ASICMINER: Entering the Future of ASIC Mining by Inventing It

[minerpumpkin]

I don't understand why no one gets that the price of BTC going up is a good thing.  The higher the price of BTC the more we can charge per H/s.  The price we can charge will increase proportionally while our costs remain fixed, thus more profit.  BTC price increased by a bigger percentage last month than difficulty did.  That means we should be able to sell chips for MORE now than we could a month ago (in dollars).

That's been addressed as well. Like I already said, we're entering a more saturated market now - in comparison to last year. The competition is a lot stronger now and has good chips. It'll be a lot harder to re-adjust the price because the competition has to do so, as well. If we try to sell more chips, we may soon be limited by the maximum number of chips we may produce per month. Also, price adjustments often can't reflect the increase in BTC price that fast and customers may not be willing to buy a proportionally more expensive product.
But the most important thing is: If we sell chips today and encounter another bubble or dramatic increase in BTC price, we won't have sold more, only our divs (priced in BTC) will get slashed due to the exchange rate.
This is indeed one of the few cases, where mining makes sense and also offers increased stability.

[minerpumpkin]

Of course the sales price can always be adjusted for future sales.

Regarding that rumoured near-future 0.35$/G:

Anybody knows at what G-rate of the chip that price might be based on?

If it is the initial 12.8G/chip (and as now everybody incl. fc is talking about 10G/chip), the actual price would be 0.448$/G (0.35$ for actual 0.78G at 10G/chip).

Just a thought...

I'm not following... We're talking about $0.35 per GH/s, that is per GH/s. That Chinese offer seems to be our very own gen 3 chips, since it says "grilled cat 3 generations chips". Delivery seems to be June 10-20.

[vortex1878]

Of course the sales price can always be adjusted for future sales.

Regarding that rumoured near-future 0.35$/G:

Anybody knows at what G-rate of the chip that price might be based on?

If it is the initial 12.8G/chip (and as now everybody incl. fc is talking about 10G/chip), the actual price would be 0.448$/G (0.35$ for actual 0.78G at 10G/chip).

Just a thought...

I'm not following... We're talking about $0.35 per GH/s, that is per GH/s. That Chinese offer seems to be our very own gen 3 chips, since it says "grilled cat 3 generations chips". Delivery seems to be June 10-20.

Please think again. Or is my English really that bad?

EDIT:
I'll try again:
Yes, yes, of course we are talking about AM Gen3 chips here.
If the advertised 0.35$/G are based on 12.8G/chip, then at only - I assume more efficient - 10G/chip (and that is the latest official rate from fc) the actual price would be 0.448$/G.

[hdbuck]

Like I already said, we're entering a more saturated market now - in comparison to last year. The competition is a lot stronger now and has good chips.

saturated? besides spondoolies that may be doing ok (yet there is no comparison in term of quantity, nor in business model), i dont see a single ASIC manufacturer that offer stable, affordable and instock products. bitmain's S2 are a total disaster, avalon and hashfast i wont even talk about them, bitfury seems to be on the go now with that recent funding (yet its only the FUNDING phase and nothing really came out anyway) etc etc.. for the last year, the ASIC market has been ruined and undermined by scammy commercial practices and chip design amateurism with all of them wanting to produce 28nm chips straight on & at all cost. AM is here to change that.

sure current btc bull market is quite worrying, but FC mentioned OTC channels in HK. plus if bitcoin price rise, chips price to mine them will follow too. never in hell they'll sell at lost. fuck even BFL managed to put their 5Gh jalapenos in wallmarts for 300$!

[minerpumpkin]

Of course the sales price can always be adjusted for future sales.

Regarding that rumoured near-future 0.35$/G:

Anybody knows at what G-rate of the chip that price might be based on?

If it is the initial 12.8G/chip (and as now everybody incl. fc is talking about 10G/chip), the actual price would be 0.448$/G (0.35$ for actual 0.78G at 10G/chip).

Just a thought...

I'm not following... We're talking about $0.35 per GH/s, that is per GH/s. That Chinese offer seems to be our very own gen 3 chips, since it says "grilled cat 3 generations chips". Delivery seems to be June 10-20.

Please think again. Or is my English really that bad?

