1GH/s, 20w, $500 — Butterflylabs, is it a scam?

[sadpandatech]

The main reason to buy stuff like BFL is trying to sell is because of the low electric usage. That is the main selling point.

Which is irrelevant if you live in an apartment. Also in my case my apartment gets cold in the winter so my rig doubles as an electric heater.

  That works great for the <10Gh people. But what about the 20, 50 or even 100Gh? That is not going to happen on free elc with GPU..  Atleast not on any scale that would impact global hash..

I think corporate level mining like that goes against what Bitcoin stands for anyways. The idea is to decentralize so that not one party holds all the cards. A bunch of low level miners (GPU miners such as myself) are better for bitcoin in the long run. I would actually be curious to find out how much % of the global hashing are from people such as myself and corporate level miners such as goat (no offence). I think those that do it at that level are taking a much higher gamble and I just wouldn't advise it.

  Though, its completely irrelevant to the point here of 'free elctricity', I agree. But, rest assured there are those of us working on 'Corporate' size mining ventrures, not much unlike Goat and some others already in place, that will work on a share bassis. Trough these programs, the rewards from mining will be better secured in the hands of the many. Atleast that's the goal anyhows..... Can't really say much more, but just because some of us toss out big numbers like that, does not mean we intend to harvest all that for personal gain.

   Cheers,
      Derek

[rph]

Given equal technology (MH per watt) - a miner's operational profitability depends on cost of electricity vs
other miners. It doesn't matter if the other guy is getting free electricity, or simply less expensive
electricity. The number of miners with free electricity is almost irrelevant. What matters is the number
of miners with less expensive electricity.

-rph

[ngzhang]

dear rph please help me about the  mpbm  miner please...

[bulanula]

Nice to see BFL respond in this crazy thread. When is that demo again ? Why so many inconsistencies about your incorporation / name ? Are the figures still on ?

[Turbor]

Yeah give us a countdown 

[heavyb]

If this is legit, I would imagine it would greatly change the mining game. If it really does cost $600 for 1ghash than this will essentially force GPU mining out of the game would it not? I would probably continue to run my GPU miners since I already spent the money on them, but any additional capacity would be done with the BFL products.

What effect do you think these products would have on difficulty? Do you think it would raise difficutly because the majority of miners would add capacity with these new toys, or would they just replace the GPU mining that is already occuring?

Will the simplified technology promote the casual miners who seemed to have left with the price colapse back in? Would this in turn raise the dollar value.

If this technology IS real, I think it would open the door for a lot of questions going forward.

You are making the assumption that people only buy GPUs solely for mining. I bought my GPU for gaming with mining in the back of my mind. Still at $200 for roughly 400Mhash I still beat it in cost per Mhash. GPU mining will never die as long as there are gamers.

I get what you're saying, I am a gamer, but I have a gaming laptop(yes, I know they are more expensive and alienware sucks etc etc but I got tired of moving my tower and monitor to my friends to game.) All my miners I made especially for mining, and a motherboard only has so many slots, eventually you hafta build another miner and purchse power supplies, RAM, motherboards etc.

I eventually would like to continue to expand my mining capacity, and if these BFL machines are legit, I would buy them over building new GPU miners for both the lower power cost as well as the resonable price per mhash. Obviously GPU mining would not completely disapear(sorry if that was the impression I gave) but the lower overhead for the additional parts make the BFL miners attractive!

I would be curious to see how many people who got involved during the spike heard about BTC from their nerdy friends and tried to get rich quick, got frustrated with the upkeep and quit when the price dropped. I feel like these new products would be attractive to casual miners as well.

[DeathAndTaxes]

Yeah give us a countdown  

[ngzhang]

 

OK, i'm coming to scam you.

i will invent a mining box which is 1.5Gh/s @ <50W, and the price will less than 999$. IN next 6 MONTHs time. and no pre-order, just open for sale~

do you believe me?

 

if you believe, why not just wait and do not order BFL's product. it seems you can not get anything for next few month from BFL.

if you don't believe, why now you trust BFL?

 

[Turbor]

Yeah give us a countdown  

Hope we get results earlier 

[bulanula]

10 hours to go then by the countdown. I am watching with great anticipation. If true, this really is revolutionary I think.

[Turbor]

It's 12:43 in Kansas. If they meet this afternoon we don't have to wait that long.

[Inaba]

We plan on meeting at 16:00 ... I have some other engagements afterwards, so I won't be able to post in regard to it until mid-evening time CST when I get home.

[julz]

We plan on meeting at 16:00 ... I have some other engagements afterwards, so I won't be able to post in regard to it until mid-evening time CST when I get home.

Stay safe..  They only need to kidnap you for about 24hrs whilst forcing you to post glowing reports, and they'll rake it in

[Mousepotato]

Meh, can't play BF3 on an FPGA so it's completely useless to me.

[rjk]

Meh, can't play BF3 on an FPGA so it's completely useless to me.

This ^ is why I don't expect a huge change in the network hashpower. Perhaps some change, but not enough to be remarkable.

[fred0]

Meh, can't play BF3 on an FPGA so it's completely useless to me.

This ^ is why I don't expect a huge change in the network hashpower. Perhaps some change, but not enough to be remarkable.

This is evolutionary not revolutionary. As some others have said the major selling point is power consumption.  The other factor is the price of bitcoin.  Should bitcoin go back to say $15, I guarantee that GPUs will be mining bitcoin.

[DeathAndTaxes]

Meh, can't play BF3 on an FPGA so it's completely useless to me.

This ^ is why I don't expect a huge change in the network hashpower. Perhaps some change, but not enough to be remarkable.

Also my guess is you would see mostly substitution.

Say 1 TH of FPGA are sold.  Difficulty increases by 15%.  The most marginal miners are even more marginal.  Some of them call it quits.  So even if it isn't D&T replaces 1 GH of GPU w/ 1 GPU of FPGA the increasing efficiency of the network will drive down the price : difficulty ratio making marginal miners uneconomical.  Replacement will happen.

We won't be Network hashing power = 8000 GH of GPU + 1000 GH of FPGA. 
It will be Network hashing power = 8000 GH of GPU + 1000 GH of FPGA - x GH of GPU power idled.

[2112]

Meh, can't play BF3 on an FPGA so it's completely useless to me.

Dude, you don't know what you are missing. FPGA programming is like playing a combination of Tetris, chess and contract bridge on a board few millimeters-square, all at the same time. Great fun for the cold winter evenings! The cracks for the FPGA games are available on the usual sites.

[Turbor]

We plan on meeting at 16:00 ... I have some other engagements afterwards, so I won't be able to post in regard to it until mid-evening time CST when I get home.

You're the man ! Hope it is good news.

[Transisto]

We plan on meeting at 16:00 ... I have some other engagements afterwards, so I won't be able to post in regard to it until mid-evening time CST when I get home.

We're behind you, do you best and bring us some hard numbers