Difficulty post ASIC?

[dlasher]

http://www.sfgate.com/business/prweb/article/BitPay-Shatters-Record-for-Bitcoin-Payment-3663354.php

According to that article, Butterfly took >$250,000 in prepayments for ASIC's. I suspect we're looking at difficulty D-day assuming they deliver. Assuming they sold mostly "singles", that's  192 of them. 192 x 40Ghash = 7,680 Ghash... I can't guess for removal of old hardware, but that's a 50% increase in network wide-hash rate.

And I would guess there's at least that much waiting in the wings to see if BFL actually ships... So at least 2x the difficulty well before the reward drop doesn't seem out of the realm of possibility.

<btw, outstanding writeup nedbert9..>

[sadpandatech]

http://www.sfgate.com/business/prweb/article/BitPay-Shatters-Record-for-Bitcoin-Payment-3663354.php

According to that article, Butterfly took >$250,000 in prepayments for ASIC's. I suspect we're looking at difficulty D-day assuming they deliver. Assuming they sold mostly "singles", that's  192 of them. 192 x 40Ghash = 7,680 Ghash... I can't guess for removal of old hardware, but that's a 50% increase in network wide-hash rate.

And I would guess there's at least that much waiting in the wings to see if BFL actually ships... So at least 2x the difficulty well before the reward drop doesn't seem out of the realm of possibility.

<btw, outstanding writeup nedbert9..>

That announcement is only first 24 hours sales. By the time they, Bit-Pay, came to the forums to announce it, they were up to 46k BTC. That does not account for orders after that in BTC up until now. It also does not account for bank-wire orders.

I'm guaging more like 10.5TH to 35TH. The other catch is we have absolutly zero way to know what exactly BFL will actually deliver and when. COuld be only Jalepenos. Could be only SC's. COuld be only 500 of each and a few 1TH minis. We have no clue unfortunatly. :/

What we can guage is that unless the miners actually buy like 90TH worth and it is actually delivered all at once. Is that everyone who does get an asic will be very profitable until either BFL lower the prices or find a way to get more sales. Unlike the gpu/gaming market there is only so many people who actually want to mine.

cheers

[crazy_rabbit]

http://www.sfgate.com/business/prweb/article/BitPay-Shatters-Record-for-Bitcoin-Payment-3663354.php

According to that article, Butterfly took >$250,000 in prepayments for ASIC's. I suspect we're looking at difficulty D-day assuming they deliver. Assuming they sold mostly "singles", that's  192 of them. 192 x 40Ghash = 7,680 Ghash... I can't guess for removal of old hardware, but that's a 50% increase in network wide-hash rate.

And I would guess there's at least that much waiting in the wings to see if BFL actually ships... So at least 2x the difficulty well before the reward drop doesn't seem out of the realm of possibility.

<btw, outstanding writeup nedbert9..>


I actually assume they sold the 1,000USD version the most. I'm small time and it didn't even cross my mind to go for the single, and why would you go for a single? As far as I can tell, this could be the last opportunity to mine bitcoin. I doubt ASIC will get much cheaper- or faster. As we get closer and closer to the end of mining, buying rigs will make less and less sense, thus no manufacturer of ASIC has any incentive to sell in volume with price discounts. AS for getting faster- I doubt it, unless some engineer really thinks they can squeeze a large chunk of extra performance by redesigning a new chip why bother?

IMHO. :-)

[nedbert9]

http://www.sfgate.com/business/prweb/article/BitPay-Shatters-Record-for-Bitcoin-Payment-3663354.php

According to that article, Butterfly took >$250,000 in prepayments for ASIC's. I suspect we're looking at difficulty D-day assuming they deliver. Assuming they sold mostly "singles", that's  192 of them. 192 x 40Ghash = 7,680 Ghash... I can't guess for removal of old hardware, but that's a 50% increase in network wide-hash rate.

And I would guess there's at least that much waiting in the wings to see if BFL actually ships... So at least 2x the difficulty well before the reward drop doesn't seem out of the realm of possibility.