I thought you weren't sure which chips were being sold here: http://www.cybtc.com/forum.php?mod=viewthread&tid=7951&highlight=%E7%83%A4%E7%8C%AB.
Still not following. We're pricing the chips per GH/s. If 1 GH/s costs $0.35, a 10 GH/s chip costs $3.5 and the initial 12.8GH/s chip would be $4.48. But not $0.448/GH/s!?
The chips could do 50GH/s, they'd still be $0.35/GH/s.

10 GH/s may be due to the increase in consumption or heat they encountered, so the recommended speed has been cut to about 10 GH/s. The only thing that does happen is that the production price would increase by the factor 1.28x per GH/s, since one chip yields less GH/s.

[minerpumpkin]

Like I already said, we're entering a more saturated market now - in comparison to last year. The competition is a lot stronger now and has good chips.

saturated? besides spondoolies that may be doing ok (yet there is no comparison in term of quantity, nor in business model), i dont see a single ASIC manufacturer that offer stable, affordable and instock products. bitmain's S2 are a total disaster, avalon i dont even talk about em, bitfury seems to be on the go now too but nothing really came out anyway etc etc.. for the last year, the ASIC market has been ruined and undermined by scammy commercial practices and chip design amateurism with all of them wanting to produce 28nm chips straight on & at all cost. AM is here to change that.

sure current btc bull market is quite worrying, but FC mentioned OTC channels in HK. plus if bitcoin price rise, chips price to mine them will follow too.

Bitfury just got a massive cash infusion and they're quite talented in doing effective designs in low-nm architectures. I really do think we shouldn't underestimate Spondoolies. They seem to know what they're doing and their next generation could be quite powerful.

OTC channels are a great solution! They won't offer a different price, though. I'm just worried that the price of the chips won't be adjusted as fast as the BTC price, additionally money needs time to trickle in and be converted. A month is an eternity in Bitcoin bull/bubble-world.

[vortex1878]

Of course the sales price can always be adjusted for future sales.

Regarding that rumoured near-future 0.35$/G:

Anybody knows at what G-rate of the chip that price might be based on?

If it is the initial 12.8G/chip (and as now everybody incl. fc is talking about 10G/chip), the actual price would be 0.448$/G (0.35$ for actual 0.78G at 10G/chip).

Just a thought...

I'm not following... We're talking about $0.35 per GH/s, that is per GH/s. That Chinese offer seems to be our very own gen 3 chips, since it says "grilled cat 3 generations chips". Delivery seems to be June 10-20.

Please think again. Or is my English really that bad?

I thought you weren't sure which chips were being sold here: http://www.cybtc.com/forum.php?mod=viewthread&tid=7951&highlight=%E7%83%A4%E7%8C%AB.
Still not following. We're pricing the chips per GH/s. If 1 GH/s costs $0.35, a 10 GH/s chip costs $3.5 and the initial 12.8GH/s chip would be $4.48. But not $0.448/GH/s!?
The chips could do 50GH/s, they'd still be $0.35/GH/s.

10 GH/s may be due to the increase in consumption or heat they encountered, so the recommended speed has been cut to about 10 GH/s. The only thing that does happen is that the production price would increase by the factor 1.28x per GH/s, since one chip yields less GH/s.

Now I know it is not my bad English. ^^

I'll give it a last try with a bold example:
Somebody is offering you chips for 1$/G. He says each chip performs 1Gh/s (although the official rating is different).
At 1 Gh/s the chip consumes 10 Watts. But the most efficient (and rated) rate for the chip is 0.5Gh/s as it is only consuming 2 Watts then. So you might want to run the chips at the rated 0.5Gh/s only. Hence, you actually pay 2$/G.

[hdbuck]

Like I already said, we're entering a more saturated market now - in comparison to last year. The competition is a lot stronger now and has good chips.

saturated? besides spondoolies that may be doing ok (yet there is no comparison in term of quantity, nor in business model), i dont see a single ASIC manufacturer that offer stable, affordable and instock products. bitmain's S2 are a total disaster, avalon i dont even talk about em, bitfury seems to be on the go now too but nothing really came out anyway etc etc.. for the last year, the ASIC market has been ruined and undermined by scammy commercial practices and chip design amateurism with all of them wanting to produce 28nm chips straight on & at all cost. AM is here to change that.

sure current btc bull market is quite worrying, but FC mentioned OTC channels in HK. plus if bitcoin price rise, chips price to mine them will follow too.

