ANTMINER S5: 1155GH(+OverClock Potential), In Stock $0.319/GH & 0.51W/GH

[visdude]

I have deludedly convinced myself to take the plunge with this recent price drop but...

@ US$310 (without taking into account shipping cost, future network diff variances and BTC volatility), it would take an S5 about five months to recover such a price at the current exchange rate (US$215):

.01 BTC per day S5 yield * USD215 = US$2.15 per day S5 yield

US$310 S5 price / US$2.15 = 144.19 days

144.19 days / 30 days per month = 4.81 months or about 5 months rounded up...

...again, not considering shipping cost, diff variances and BTC volatility.

That water is still too cold for me to jump into.


Edit 1:  Oh!  Energy cost is also not taken into account, BTW.

Edit 2:  ...and other additional expenditures such as PSUs, fan mods, etc.

And assuming the miner has $0 value after 5 months, which isn't the case.

In that case, what is the general resale value (% of purchase price) of miners after 5 months?  Based on it, can you present a concise calculation to show that such a resale price would be significant enough to recover (and hopefully make a small profit) the total cost in buying and operating an S5 at this price point at this time?  If your presentation will be convincing enough, I might just take the plunge anyway.  While we're at it, why not also factor in time, effort and other related incidentals incurred in the course of a mining operation.

An argument to buy s-5 miners today.

A) you must have some coupons 45 dollar ones preferred.
B) you must buy in units of 3 and you must have 3x 45 dollar coupons.
C) you must have power supplies in hand.
D) you must have a way to sell now.  I have a stellar ebay account I can also sell here.
E) you must have at least 1 in your possession now.
Lets say all of the above are true.

3 units = 930 it is 96 usd to ship 3 to the usa  via fed ex  price is 1026  - 135 in 45 dollar coupons. = 881 for 3 units shipped to you home.

You must sell one now on ebay or on this site.
I know you could sell one on ebay for 440.  After fees you get 370 in hand  sell 2 you get 740 in hand.

881- 740 = 141 for 1 unit. your in home setup is 0 as you have  a psu from prior mining.  At 141 you can roi it should be about 5 months to roi

or

881 -370 = 511 for 2 units.  your in home setup is 0 as you have a psu from prior mining. at 255 you may not roi it should be about 10 months to roi.

I have 2x 45 dollar coupons

so 620 + 76 to ship = 696 - 90 = 606

606 - 370 net on ebay means my 1 cost me  236.  that is just a bit out of my comfort zone as roi should be 9 months.

These are hard times for miners.  I was going to get the 3 but the site did not allow me to use 2x 45 coupons and 1 x 40 dollar coupon for 3 units.  if it had I would have done this sold 2 on ebay and kept the 1 to mine,  but the site does not allow for mixed value coupons and bitmaintech did not send me a 45 dollar one to let me have 3.

so I can't do ant business with them at this time.  That third coupon which I should be able to use and can't use kills any chance of roi for me.    that is how tight the margins are for me.

Thanks for the presentation.  Although I understand that this has been your procedure, your figures are skewed towards your particular situation and discombobulates me a bit, hence it is not a good example of a typical person who buys S5 units at the current price.  Not everybody has S5 units already in their possession to sell and not everybody has coupons; certainly not me.  Aren't the S5 units purchased much earlier also cost more?  BTW, what is your kWh rate?  Unless I missed it, I don't think you factored it in.  A US$0.15/kWh rate alone would equate to around US$324 energy bill in 5 months time based on a 600WAC draw at the wall of a single S5.  I also understand that this whole thing is relative and subjective which is why I think it is important to have a simple but reasonably controlled scenario to a certain extent.

To keep it simple and meaningful, let's base it on one S5 at US$310 + US$47 shipping (based on your earlier post about shipping cost) for a total purchase cost of US$357 and then apply the other factors that are applicable to whoever buys it.  Not everybody buys 3 units to save a little bit on shipping cost, pays customs/duty fees, pays the same kWh rates, can afford the time and the hassles associated with selling and shipping miners on FeeBay to recoup some loss in investment or a miniscule (if at all) profit that's not worth the effort and time, etc., etc. etc.

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[visdude]

I have deludedly convinced myself to take the plunge with this recent price drop but...

