostly be cleaning the mirrors every several weeks and lubing up the engine. occasionally replacing a part.

[TraderTimm]

thats always obvious, and why i never said it was free to mine, however, once everything is set up, you only have to do small maintenance for the most part. this would mostly be cleaning the mirrors every several weeks and lubing up the engine. occasionally replacing a part.

Combine the design with easily printed 3D parts via current technology, and you'd really have something there. Of course, it would require the associated machining to get the whole thing assembled, but if you ever broke anything you could replace it readily without relying on anyone. The plans could also be easily distributed.

[ctoon6]

thats always obvious, and why i never said it was free to mine, however, once everything is set up, you only have to do small maintenance for the most part. this would mostly be cleaning the mirrors every several weeks and lubing up the engine. occasionally replacing a part.

Combine the design with easily printed 3D parts via current technology, and you'd really have something there. Of course, it would require the associated machining to get the whole thing assembled, but if you ever broke anything you could replace it readily without relying on anyone. The plans could also be easily distributed.

i don't think you could make parts accurate enough with a 3d printer, and i am not sure it would be big enough either.

it would require accuracies in the scale of µm. however i am not completely familiar with current 3d printing technology so this may very well be possible.

but id guess you would make a cast mold of the parts and pour in the molten metal and go over it with sand paper and buffer it to a shine. cover moving parts that make heat with graphite.

because of this, really you could just buy the molds online and cast them yourself, or 2 people, each with either a printer or casting ability can make parts on demand.

however i think 3d printers put out plastic, so you would need to make positives, cover in something else, them make another negative from the positive out of a material that will not melt or burn.

[TraderTimm]

i don't think you could make parts accurate enough with a 3d printer, and i am not sure it would be big enough either.

it would require accuracies in the scale of µm. however i am not completely familiar with current 3d printing technology so this may very well be possible.

but id guess you would make a cast mold of the parts and pour in the molten metal and go over it with sand paper and buffer it to a shine. cover moving parts that make heat with graphite.

because of this, really you could just buy the molds online and cast them yourself, or 2 people, each with either a printer or casting ability can make parts on demand.

however i think 3d printers put out plastic, so you would need to make positives, cover in something else, them make another negative from the positive out of a material that will not melt or burn.

Quite right, the printed parts would be used to make mold impressions for further casting/refining. But it could provide enough resolution so you would be able to make a custom design for very little. I don't think the makerbot-type of 3D printers have the ability, but there are some services that could at least supply you with the mold 'masters' that you could then use to build the assemblies.

(Perhaps a service like shapeways, etc..)

Like the solar-powered concept, be interesting to see what you come up with if you decide to pursue prototyping.