<btw, outstanding writeup nedbert9..>


I actually assume they sold the 1,000USD version the most. I'm small time and it didn't even cross my mind to go for the single, and why would you go for a single? As far as I can tell, this could be the last opportunity to mine bitcoin. I doubt ASIC will get much cheaper- or faster. As we get closer and closer to the end of mining, buying rigs will make less and less sense, thus no manufacturer of ASIC has any incentive to sell in volume with price discounts. AS for getting faster- I doubt it, unless some engineer really thinks they can squeeze a large chunk of extra performance by redesigning a new chip why bother?

IMHO. :-)

Let's just hope, don't hold breath, that bitcoin adoption and tx fees start to represent a decent incentive.



On the bright side, if you are a bitcoin believer, appropriately priced ASICs (eventually nearer to production cost - com'on competition) will allow one to support bitcoin transactions at a very reasonable cost.

[Raize]

I just think it's silly to highlight the fact that there is risk involved, when that should be common sense for just about anyone entering any sort of investment to start with.

This sounds like saying that people shouldn't be informed, which contradicts your first sentence.

Have you been paying attention to all the new posters in this forum every single week asking if the "Unknown" mining pool is a threat?

Hundreds of new miners appear to have entered into what could be better called an "nonrefundable three-month layaway". There is no real-world precedence for this in the world of retail, so it is NOT common sense.

Due to the nature of Bitcoin, what if BFL can't raise enough funds to do an ASIC run and Bitcoin increases in value 100% after they've been selling them for USD? They now can't deliver the goods and they can't return the coin, the best they can do is return a dollar investment in coin, and let's sure hope they are backing up their order info in the process!

How could you possibly be opposed to someone bringing these sorts of issues to bear?

[SgtSpike]

I just think it's silly to highlight the fact that there is risk involved, when that should be common sense for just about anyone entering any sort of investment to start with.

This sounds like saying that people shouldn't be informed, which contradicts your first sentence.

Have you been paying attention to all the new posters in this forum every single week asking if the "Unknown" mining pool is a threat?

Hundreds of new miners appear to have entered into what could be better called an "nonrefundable three-month layaway". There is no real-world precedence for this in the world of retail, so it is NOT common sense.

Due to the nature of Bitcoin, what if BFL can't raise enough funds to do an ASIC run and Bitcoin increases in value 100%? They can't deliver the goods and they can't return the coin, the best they can do is return a dollar investment in coin, and let's sure hope they are backing up their order info in the process!

How could you possibly be opposed to someone bringing these sorts of issues to bear?

I suppose I am just expecting too much common sense out of people then.  To me, all of the things you just wrote about are simply stating the obvious.

[dlasher]

Let's just hope, don't hold breath, that bitcoin adoption and tx fees start to represent a decent incentive.

^^ This ^^

Together they could make processing transactions based on fees alone possible, and potentially profitable.

[DILLIGAF]

I just think it's silly to highlight the fact that there is risk involved, when that should be common sense for just about anyone entering any sort of investment to start with.

This sounds like saying that people shouldn't be informed, which contradicts your first sentence.

Have you been paying attention to all the new posters in this forum every single week asking if the "Unknown" mining pool is a threat?

Hundreds of new miners appear to have entered into what could be better called an "nonrefundable three-month layaway". There is no real-world precedence for this in the world of retail, so it is NOT common sense.

Due to the nature of Bitcoin, what if BFL can't raise enough funds to do an ASIC run and Bitcoin increases in value 100%? They can't deliver the goods and they can't return the coin, the best they can do is return a dollar investment in coin, and let's sure hope they are backing up their order info in the process!

How could you possibly be opposed to someone bringing these sorts of issues to bear?

I suppose I am just expecting too much common sense out of people then.  To me, all of the things you just wrote about are simply stating the obvious.

I have found that common sense is not all that common, that phrase is a misnomer.

[SgtSpike]

I just think it's silly to highlight the fact that there is risk involved, when that should be common sense for just about anyone entering any sort of investment to start with.

This sounds like saying that people shouldn't be informed, which contradicts your first sentence.

Have you been paying attention to all the new posters in this forum every single week asking if the "Unknown" mining pool is a threat?

Hundreds of new miners appear to have entered into what could be better called an "nonrefundable three-month layaway". There is no real-world precedence for this in the world of retail, so it is NOT common sense.