@ US$310 (without taking into account shipping cost, future network diff variances and BTC volatility), it would take an S5 about five months to recover such a price at the current exchange rate (US$215):

.01 BTC per day S5 yield * USD215 = US$2.15 per day S5 yield

US$310 S5 price / US$2.15 = 144.19 days

144.19 days / 30 days per month = 4.81 months or about 5 months rounded up...

...again, not considering shipping cost, diff variances and BTC volatility.

That water is still too cold for me to jump into.

I look at it this way: There is about zero probability that the currently plunged price, of $212, at the moment, will remain the price for the next 5 months, right?  On the other hand, I can personally guarantee you -- there a 100% probability! -- that it will either go up, down, or stay about the same :-)

So, lets look at each possibility, and see if we can come up with a plan for each eventuality, including the worst-case scenario:

1. starting with the easiest: the price could go up.  Maybe steadily, maybe suddenly, maybe only slightly and maybe, just maybe (say a 1% likelihood) retaking all the ground it lost this year and then some, to $1100 after the yen or the yuan or the euro undergoes some scary crash-ey volatility, maybe the ruble crashes and 143 million Russians take their savings and flee to bitcoin for safety, all on the same day :-) Then all the $200 bitcoins you mined this month will be worth much, more (assuming you save them, and don't spend them on playthings!) and you will experience what I call "Retroactive ROI".  This happened to me last year.  My mining gear was barely earning the price of a cup of coffee a day (and I drink much, much more coffee than that).  But the few thousand dollars I'd accumulated became many the week of Thanksgiving.  I cashed out most of it, paid off a bunch of credit cards (made the wife very happy) and when the price tanked, and then kept tanking, gradually lower and lower, each month, all year long I chose to look at that as a buying opportunity.  I plan to have a lot more bitcoins -- much of them purchased at today's prices -- the next time the universe comes together with a few different pieces of synchronicity, from a few different directions.  Some economy somewhere "corrects" the day after some new commercial giant suddenly embraces crypto-currency publicly, and some bureaucrat televises a much-anticipated regulatory hearing about bitcoin that doesn't go badly.  So, when I say the price could go up, I really believe that over the next 5 -15 years it *must* go up.  A lot.  I just don't know when :-)

2. it could stay about the same.  Or, more realistically, fluctuate maddeningly without getting anywhere too far away from today's price.  In this scenario, your calculations (maybe adjusted to take difficulty adjustments, PSU's and fan mods, and power costs into account) bear out.  So it's June and your miners have finally paid for themselves and now, although they don't earn what they used to, its all profit until they can't even pay for their electricity, which is still a ways off.  So you can keep running them, and make a little more.  If you believe as I do that, over the long haul, btc will take over the world, then keep banking those bitnickels and bitdimes every day, and be sure to leave them alone, and let them add up...

3. the BTC price could continue its current plunge and be god-knows-how-low by June of 2015, and then the $310 plus shipping that you spend today would be mostly lost.  But, like they say in the stock market, you don't "lock in the loss" unless you sell while the price is low.  You're loss on June 19th is just 'how you're doing".  You still have mining hardware that is still mining a little each day.  You have all the bitcoin you've mined in 5 months, if you're smart and you've saved it!  You don't "lose" until you give up and sell low.  Be smart and hold those coins long term -- things will turn around sooner or later.

Mining is like dollar-cost-averaging.  You add bitcoin to your portfolio, gradually, completely independent of the whatever "the market" says they are worth at this moment or that.  I invest in mining equipment when it is proven and not as expensive when first introduced, mine like hell and then sell it before its resale value is completely lost.  Sometimes the product cycle forces me to keep equipment longer than I'd like, or sell it too soon.  But I roll my eyes when people say "it will never roi".  They are predicting that the coins you mine with it will never appreciate in value.  They are basing their calculations on the assumption that you will not sell it when it still has some resale value  They are looking at the extremely short term only.  They are the ones who sell their btc the moment they mine it.  If you take a buy-and-hold approach, you will buy steadily, only what you can afford to lose (or leave in an investment for 3 - 5 years), a little more each week or month, when the price is low, maybe less when the price is higher.  You will relax and remember, especially when the price drops, not to panic and sell your bitcoins as if the price may drop to zero -- it never does -- it rebounds, fast or slow. You will remember that, like Warren Buffet says, wise investors "get scared when everyone else is being greedy, and get greedy when everyone is getting scared" -- that simply means buy low, and sell high. And don't let the headlines fool you.