Bitfury just got a massive cash infusion and they're quite talented in doing effective designs in low-nm architectures. I really do think we shouldn't underestimate Spondoolies. They seem to know what they're doing and their next generation could be quite powerful.

OTC channels are a great solution! They won't offer a different price, though. I'm just worried that the price of the chips won't be adjusted as fast as the BTC price, additionally money needs time to trickle in and be converted. A month is an eternity in Bitcoin bull/bubble-world.

sure but bear in mind that not only AM will be stressed by that factor. all ASIC manufacturers will have to deal with it. and so far the only one that is already releasing new working chips is AM. not bitfury, nor spondo's nor no one. they're just not even in mass production phase. AM is.

[vortex1878]

And except a lousy initial testing of Gen3 by Rockminer we have not even seen the up-to-date specs of Gen3.1 anywhere.

[minerpumpkin]

Now I know it is not my bad English. ^^

I'll give it a last try with a bold example:
Somebody is offering you chips for 1$/G. He says each chip performs 1Gh/s (although the official rating is different).
At 1 Gh/s the chip consumes 10 Watts. But the most efficient (and rated) rate for the chip is 0.5Gh/s as it is only consuming 2 Watts then. So you might want to run the chips at the rated 0.5Gh/s only. Hence, you actually pay 2$/G.

Ah okay, so you're interested in the currently advertised rated performance of the chips? Yes, that isn't entirely clear. But even in April FC already stated "assuming each chip has 10GH/s", like you already mentioned. They could indeed have a minor influence. Effectively an example why the January plans seem outdated.

[hdbuck]

And except a lousy initial testing of Gen3 by Rockminer we have not even seen the up-to-date specs of Gen3.1 anywhere.

but why would we? there is just no competitive incentive to release all this data. its not because we know nothing that nothing is happening. At the very best, that would explain such low communication from FC. too busy getting that sh*t straight.

[minerpumpkin]

Like I already said, we're entering a more saturated market now - in comparison to last year. The competition is a lot stronger now and has good chips.

saturated? besides spondoolies that may be doing ok (yet there is no comparison in term of quantity, nor in business model), i dont see a single ASIC manufacturer that offer stable, affordable and instock products. bitmain's S2 are a total disaster, avalon i dont even talk about em, bitfury seems to be on the go now too but nothing really came out anyway etc etc.. for the last year, the ASIC market has been ruined and undermined by scammy commercial practices and chip design amateurism with all of them wanting to produce 28nm chips straight on & at all cost. AM is here to change that.

sure current btc bull market is quite worrying, but FC mentioned OTC channels in HK. plus if bitcoin price rise, chips price to mine them will follow too.

Bitfury just got a massive cash infusion and they're quite talented in doing effective designs in low-nm architectures. I really do think we shouldn't underestimate Spondoolies. They seem to know what they're doing and their next generation could be quite powerful.

OTC channels are a great solution! They won't offer a different price, though. I'm just worried that the price of the chips won't be adjusted as fast as the BTC price, additionally money needs time to trickle in and be converted. A month is an eternity in Bitcoin bull/bubble-world.

sure but bear in mind that not only AM will be stressed by that factor. all ASIC manufacturers will have to deal with it. and so far the only one that is already releasing new working chips is AM. not bitfury, nor spondo's nor no one. they're just not even in mass production phase. AM is.

Yeah but in our case this cuts the dividends. Spondoolies doesn't care since they're effectively operating in FIAT. (On a side-note: AM itself doesn't care either, it makes a lot of sense to conduct the core operation using USD)

[minerpumpkin]

And except a lousy initial testing of Gen3 by Rockminer we have not even seen the up-to-date specs of Gen3.1 anywhere.

but why would we? there is just no competitive incentive to release all this data. its not because we know nothing that nothing is happening. At the very best, that would explain such low communication from FC. too busy getting that shit straight.