Due to the nature of Bitcoin, what if BFL can't raise enough funds to do an ASIC run and Bitcoin increases in value 100%? They can't deliver the goods and they can't return the coin, the best they can do is return a dollar investment in coin, and let's sure hope they are backing up their order info in the process!

How could you possibly be opposed to someone bringing these sorts of issues to bear?

I suppose I am just expecting too much common sense out of people then.  To me, all of the things you just wrote about are simply stating the obvious.

I have found that common sense is not all that common, that phrase is a misnomer.

Likewise, I have found that particular phrase commenting on a phrase to be cliche.  But still, it may be true nonetheless. 

[zvs]

OK.. so I have kind of a different take on where difficulty post-asic will wind up....

I have no idea in hard numbers / actual terms... but in relative terms, it will wind up wherever it needs to be for the break-even running costs point to be around 10 cents per Kw/hr..   (this will of course vary based upon the USD/BTC exchange rate)

So.. if your electric costs more than 10 cents, don't even bother getting on the waiting list.. you'll never get your money back.

If you pay between 5 and 10 cents.. your break even (initial purchase + running costs) will be 1 to several years...   Up to your individual confidince in bitcoin if you wanna play.....

If you pay less than 5 cents.. Time to beg/borrow/mortgage-the-farm and buy as many ASICs as you can.  You will be in the select few who will still be able to mint money mining. 

If you happen to live in the arctic circle, and heat with electric.. well then you might wanna consider robbing a few banks....  Just buy the company outright.

And one last thought...  just like the gold rush, ultimately the ones who make the most money will be those that provide the picks & shovels (errr ASICs).. not the miners. 

Sigg

like some others have said,

people will simply lose interest in bitcoins. 

so a couple dozen people spend lots of $$ on ASICs, it's not worth mining for anyone else.  now why do we care about bitcoins?   so hobbyists can try to recoup their investments?

myself + a handful of friends became interested initially because we could generate a quarter of a bitcoin a day or w/e.  we could have some actual involvement.   

nobody i know spends bitcoins to buy drugs.  i'm not particularly concerned with using USD on anything I buy.

it just won't matter anymore

[crazy_rabbit]

OK.. so I have kind of a different take on where difficulty post-asic will wind up....

I have no idea in hard numbers / actual terms... but in relative terms, it will wind up wherever it needs to be for the break-even running costs point to be around 10 cents per Kw/hr..   (this will of course vary based upon the USD/BTC exchange rate)

So.. if your electric costs more than 10 cents, don't even bother getting on the waiting list.. you'll never get your money back.

If you pay between 5 and 10 cents.. your break even (initial purchase + running costs) will be 1 to several years...   Up to your individual confidince in bitcoin if you wanna play.....

If you pay less than 5 cents.. Time to beg/borrow/mortgage-the-farm and buy as many ASICs as you can.  You will be in the select few who will still be able to mint money mining. 

If you happen to live in the arctic circle, and heat with electric.. well then you might wanna consider robbing a few banks....  Just buy the company outright.

And one last thought...  just like the gold rush, ultimately the ones who make the most money will be those that provide the picks & shovels (errr ASICs).. not the miners. 

Sigg

like some others have said,

people will simply lose interest in bitcoins. 

so a couple dozen people spend lots of $$ on ASICs, it's not worth mining for anyone else.  now why do we care about bitcoins?   so hobbyists can try to recoup their investments?

myself + a handful of friends became interested initially because we could generate a quarter of a bitcoin a day or w/e.  we could have some actual involvement.   

nobody i know spends bitcoins to buy drugs.  i'm not particularly concerned with using USD on anything I buy.

it just won't matter anymore

If you already have GPU mining rigs, I assume you (and most people) will switch to Litecoin. In the past few days it's actually been a bit more profitable to mine LTC and sell for BTC then to mine BTC directly. And there are also a lot more Litecoins that can be mined. We just have to keep the interest of people like you a bit longer so that more services can be developed.

[westkybitcoins]

You don't seem to be able to read the above comments and actually address what they are saying.  I am not trying to troll you, but some very valid points have been made and its like everyone seems to ignore it and then say, "ASIC's are available to EVERYONE,just like a video card you need a few bucks,BUT,you don't need to know how to "build" anything(like a PC).Just buy it,setup the mining software & GO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!".   To make it clear, the argument against ASIC is that is will centralize the network over time because people will quit when it is not profitable AND an agency (gov) could easily come in and purchase enough capacity to pull off the 51% attack (their pockets are much deeper and it would be just a trickle in the bucket for them). 