thanks,

-dave

Thank you!  I have similar considerations as you do and I'm sure a lot of us in here share the same thougths.  As I have always stated, it's all "relative and subjective".  In the end, it really boils down to how one justifies it as each individual has a unique situation and sees things differently than others.  Personally, I can't justify purchasing S5 units at $310 + shipping cost at this time.  That's all I've been trying to say.

[pekatete]

Thanks for the presentation.  Although I understand that this has been your procedure, your figures are skewed towards your particular situation and discombobulates me a bit, hence it is not a good example of a typical person who buys S5 units at the current price.  Not everybody has S5 units already in their possession to sell and not everybody has coupons; certainly not me.  Aren't the S5 units purchased much earlier also cost more?  BTW, what is your kWh rate?  Unless I missed it, I don't think you factored it in.  A US$0.15/kWh rate alone would equate to around US$324 energy bill in 5 months time based on a 600WAC draw at the wall of a single S5.  I also understand that this whole thing is relative and subjective which is why I think it is important to have a simple but reasonably controlled scenario to a certain extent.

To keep it simple and meaningful, let's base it on one S5 at US$310 + US$47 shipping (based on your earlier post about shipping cost) for a total purchase cost of US$357 and then apply the other factors that are applicable to whoever buys it.  Not everybody buys 3 units to save a little bit on shipping cost, pays customs/duty fees, pays the same kWh rates, can afford the time and the hassles associated with selling and shipping miners on FeeBay to recoup some loss in investment or a miniscule (if at all) profit that's not worth the effort and time, etc., etc. etc.

If you are going to be that negative about bitcoin mining, and that in a thread about one of the more efficient miners on the market, then you subscribed and signed onto the wrong thread!

In one breath you rubbish the "miniscule" amount that can be recouped from selling on an S5, yet you profess not to have enough to buy more than one. Fine, it is possible to mine solo and strike it lucky by finding a block, but generally the rest of us get by OK via pool mining where the earnings (in your instance of a single S5) are miniscule whence compared to the entire block. But hey, we get along nicely, thank you very much.

In any case, I believe the point that was being made (and was emphasised just in case ...) was that if you are going to compute ROI on the S5, then it is only financially prudent to take into account the residual value of the S5 at that future point where you estimated to hit the ROI (in which case you have actually surpassed the break-even point if you are following). I actually identified with that posting to the extent of not growing attached to a mining rig and treat it as a mere mint .... shift them while you can get a good return on them and be ready for the next big thing (which in the bitcoin market is more often than I care to think).

[visdude]

I have deludedly convinced myself to take the plunge with this recent price drop but...
[snip]
@ US$310 (without taking into account shipping cost, future network diff variances and BTC volatility), it would take an S5 about five months to recover such a price at the current exchange rate (US$215):
[snip]
That water is still too cold for me to jump into.

And assuming the miner has $0 value after 5 months, which isn't the case.

In that case, what is the general resale value (% of purchase price) of miners after 5 months?  Based on it, can you present a concise calculation to show that such a resale value (assuming one would sell them) would be significant enough to recover (and hopefully make at least a small profit) the total cost in buying and operating an S5 at this price point at this time?  If your presentation will be convincing enough, I might just go ahead and take the plunge anyway.  While we're at it, why not also factor in time, effort and other related incidentals incurred in the course of a mining operation.

I can't predict the future, but I can report the past, and hope it continues to repeat itself:

In late may of 2013 I bought a ATI Radeon 7970 GPU video card for about $472, and had to upgrade my motherboard (and ram of course) and then my power supply to support it.  Maybe i spent $1000?  Bitcoin price was $83.  I mined with it for about 3 months, until my first Butterfly Labs Jalepeno finally arrived.  I sold the ATI card on eBay in September for $237, just about half what I'd bought it for, and I mined just about 1 BTC with it.  The bitcoin price had gone up by then almost 50% to 133!  So at the time I sold the video card, I had not even made a "paper profit".  I was out $250 USD with a measly $133 bitcoin to show for it.  Thing is, I didn't sell that bitcoin for over a year, till it was worth $1000.  By combining mining, and plain old investing, my "paper loss" paid for Christmas for three kids with plenty more to spare :-)

I took some time off mining this year.  I ran my 2 Jally's for fun, but been buying, instead of mining, bitcoin gradually all year too, since the Jally's weren't doing much more by then than adding a pleasant whirring sound and two additional blinky lights to my desktop's ambiance.

