Custom FPGA Board for Sale!

[newMeat1]

I'm still optimistic that we can get some good cost savings. Some of the other team members are more reserved. We are going to be going over spreadsheets in the next 24 hours to find out for sure. So look for a better answer soon.

I'm not saying you plan to do that, but there's really no incentives for you to pass along the savings to us since we are already committed to the $420 price. Know what I mean?

We absolutely aren't going to pocket the money due to discount savings. We have a minimum profit in mind that we are going to split for each board. If bulk discounts save us more than that, it will be passed directly on to those who preordered.

[1713973434]

1713973434

[coblee]

We absolutely aren't going to pocket the money due to discount savings. We have a minimum profit in mind that we are going to split for each board. If bulk discounts save us more than that, it will be passed directly on to those who preordered.

I believe that. Keep up the good work. Looking forward to receiving my FPGA miners.

[leeloulee]

At 400 each and 100 mhash even with low electricity cost it would still take over 3 years to make back you investment at this diffculty.....I think I'll wait

[coblee]

At 400 each and 100 mhash even with low electricity cost it would still take over 3 years to make back you investment at this diffculty.....I think I'll wait

For the dual FPGA one, at $620 and 200 mhash, it will take a year and a half. It's definitely not very cost effective right now. But I'm definitely supporting this project.

[sirky]

So since there are no bulk discounts for FPGA's, and they are the most expensive part, you don't have to buy them until you get the full order in for people (or maybe just before).

If you need front money just to buy the boards, and some of the cheaper stuff, you should let us know. I am willing to front some of the money for this, or pay for entire cards up front if it helps you obtain discounts (which you can hopefully pass on to us somewhat).

That's a good point, but then you have to deal with shipping on each of those FPGA orders. Li works in Singapore, so that's international shipping, too. Also, like I said, we can't really use any Paypal money to order parts until the finished board is shipped to the customer. We're working something out, though, so we'll get back to you soon.

Let me know for real. I am happy to pay for a dual FPGA up front right now with bitcoins if it helps you raise the needed capital to fulfill all your preorders.

[makomk]

The biggest problem with quantity discounts is that we get absolutely no discount for ordering FPGAs in bulk. It's going to be the same price to buy 1 as it is to buy 50. All of the rest of the parts are minor compared to the FPGAs, so I don't see the prices dropping as significantly as newMeat has hoped. Of course, we'll do our best!

That's interesting. Someone who replied to one of my /. comments reckoned FPGAs were about half the retail price if bought in bulk from the manufacturer... of course he could be talking BS or the required volume could be higher than you're going to reach, and the lead times are probably horrid.

[mb300sd]

The biggest problem with quantity discounts is that we get absolutely no discount for ordering FPGAs in bulk. It's going to be the same price to buy 1 as it is to buy 50. All of the rest of the parts are minor compared to the FPGAs, so I don't see the prices dropping as significantly as newMeat has hoped. Of course, we'll do our best!

That's interesting. Someone who replied to one of my /. comments reckoned FPGAs were about half the retail price if bought in bulk from the manufacturer... of course he could be talking BS or the required volume could be higher than you're going to reach, and the lead times are probably horrid.

In my experience ordering microcontrollers, bulk discounts are usually pretty small under 100, and increase substantially in the 1K-10K range.

[fizzisist]

The biggest problem with quantity discounts is that we get absolutely no discount for ordering FPGAs in bulk. It's going to be the same price to buy 1 as it is to buy 50. All of the rest of the parts are minor compared to the FPGAs, so I don't see the prices dropping as significantly as newMeat has hoped. Of course, we'll do our best!

That's interesting. Someone who replied to one of my /. comments reckoned FPGAs were about half the retail price if bought in bulk from the manufacturer... of course he could be talking BS or the required volume could be higher than you're going to reach, and the lead times are probably horrid.

Actually, newMeat is planning to call them, but I'm skeptical he'll have much luck. I expect the quantity needs to be more like 1k, and that's definitely way out of our reach.

[ArtForz]

50 != bulk.
Hell, that's not even one tray.

[newMeat1]

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This post from somebody who is rumored to hold 25% of the network's hashing power.  We are honored.

But, we are now closing in on 100 chips needed.

There have been 2 inquiries about orders in the triple-digit sizes, we'll see if either of them pans out. That's another reason why we have to look at our numbers very carefully.

[ArtForz]

That was a loooong time ago, nowadays it's < 1%.

[Keninishna]

lol probably still better than my 0.0001% but its nice to see these fpga orders pick up. Once/if the price can get down to somewhere around 2$/mh you'll probably see more mass orders. Because imo fpgas are more ideal for bitcoin mining especially for long term profit.