Again, don't overestimate gen 3.1 there is no new chip design (mask set) but rather an increased die size or similar, in order to get rid of the heat better and to stabilise the chip. This shouldn't take any time at all. I also believe that the chips at XBTec are gen 3.1 since they use the new dimensions (8x8mm)

[vortex1878]

And except a lousy initial testing of Gen3 by Rockminer we have not even seen the up-to-date specs of Gen3.1 anywhere.

but why would we? there is just no competitive incentive to release all this data. its not because we know nothing that nothing is happening. At the very best, that would explain such low communication from FC. too busy getting that sh*t straight.

True. We know NOTHING actually. So also we do not know if advertising improved specs (equals more info to competitors) would generate more customers or we already do not need more customers as future batches are already in LoI phase or similar.

[vortex1878]

And except a lousy initial testing of Gen3 by Rockminer we have not even seen the up-to-date specs of Gen3.1 anywhere.

but why would we? there is just no competitive incentive to release all this data. its not because we know nothing that nothing is happening. At the very best, that would explain such low communication from FC. too busy getting that shit straight.

Again, don't overestimate gen 3.1 there is no new chip design (mask set) but rather an increased die size or similar, in order to get rid of the heat better and to stabilise the chip. This shouldn't take any time at all. I also believe that the chips at XBTec are gen 3.1 since they use the new dimensions (8x8mm)

Agreed, this will not take much time but the effect is unknown. Apparently the generation used by XBTec is more efficient. Could be due to 3.1 improvements, PCB improvements or just less loss on the overall device-level due to lower overheads because of more chips per device and less supporting components (I am not an engineer, excuse my wording).

[ujka]

Why are you guys so fast in dismising self-mining?
20Ph mentioned as possible with franchising + AM farms, could mine around 90'000 btc before next reward halving:
http://btcinvest.net/en/bitcoin-mining-profit-calculator.php?diff=10455720138&dcosts=0&diff_mincrease=15&blpbtc=25&dhsmhs=20000000000&diff_mincreasedecrease=3&btcusd=623.06&dpowcon=30&btcusd_mincrease=1&pcost=0&calcweeks=60&dleadtime=3&action=calc

[Anotheranonlol]

When it comes to the nitty gritty internals of Asicminer we are like Jon Snuh  
we know nothing

[kaerf]

So about 0.01 btc per share is probably about the most total dividend one could possibly expect for now, until gen 4.

you forgot about selfmining and franchisees.

If we assume that selling chips is the most profitable and fast(!) way to go, every KH/s that goes into self-mining and franchising, is a KH/s sold for less. i.e. we'd be off worse.

This all depends on how much and how fast FC can produce self-mining machines.

In my (crazy) estimates, 1GH can still make $1-$2 (accounting for power,fees , and more). If FC can produce machines for less than $0.65/GH ($1 - $0.35), then it's better to self mine....unless he has problems with deploying that much power. Personally, I'd like to see more self mining, but if I were FC I'd also be wary of the additional liability of self mining (sourcing power/space thus making the business much less nimble).

[jimmothy]

unless he has problems with deploying that much power.

I do believe this is a limiting factor. AM is only working with 1MW and it's not particularly cheap electricity ($0.15/kwh for the immersion DC iirc).

Personally, I'd like to see more self mining, but if I were FC I'd also be wary of the additional liability of self mining (sourcing power/space thus making the business much less nimble).

I agree. Although I believe FC knows what he is doing and will do whatever is most profitable, I'd still like to see some expansion on the solomining operation.

It would be nice if we could get a ~20Mw DC with cheap electricity (<$0.05/kwh) to rival bitfuries giant farm which will be running soon.

[Anotheranonlol]

unless he has problems with deploying that much power.

I do believe this is a limiting factor. AM is only working with 1MW and it's not particularly cheap electricity ($0.15/kwh for the immersion DC iirc).

Personally, I'd like to see more self mining, but if I were FC I'd also be wary of the additional liability of self mining (sourcing power/space thus making the business much less nimble).

I agree. Although I believe FC knows what he is doing and will do whatever is most profitable, I'd still like to see some expansion on the solomining operation.

It would be nice if we could get a ~20Mw DC with cheap electricity (<$0.05/kwh) to rival bitfuries giant farm which will be running soon.

Most of chinese farms have been discussing plant subsidy in mainland then ultimately moving to mongolia. not now but in future
AM cannot compete with Bitfury. their plans is to have better heat efficiency than nearby google DC