And then in late July I bought two S3's (too early, before the price drops) paying $745 for the pair.  They "paid for themselves" by around the end of October.  I added those quotes around "paid for themselves" because there are so many different ways to calculate it.  They'd earned as many dollars as I'd paid for them, if you define "earned" as totaling up their pool payments, each converted to USD using the exchange rate at the time of the payment.  But that was a purely theoretical exercise, since I did not sell all the bitcoin as I mined it -- I still have all of it.  Several weeks later they Returned On their Investment in the simplest terms: they had now mined the same number of bitcoins I'd paid for them -- so that was good.  They may have UN-ROI'ed since then, since the price is about a third of what it was when I started.  But I'm not freaking out.  There are booms and there are busts, and my plan, next time, is to have enough BTC that only cashing out 10% of the nut will still feel good.  And I'll let the other 90% ride.  I'll ride it all the way to -- well, you know.  (the moon -- there! I said it! I promised myself I'd never say it but that's where I plan to let it ride to lol)

I think I may have missed the boat on the resale value of this pair of S3's (like I missed the boat on the second Jally - I did sell the first one for about half what I bought it for).  But used S3's are barely selling for $100 now, and making somewhat less than that per month.  But they still keep the office warm 24/7 and dribble a few bit dimes a month into the retirement account.  So I'll probably run them into the ground, then put them in the kids rooms as auxiliary heat :-)

In between I also bought an S4, mined a coin or so ($500, then!) and then turned around and sold it for almost as much as I'd bought it for, so that was clearly a profitable deal, all in all.  But I miss it.  Our time together was cut far too short by my capitalist greed.  I wish I'd held onto it, especially since it was not only minting money, it was heating my basement and I was just one saws-all, just a bit of ductwork and 3 floor vents away from making it heat the upstairs too!  But I was getting quite the hairy eyeball from the wife when I mentioned cutting holes in her new hardwood floors.

So, no.  No one can tell you what your S5's will be worth in 5 months.  You just have to pay attention to the market (i tend to lean on the refresh button, searching recent ebay sales of whatever i'm mining with at the moment) and the difficulty, and the price until what you see that you could sell it for excites you a little more that what you think it has left in it as a miner.  It does take a *bit* of math, but also a bit of intuition, some hope and some trust ...that today's btc price is just a fleeting thing, while the bitcoins themselves are forever.

thanks,

-dave

Thanks for sharing your thoughts.  Selling wares on FeeBay is not for everybody though let alone constantly monitoring resale prices.  Some folks just don't have the time to do that or have the patience to deal with the associated hassles and would rather prefer to spend such time to do what they think is more worthwhile and more productive.  Again, relative and subjective.

Ahh!  The good ol' days of GPU mining when my initial 800 MH/s was able to mine a coin every couple of days back in 2012.  It's totally different after ASIC was introduced and more so now.

[bbxx]

Did anybody tried a low setting, like 300 mhz together with some very low dB fan or couple of fans (push-pull), like Coolmaster Jetflo (up to 2000 rpm)?
It has only ~95-100 CFM, but just 36dB, which is pretty much silent. I want to deploy a couple of S5 in my actual office space and Scythe/Noctua  combo might be a bit too loud (they are OK in another room at about 46dB each).

coolermaster jetflo is very loud...
i tested it and you can use 2 fans at stock
but 15 blade aab is much much quieter



read this: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=928932.0

[visdude]

In that case, what is the general resale value (% of purchase price) of miners after 5 months?  Based on it, can you present a concise calculation to show that such a resale value (assuming one would sell them) would be significant enough to recover (and hopefully make at least a small profit) the total cost in buying and operating an S5 at this price point at this time?  If your presentation will be convincing enough, I might just go ahead and take the plunge anyway.  While we're at it, why not also factor in time, effort and other related incidentals incurred in the course of a mining operation.

