ASICMINER: Entering the Future of ASIC Mining by Inventing It

[memvola]

why not p2pool, isn't that pretty decentralized?  asicminer could really bring them into the light!

ASICMINER would become more than 95% of p2pool, which means almost no reduction in variance for a significant overhead. Going solo is better in every way. Someone mentioned that pools are more resistant to DDOS than solo mining but I doubt that there is a good supporting argument for that either.

However, I presume friedcat thinks we will most likely be below a few percent for the most of our operation and that's why he will develop the infrastructure with pools in mind. In that case, we could use one p2pool instance among other pools.

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[SebastianJu]

Sample boards to the community: this is at the 2nd order of our priority list following deploying. Once we have enough time it will be done immediately.

Why that? And who will get this sample and the bitcoins created with it? I dont see a reason why someone should get a sample because we already can see that the asics work. So what should this be good for? Its another thing when avalon does this. They have a completely other business model.

Maybe i missed it but i wonder if nefario paid the btc from glbse back already. Is that done or will asicminer have to compensate a loss there?

[piotr_n]

Maybe i missed it but i wonder if nefario paid the btc from glbse back already. Is that done or will asicminer have to compensate a loss there?

It was already said. Nefario is still holding 1688.188 BTC that used to belong to ASICMINER, but friedcat has put his own money to cover this missing amount.
When nefario pays back, this will go to reimburse friedcat.

In other words: nefario did not pay back, but ASICMINER's funds are all there, after friedcat covered the frozen funds from his own pocket.

[SebastianJu]

Maybe i missed it but i wonder if nefario paid the btc from glbse back already. Is that done or will asicminer have to compensate a loss there?

It was already said. Nefario is still holding 1688.188 BTC that used to belong to ASICMINER, but friedcat has put his own money to cover this missing amount.
When nefario pays back, this will go to reimburse friedcat.

In other words: nefario did not pay back, but ASICMINER's funds are all there, after friedcat covered the frozen funds from his own pocket.

Thanks. I dont like the thought that the money isnt paid back and friedcat, who isnt guilty for this has to pay. Its a big amount of real money. And it looks like nefario stopped everything some weeks ago. So its not likely that the money will be paid back. Ill try to email nefario, maybe he gets back and says a word about it. I mean its $45232.97 judging from the average price at mtgox... i dont see why it shouldnt be paid back.

[piotr_n]

Thanks. I dont like the thought that the money isnt paid back and friedcat, who isnt guilty for this has to pay. Its a big amount of real money.

Yea, I agree with you, but it was friedcat's decision (nobody has pushed him into it), so we can only thank him for being so generous

[MPOE-PR]

Im surprised no one has setup a passthrough yet. I know there is a trading platform coming but in the meantime a pure passthrough might be the way to go.

Do their rules allow it?  They seem pretty intent on doing everything possible to keep it as a legitimate investment and avoid the kinds of cluster-fucks we've seen in the past due to sketchy intermediaries.  You can almost guarantee that if they allow anyone and everyone to operate a pass-through, someone will eventually scam people who invest in the pass-throughs.

You can't really disallow a passthrough. How would you do it?

[DiabloD3]

why not p2pool, isn't that pretty decentralized?  asicminer could really bring them into the light!

ASICMINER would become more than 95% of p2pool, which means almost no reduction in variance for a significant overhead. Going solo is better in every way. Someone mentioned that pools are more resistant to DDOS than solo mining but I doubt that there is a good supporting argument for that either.

However, I presume friedcat thinks we will most likely be below a few percent for the most of our operation and that's why he will develop the infrastructure with pools in mind. In that case, we could use one p2pool instance among other pools.

Yes, but it would also prevent friedcat from becoming a threat in a 51% situation since he does not control the output. p2pool has made monolithic pools obsolete, and I don't understand why anyone would be silly enough to ever use anything but p2pool.

[Deprived]

why not p2pool, isn't that pretty decentralized?  asicminer could really bring them into the light!

ASICMINER would become more than 95% of p2pool, which means almost no reduction in variance for a significant overhead. Going solo is better in every way. Someone mentioned that pools are more resistant to DDOS than solo mining but I doubt that there is a good supporting argument for that either.

However, I presume friedcat thinks we will most likely be below a few percent for the most of our operation and that's why he will develop the infrastructure with pools in mind. In that case, we could use one p2pool instance among other pools.

Yes, but it would also prevent friedcat from becoming a threat in a 51% situation since he does not control the output. p2pool has made monolithic pools obsolete, and I don't understand why anyone would be silly enough to ever use anything but p2pool.

