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

[Brian DeLoach]

Is there some reason Inaba hasn't been invited to walk into their office and prove definitively that they are at least developing this product? That would stamp out most of the claims of scamming. Every hour that goes by without this happening will continue to cement their reputation as scammers.

[bulanula]

Is there some reason Inaba hasn't been invited to walk into their office and prove definitively that they are at least developing this product? That would stamp out most of the claims of scamming. Every hour that goes by without this happening will continue to cement their reputation as scammers.

Exactly. Scammers gonna scam. And don't give us all that IP and "we need the industrial protecshun from da competitoahrs" BS !

[RandyFolds]

Is there some reason Inaba hasn't been invited to walk into their office and prove definitively that they are at least developing this product? That would stamp out most of the claims of scamming. Every hour that goes by without this happening will continue to cement their reputation as scammers.

This times a million. Nut up and put them on the table if you've got 'em.

[Brian DeLoach]

I live in Kansas City and run the EMC bitcoin pool. I also work downtown. I can check this out any day of the week fairly easily. I'll keep an eye on the thread, but there's no need to fly some out out here or ship a product out when I can just stop by at any time.

BFL - being as I am local AND a pool op, give me a unit to test with. I will connect to my pool and verify the hashrate and validity of submitted work on the unit and report back here.  If your unit can push the specified hashrate to my pool from MY network, I would call that fairly conclusive evidence that it works.  I will also connect it to my testing environment that is not connected to the internet and verify hashrate that way as well.

I've been in contact with BFL via PMs.  They are on board with letting me test out a box for legitimacy and performance.   

BFL just has to give me the word and I'll test a unit out the same day, both on the live pool and on my development site which is not open to the internet (and thus couldn't be pulling any hanky panky as far as hashrate goes.)  If it delivers anywhere close under those conditions, I'd say it's pretty conclusive. 

It could have been done a long time ago, but they choose to prolong it.

[Inaba]

Just wanted to confirm that I have received 10 BTC + 6.5 BTC to the 2nd BFL escrow address. 

Although I'm not sure how to mark the bet, since it's not complete?

[rjk]

More geek pr0n in the form of pix:

Letting it out in little bits....

EDIT: I am interested in the JTAG headers, it seems to me that there are more pins than usual, ideas?

[sadpandatech]

More geek pr0n in the form of pix:

Letting it out in little bits....

EDIT: I am interested in the JTAG headers, it seems to me that there are more pins than usual, ideas?

   It appears to be 2 seperate sets of pins for connections. Maybe 1 JTAG, and the other USB..?

  More interesting to me are the main chip packages. Some of you guys that are much more familiar with it than I am may be able to answer a few questions. The chips appear to be of the pin and socket type and not a bga package, is this correct?  Would it be feasable to mount pins to, say a Xilinx fpga bga chip? Is it even possible? Did they have the forsight to design the chips purposely as pin type package for extra heat disipation or are the chips of the type that would be that way by default? hmm

[bulanula]

I really, really want to believe this is real. I really do. It would be a real game changer if all the specs are true and the price is also as stated. Why does not BFL allow Inaba or someone else to come in and confirm this is not a scam ? It really boggles the mind, to be honest. Hope this turns out to be true in the end, as the last thing we need in here is more scammers.

Can they be used with a USB hub or something so are they easily stackable ? How many can you deliver per month ? When is the final release and expected availability ?

Maybe this project is just like the OpenPandora thing which had delays of 2 years before finally getting released.

[rjk]

It appears to be 2 seperate sets of pins for connections. Maybe 1 JTAG, and the other USB..?

  More interesting to me are the main chip packages. Some of you guys that are much more familiar with it than I am may be able to answer a few questions. The chips appear to be of the pin and socket type and not a bga package, is this correct?  Would it be feasable to mount pins to, say a Xilinx fpga bga chip? Is it even possible? Did they have the forsight to design the chips purposely as pin type package for extra heat disipation or are the chips of the type that would be that way by default? hmm

There appears as far as I can tell to be 16 pins in groups of 8 on one side, as well as a fan connector. The other side appears to be a standard JTAG. Not sure the answer to your question about pins.

EDIT: a different pic from a different angle shows that there are 20 pins in groups of 10.

[P4man]

Just wanted to confirm that I have received 10 BTC + 6.5 BTC to the 2nd BFL escrow address. 

Although I'm not sure how to mark the bet, since it's not complete?