[sirky]

You guys are all smartypants, so let me know if I am correct.

Let's say sometime down the line we switch to SHA3 (or whatever new hashing algo).

FPGA's/GPU's/CPU's would be fine, while ASIC's would be hosed, correct? Or am I wrong?

[mb300sd]

You guys are all smartypants, so let me know if I am correct.

Let's say sometime down the line we switch to SHA3 (or whatever new hashing algo).

FPGA's/GPU's/CPU's would be fine, while ASIC's would be hosed, correct? Or am I wrong?

All mining software would have to be redeveloped, and re-optimized. ASICs would then be useless, but I'm sure you could find a buyer in the server (crypto accelerator) or hacking community if you had a mass number of ASICs that calculate SHA256...

[sirky]

You guys are all smartypants, so let me know if I am correct.

Let's say sometime down the line we switch to SHA3 (or whatever new hashing algo).

FPGA's/GPU's/CPU's would be fine, while ASIC's would be hosed, correct? Or am I wrong?

All mining software would have to be redeveloped, and re-optimized. ASICs would then be useless, but I'm sure you could find a buyer in the server (crypto accelerator) or hacking community if you had a mass number of ASICs that calculate SHA256...

That is what I suspected. Thanks!

[Christian Pezza]

So since there are no bulk discounts for FPGA's, and they are the most expensive part, you don't have to buy them until you get the full order in for people (or maybe just before).

If you need front money just to buy the boards, and some of the cheaper stuff, you should let us know. I am willing to front some of the money for this, or pay for entire cards up front if it helps you obtain discounts (which you can hopefully pass on to us somewhat).

That's a good point, but then you have to deal with shipping on each of those FPGA orders. Li works in Singapore, so that's international shipping, too. Also, like I said, we can't really use any Paypal money to order parts until the finished board is shipped to the customer. We're working something out, though, so we'll get back to you soon.

what about anticipate 25% or more (just ask for a start up budget) trough Dwolla or BTC . What I try to say if u need $100 today as now we give to u BTC 9.26 as today the value is BTC 1=$10.80 and you have to convert them and spend for what ever u need! This is why we do this right?! let's start to think how we can use this BTC and mediate other currency as we need! We have to spend BTC to make it worth it other ways it will stall all this system!!!

I don't need Escrow, I am doing this on trust we already take a risk to freez money trough paypal the deposit thats already an escrow! If you need cash, well I reading there is some people like me to help so let's get focus to make things done in some ways!

Thank you for reading!

BTW if u need to figure out to finalize the price it's okey long of the way in some what, you will not drop the price up to 50% and if u do so mean we can have more cards

[mrb]

so you get about 160 mh/s with one of these for what was it $450?? i dont understand how these are better than buying a graphics card for 150 and getting 350 mhs

Its a lot more complicated than that Arij!

Yes you are going to pay around $450 and get only 100-110 Mh/s it seems,  thats almost 4x-5x more cost than buying GPU's.  But these things are almost magic and this is why.

They connect via USB, So your rig can be anything that has a internet connection (and likely free...,  This means no more $300 Power supplies.  Hell you could run 10 of these cards on a old ATX 300 Power supply from a computer going to the landfill...)

They consume roughly 1/8th 1/10th the electricity.  Perhaps less?  So every month the power savings will slowly eat up the 'savings' you think you have buy buying a gpu.

You are wrong. For the majority of Bitcoin users who pay an average worldwide electricity rate of ~$0.10/kWh, buying a $450 FPGA board for only ~100Mh/s makes absolutely no sense from a financial viewpoint, given the current Bitcoin difficulty/exchange rate ratio. You wrote your post based on feelings, not math. I encourage you to run the numbers yourself.

The only rational decisions for buying these FPGA boards are either (1) your power is a lot more expensive (2x or 3x more, eg. $0.20-0.30/kWh), or (2) you bet on the difficulty/exchange rate to sharply increase in the very short term, or (3) you are significantly power-constrained (eg. want to run a mining farm out of a small apartment).

[thirdlight]

I would be happy to pay another deposit in BTC to help with the funding, if cablesaurus can work it out.

[thirdlight]

(1) your power is a lot more expensive (2x or 3x more, eg. $0.20-0.30/kWh)

That's the UK, then. Ave price (before recent ~20% rises) was £0.13 / kWh, about $0.21. 

[coblee]

(1) your power is a lot more expensive (2x or 3x more, eg. $0.20-0.30/kWh)

That's the UK, then. Ave price (before recent ~20% rises) was £0.13 / kWh, about $0.21. 

Here in northern California, I'm paying $.34 per kWh. So the math works out a bit better... still not cost effective though.