I don't see how anyone is thinking the release of ASICs is in any way going to centralize Bitcoin mining.

For example, I personally could already be mining, but the reason I haven't done it isn't hardware cost. A cheap graphics card isn't exactly extravagant. It's because of (1) the hassle (mainly heat output, but also other problems if scaling up) and (2) the electrical costs. That's just not convenient for casual mining.

Now, I can pre-order a $150 device that draws less power than a fluorescent light bulb and has nearly-negligible hassle, and keep it turned on for the heck of it. I'm helping secure the network, and making a little in the process... it's about like CPU mining before the GPU days, but with a small(ish) upfront cost. And the fact that I have pre-ordered one, but had no intention of GPU (or FPGA) mining just proves that the market of potential miners has expanded, not contracted.

Seriously, I don't understand the fuss.

(Even the 51% attack is less feasible... with more people mining, and a higher hash rate per miner, it's win/win. And it's not as if some agency couldn't just make their own ASICs if no one else did, although eventually someone was bound to.)

[sadpandatech]

Now, I can pre-order a $150 device that draws less power than a fluorescent light bulb and has nearly-negligible hassle, and keep it turned on for the heck of it. I'm helping secure the network, and making a little in the process... it's about like CPU mining before the GPU days, but with a small(ish) upfront cost. And the fact that I have pre-ordered one, but had no intention of GPU (or FPGA) mining just proves that the market of potential miners has expanded, not contracted.

+1 to this. My orginal intention in mining was akin to that of the same reasons I processed seti@home shares, human genome(sadly corp scum think it's their right to copyright life and got access to this results), various boinic programs.

Bitcoin just seemed something with a much broader scope to move over to atm. Yes, eventually I got enough equipment to 'profit', whch is great. But I am sure there are more with this same mindset.



edit; I just hope that before too long more companies will have similar offerings.

[Gabi]

OK.. so I have kind of a different take on where difficulty post-asic will wind up....

I have no idea in hard numbers / actual terms... but in relative terms, it will wind up wherever it needs to be for the break-even running costs point to be around 10 cents per Kw/hr..   (this will of course vary based upon the USD/BTC exchange rate)

So.. if your electric costs more than 10 cents, don't even bother getting on the waiting list.. you'll never get your money back.

If you pay between 5 and 10 cents.. your break even (initial purchase + running costs) will be 1 to several years...   Up to your individual confidince in bitcoin if you wanna play.....

If you pay less than 5 cents.. Time to beg/borrow/mortgage-the-farm and buy as many ASICs as you can.  You will be in the select few who will still be able to mint money mining. 

If you happen to live in the arctic circle, and heat with electric.. well then you might wanna consider robbing a few banks....  Just buy the company outright.

And one last thought...  just like the gold rush, ultimately the ones who make the most money will be those that provide the picks & shovels (errr ASICs).. not the miners. 

Sigg

like some others have said,

people will simply lose interest in bitcoins. 

so a couple dozen people spend lots of $$ on ASICs, it's not worth mining for anyone else.  now why do we care about bitcoins?   so hobbyists can try to recoup their investments?

myself + a handful of friends became interested initially because we could generate a quarter of a bitcoin a day or w/e.  we could have some actual involvement.   

nobody i know spends bitcoins to buy drugs.  i'm not particularly concerned with using USD on anything I buy.

it just won't matter anymore

Protip: mining is not a get rich quick scheme

and no, bitcoin won't disappear because you are unable to become rich via mining.

[bitcool]

If you already have GPU mining rigs, I assume you (and most people) will switch to Litecoin. In the past few days it's actually been a bit more profitable to mine LTC and sell for BTC then to mine BTC directly. And there are also a lot more Litecoins that can be mined. We just have to keep the interest of people like you a bit longer so that more services can be developed.

Just curious, how difficult is it to modify a ASIC rig to mine LTC?
I suppose there's always the possibility of a new xyzCoin based on different hashing algorithm(s), which will screw the ASIC?