Not sure what your question is. Goat is still mining those 13.5 missing BTC. Then Im sure he'll send them. Should only take a few days with his farm  .

[DeathAndTaxes]

What I do not understand with paypal, is assuming 10 guys did send him the money via paypal and then he takes it all out of his account. The account was made with some fake/name company and he gets away with the crime. Will paypal then give everyone back their money or will paypal say we are trying to recover your funds and will get back to you. This is a real question as I do not use PayPal and do not know their policy.

Sadly I doubt it is 10 probably 100 units or more.  Paypal policy is that you must request a reversal within 45 days.  For customers who pre-ordered on the first day this thread started that means they have about 21 days left.

Don't worry the website says products will ship in 4-6 weeks ... oh wait that is 1 to 3 weeks after deadline for a reversal.

[Raoul Duke]

Any paypal account that got even $2k of movement on the first month would be hassled to give them all the documents before they could even touch the money, much less $200k lol

You really don't have a paypal account.

[DeathAndTaxes]

My question is, if paypal can not get the money back from BFL will they still give it back to the people?

It doesn't matter if Paypal can't recover the funds.  If you file a reversal in 45 days you will likely get your funds back.  It is then up to Paypal to attempt to find the people and sometimes they don't.  That is why they collect fees.  Of course there are delays getting that kind of money out of Paypal which is why the shipping date never moves 4-6 weeks.  A month later it is 4-6 weeks.  

Paypal will just say sure, no problem and take the loss?

Of course.  Paypal loses money to fraud everyday however as long as they make more than they lose they come out ahead.  However once Paypal starts getting complaints the scam is up and Paypal isn't going to keep losing money.  Hence the vague, long, and never changing shipping announcement.

[rph]

2) They filled some very expensive FPGA device with a sea of thos ultra-compact hashers and they are working on the distribution/collection logic.

Unrolled pipelines are inherently more efficient than an array of rolled cores.

-rph

[rph]

However this guy does not have a good balance of public relation skills.

On the contrary - he is getting pre-orders with absolutely no objective proof of a working product.
That suggests pretty adept PR skills.

-rph

[RandyFolds]

However this guy does not have a good balance of public relation skills.

On the contrary - he is getting pre-orders with absolutely no objective proof of a working product.
That suggests pretty adept PR skills.

-rph

no, that suggest pretty dumb buyers.

[plastic.elastic]

I just want to say....


FCK you all for bumping this thread.


 If BFL refuses to provide further information, then why bother posting? Its a scam.
I checked back this thread to see many pages of same old bsing. You're all contributing the scam itself idiots

[RandyFolds]

I just want to say....


FCK you all for bumping this thread.


 If BFL refuses to provide further information, then why bother posting? Its a scam.
I checked back this thread to see many pages of same old bsing. You're all contributing the scam itself idiots

Yeah, talking about how it's a scam is making it more of a scam. Also, I can't make out the first part of your post. I appreciate you trying to compensate for my deteriorating eyesight, but if you're gonna do it,

Do it right.

[P4man]

I will try to keep this all in one past as most of it is not directly related to proving BL is a scam.

P4man, I am in Thailand right now and I am not mining. I am working with/for the Thai Government to help with the national disaster going on right now. This has interrupted millions of people plans including HDD buyers around the world.

Everyone is quite aware of the situation in Thailand. Thats is no joke. You however, are a joke.

if I do not pay off the bet then I would need to be labeled as a scammer and banned from the site.

You have already been proven a complete fake.  You dont seriously expect us to believe you are involved in the relief effort, "working for the government" as if you are some Red Adair coming to rescue of Thaland- yet you have time for all these lengthy posts about nothing here. That you have access to the internet, but somehow you cant quickly buy a few coins at Mt Gox or any other exchange.That you are as rich as you pretend, yet have to pay prepaid phone cards with your last remaining BTCs.  That you couldnt have sent those coins to inaba before you left, instead of asking me "what to expect" and pretending to be dissapointed I only bet 10; it was quite clear you were worried I would actually send them. 

Whether you en up sending those remaining coins or not (after you mined them), no one is taking you seriously. Betting every last coin you own plus a few you dont even yet own and cant afford to buy, when you are already in financial trouble is neither smart, nor going to save your face here.

[worldinacoin]

I don't see why we should be so agitated over this.  Wait for it to be release.  There are sure some who buy and will definitely complain loudly if the product does not made the specs.