I don't have anything precise, but you can look at history.
S3's came out in June. In October, they were easily worth $200.
I'm guessing an S5 will be worth at least $100 in April.

Regardless, If you're going to pick a time period (in this case 5 months), you want to calculate all expenses, all revenue, and all assets and the end of that time period. You've estimated the revenue in Bitcoin and the expenses, but you can't ignore the asset (the miner) that you still own. It's worth something whether you decide to keep running it, sell it, or let it collect dust.

Thanks for taking the time to respond.

[visdude]

Thanks for the presentation.  Although I understand that this has been your procedure, your figures are skewed towards your particular situation and discombobulates me a bit, hence it is not a good example of a typical person who buys S5 units at the current price.  Not everybody has S5 units already in their possession to sell and not everybody has coupons; certainly not me.  Aren't the S5 units purchased much earlier also cost more?  BTW, what is your kWh rate?  Unless I missed it, I don't think you factored it in.  A US$0.15/kWh rate alone would equate to around US$324 energy bill in 5 months time based on a 600WAC draw at the wall of a single S5.  I also understand that this whole thing is relative and subjective which is why I think it is important to have a simple but reasonably controlled scenario to a certain extent.

To keep it simple and meaningful, let's base it on one S5 at US$310 + US$47 shipping (based on your earlier post about shipping cost) for a total purchase cost of US$357 and then apply the other factors that are applicable to whoever buys it.  Not everybody buys 3 units to save a little bit on shipping cost, pays customs/duty fees, pays the same kWh rates, can afford the time and the hassles associated with selling and shipping miners on FeeBay to recoup some loss in investment or a miniscule (if at all) profit that's not worth the effort and time, etc., etc. etc.

If you are going to be that negative about bitcoin mining, and that in a thread about one of the more efficient miners on the market, then you subscribed and signed onto the wrong thread!

In one breath you rubbish the "miniscule" amount that can be recouped from selling on an S5, yet you profess not to have enough to buy more than one. Fine, it is possible to mine solo and strike it lucky by finding a block, but generally the rest of us get by OK via pool mining where the earnings (in your instance of a single S5) are miniscule whence compared to the entire block. But hey, we get along nicely, thank you very much.

In any case, I believe the point that was being made (and was emphasised just in case ...) was that if you are going to compute ROI on the S5, then it is only financially prudent to take into account the residual value of the S5 at that future point where you estimated to hit the ROI (in which case you have actually surpassed the break-even point if you are following). I actually identified with that posting to the extent of not growing attached to a mining rig and treat it as a mere mint .... shift them while you can get a good return on them and be ready for the next big thing (which in the bitcoin market is more often than I care to think).

Why are you getting too defensive about nothing?  Is it a subconscious manifestation to justify your S5 purchase because you realized that nothing else could after crunching your numbers?  With your "a thread about one of the more efficient miners on the market" line, you almost sound like a talking head for Bitmain but I doubt that you are though; most likely just a fan.

Who appointed you the "public" forum police or the chairman of the committee in charge of approving membership in this "public" forum?  What is negative about my post?  I was merely expressing my position/opinion that I "personally" cannot justify purchasing S5 units at $310 + shipping as much as I want to in consideration of the recent price drop.  You said, "yet you profess not to have enough to buy more than one"; just where exactly did I state that?  FYI, the "single S5" that I indicated was meant to be a starting point to base the computation on (and then multiply it by actual units to be purchased) and not a declaration of the quantity of S5s to purchase or can afford to purchase.  You should have reread that particular sentence before finalizing your discombobulated reply.

If you disagree and took offense (hence your defensiveness) of my "hassles associated with selling and shipping miners on FeeBay to recoup some loss in investment or a miniscule (if at all) profit that's not worth the effort and time" statement, please show me actual P&L figures to support a realized profit that resulted in such a resale of a unit and I'll tell you then if it's miniscule (if at all) "for me" or not.  I suggest to read my last few post carefully to get the gist of my point.  To sum it up, it's all "relative and subjective".