[Gabi]

If you already have GPU mining rigs, I assume you (and most people) will switch to Litecoin. In the past few days it's actually been a bit more profitable to mine LTC and sell for BTC then to mine BTC directly. And there are also a lot more Litecoins that can be mined. We just have to keep the interest of people like you a bit longer so that more services can be developed.

Just curious, how difficult is it to modify a ASIC rig to mine LTC?
I suppose there's always the possibility of a new xyzCoin based on different hashing algorithm(s), which will screw the ASIC?

It is impossible to mine LTC with that ASIC

You need to make a new ASIC, make the project, invest some millions $ to start making the chip and then you can mine LTC with your new ASIC.

[DILLIGAF]

If you already have GPU mining rigs, I assume you (and most people) will switch to Litecoin. In the past few days it's actually been a bit more profitable to mine LTC and sell for BTC then to mine BTC directly. And there are also a lot more Litecoins that can be mined. We just have to keep the interest of people like you a bit longer so that more services can be developed.

Just curious, how difficult is it to modify a ASIC rig to mine LTC?
I suppose there's always the possibility of a new xyzCoin based on different hashing algorithm(s), which will screw the ASIC?

It is impossible to mine LTC with that ASIC

You need to make a new ASIC, make the project, invest some millions $ to start making the chip and then you can mine LTC with your new ASIC.

It was supposed to be impossible to mine it on a GPU, look how that turned out they are hashing away right now..

[bitcool]

It is impossible to mine LTC with that ASIC
You need to make a new ASIC, make the project, invest some millions $ to start making the chip and then you can mine LTC with your new ASIC.

It was supposed to be impossible to mine it on a GPU, look how that turned out they are hashing away right now..

So LTC was the one design for CPU-mining only? Since they both use SHA-256, it won't be a surprise a LTC ASIC maker will be able to reuse most of the BTC ASIC design. In order to be truly effective, it has to make the hashing algorithm prohibitively complex for ASIC.

[rjk]

If you already have GPU mining rigs, I assume you (and most people) will switch to Litecoin. In the past few days it's actually been a bit more profitable to mine LTC and sell for BTC then to mine BTC directly. And there are also a lot more Litecoins that can be mined. We just have to keep the interest of people like you a bit longer so that more services can be developed.

Just curious, how difficult is it to modify a ASIC rig to mine LTC?
I suppose there's always the possibility of a new xyzCoin based on different hashing algorithm(s), which will screw the ASIC?

It is impossible to mine LTC with that ASIC

You need to make a new ASIC, make the project, invest some millions $ to start making the chip and then you can mine LTC with your new ASIC.

It was supposed to be impossible to mine it on a GPU, look how that turned out they are hashing away right now..

GPUs are programmable devices, custom ASICs are single-purpose. A custom ASIC could be designed to be programmable, but then all you have is an expensive and slow FPGA or CPU kind of thing.

So LTC was the one design for CPU-mining only? Since they both use SHA-256, it won't be a surprise a LTC ASIC maker will be able to reuse most of the BTC ASIC design. In order to be truly effective, it has to make the hashing algorithm prohibitively complex for ASIC.

If an ASIC was specifically designed for Scrypt (the LTC proof-of-work), it would be many magnitudes faster than anything else. LTC does not make use of SHA256 for the proof-of-work.

[Gabi]

If you already have GPU mining rigs, I assume you (and most people) will switch to Litecoin. In the past few days it's actually been a bit more profitable to mine LTC and sell for BTC then to mine BTC directly. And there are also a lot more Litecoins that can be mined. We just have to keep the interest of people like you a bit longer so that more services can be developed.

Just curious, how difficult is it to modify a ASIC rig to mine LTC?
I suppose there's always the possibility of a new xyzCoin based on different hashing algorithm(s), which will screw the ASIC?

It is impossible to mine LTC with that ASIC

You need to make a new ASIC, make the project, invest some millions $ to start making the chip and then you can mine LTC with your new ASIC.

It was supposed to be impossible to mine it on a GPU, look how that turned out they are hashing away right now..

Congratulation, you fail at logic!
Comparing GPU with ASIC is retarded. So, since it was supposed to be impossible THEN everything else must be true. Look, a flying donkey. What? It is impossible? Well, it was supposed to be impossible to mine it on a GPU, look how that turned out they are hashing away right now so i expect donkey able to fly!