If you're happy with your S5 and you justified your purchase/investment in your mind, then knock yourself out.  To each his/her own.  But please don't pervert my statements to accomplish your justification.  That's not cool, bruh!

[dogie]

Okay guys, while its inevitable that there will be a certain amount of discussion about mining speculation that will occur here, can you take the big discussions to that subforum please? This thread is designed for those looking for hardware / troubleshooting / technical information about S5s specifically.

[not.you]

Is there an SSH command or script that I could run on a computer on the S5 network that would keep the S5 responding to SSH commands, but not mine?
Then later on a command to resume mining?  I couldn't find a program that would operate as an on off timer, and using a physical wall outlet power timer seems a bit barbaric.
Also, setting the frequency to 100M equals around 140-180watt usage at the wall while getting 350-450GH, didn't let it run long to see if it was stable rate on the pool.

I believe plink can do what you are asking.  It comes with putty.  You can setup a scheduled task or a cronjob or whatever depending on the host OS of the computer you are using to SSH to the miner.  A scrypt file calling plink can connect to the miner and send a command.  I am not sure what the commands would look like to stop and start cgminer so you might have to experiment.  I know that running killall cgminer from the crontab on the miner will stop cgminer so running that from SSH might do the same.  You would also have to stop the cgminer-monitor task since that thing basically checks to see if cgminer is running and if not restarts it.  I suppose you could always just do a reboot as the command to start mining since everything would start automatically when it rebooted.

[Rabinovitch]

Why doesn't S5 became idle when it has no connection with Internet at all? Why it still heating an air and eating an electricity?..  

[MrTeal]

Why doesn't S5 became idle when it has no connection with Internet at all? Why it still heating an air and eating an electricity?..  

tl;dr - Chain design
They most likely want to make sure to keep all cores working at all times in order to keep the power draw of each chip balanced. Otherwise the voltage across chips would fluctuate, and you get Prisma-like fireworks.

[tadzio]

[..]
Also, setting the frequency to 100M equals around 140-180watt usage at the wall while getting 350-450GH, didn't let it run long to see if it was stable rate on the pool.

Sorry if this this OT a bit :

Let me make sure I understand this correctly: You can underclock this miner to 100Mhz without any firmware/hardware modifications?
At 140-180watt you could probably run this miner below 20dB with a proper fan?

[MrTeal]

I would be surprised is 100MHz gave 350-450GH/s. Based on my measurements at different setpoints, the S5 seems to get around 320-330GH/s per 100MHz.

[tadzio]

I would be surprised is 100MHz gave 350-450GH/s. Based on my measurements at different setpoints, the S5 seems to get around 320-330GH/s per 100MHz.

Thanks for response.
But it is possible by changing one value in provided software and the miner is stable at this setup?
I have only one requirement: it must run below 20dB and only modification accepted is the change of the fans.

[ElGabo]

Somebody knows any solutions to make the green led solid green not blinking when the machine works?

It's no good to wait for the blinking when I check the machines....

[dogie]

Somebody knows any solutions to make the green led solid green not blinking when the machine works?

It's no good to wait for the blinking when I check the machines....

If you halved the miner difficulty, the average time between green flashes [if we're talking about the same LED?] should half. Who knows which file LED behaviour is stored in...

[ElGabo]

Somebody knows any solutions to make the green led solid green not blinking when the machine works?

It's no good to wait for the blinking when I check the machines....

If you halved the miner difficulty, the average time between green flashes [if we're talking about the same LED?] should half. Who knows which file LED behaviour is stored in...

I was talkin about the green led at the fron of the miner under the red one.

I can do nothing with miner difficulty due to vardiff at pool.

[KeezAZA]

This wait for my S5 is painful. 
EMS just reports On Route

I want to test the S5 before our bleeping 'load shedding'(power cuts) start.

[klondike_bar]

anyone have coupons they want to give away to "lukebarrie"? for higher-value ones i would be willing to give a small thank you of 0.001-0.003BTC each (looking for about 5 coupons)

[jackbox]

This wait for my S5 is painful.  
EMS just reports On Route

I want to test the S5 before our bleeping 'load shedding'(power cuts) start.

Are you tracking it on your home country's website or China EMS website. Use www.17track.net and it should  give you detailed information from China and then from your home country when it arrives.