It wouldn't stop anything.  At any time friedcat could take the machines off p2pool and do a 51% attack.  The only way it "stops" it is if he doesn't intend to do it - which is why all the talk of which pool to use is pointless.  He has the machines - if they're over 50% he can try to double-spend.  No amount of pointing them at different pools removes that capability.

The thing preventing him 51% attacking (if ASICMINER ever got to 51% - which isn't all that likely as it requires both Avalon AND BFL to miss shipping) - is that it doesn't make economic sense to do it: the loss in value of all future mined BTC would far outweigh whatever double-spend benefit he got short-term.

So forget all the wasted effort talking about pools and just mine wherever makes the most profit - with the sole caveat of never pointing enough power at a single pool that the pool operator gets anywhere near the point of having 50% of network power.  Presumably friedcat trusts HIMSELF not to do an attack - so any significant granting of power to pools can only increase risk not reduce it.

[MrTeal]

why not p2pool, isn't that pretty decentralized?  asicminer could really bring them into the light!

ASICMINER would become more than 95% of p2pool, which means almost no reduction in variance for a significant overhead. Going solo is better in every way. Someone mentioned that pools are more resistant to DDOS than solo mining but I doubt that there is a good supporting argument for that either.

However, I presume friedcat thinks we will most likely be below a few percent for the most of our operation and that's why he will develop the infrastructure with pools in mind. In that case, we could use one p2pool instance among other pools.

Yes, but it would also prevent friedcat from becoming a threat in a 51% situation since he does not control the output. p2pool has made monolithic pools obsolete, and I don't understand why anyone would be silly enough to ever use anything but p2pool.

I'm not sure how mining on p2pool would prevent friedcat from becoming a 51% threat. Just having one entity control that much of the hashrate is the threat, regardless of how it's divided up amongst pools. At any time, Asicminer could stop mining on p2pool or any other pool and initiate a double spend or start rejecting all blocks but their own. Where they're mining currently doesn't change that they could attack at any time if they get 50TH/s when the rest of the network is only 30-40TH/s.

[DiabloD3]

why not p2pool, isn't that pretty decentralized?  asicminer could really bring them into the light!

ASICMINER would become more than 95% of p2pool, which means almost no reduction in variance for a significant overhead. Going solo is better in every way. Someone mentioned that pools are more resistant to DDOS than solo mining but I doubt that there is a good supporting argument for that either.

However, I presume friedcat thinks we will most likely be below a few percent for the most of our operation and that's why he will develop the infrastructure with pools in mind. In that case, we could use one p2pool instance among other pools.

Yes, but it would also prevent friedcat from becoming a threat in a 51% situation since he does not control the output. p2pool has made monolithic pools obsolete, and I don't understand why anyone would be silly enough to ever use anything but p2pool.

I'm not sure how mining on p2pool would prevent friedcat from becoming a 51% threat. Just having one entity control that much of the hashrate is the threat, regardless of how it's divided up amongst pools. At any time, Asicminer could stop mining on p2pool or any other pool and initiate a double spend or start rejecting all blocks but their own. Where they're mining currently doesn't change that they could attack at any time if they get 50TH/s when the rest of the network is only 30-40TH/s.

p2pool shares have to be generated as valid. If friedcat would leave p2pool and mine blocks that harm Bitcoin, we'd just change the hash algo out from under him thus rendering the entire farm useless.

[keystroke]

Looks like the stress test is ending, hashrate has dropped to 1.871 TH/s as of right now

19 blocks wasn't a bad effort for a first test run.

Up to 27 now! But the rate is hovering around 2,133.16 GH/s.

[midnightmagic]

As we stated in earlier updates, the chips for next expansion (6-fold one, >50TH/s) are ordered and being produced in the fab already.

Part of what shareholders (myself included) purchased was the possibility to be able to trade in a certain number of shares to go towards the purchase of consumer equipment prior to the expansion to >= 50TH self-mining but I can no longer find this mentioned. Could you please clarify the history of this? Was the option removed due to changing circumstances? Was there a vote held to determine this? I was under the impression that only shareholders would have first-dibs on the hardware before the general unwashed masses..

[Deprived]

As we stated in earlier updates, the chips for next expansion (6-fold one, >50TH/s) are ordered and being produced in the fab already.

Part of what shareholders (myself included) purchased was the possibility to be able to trade in a certain number of shares to go towards the purchase of consumer equipment prior to the expansion to >= 50TH self-mining but I can no longer find this mentioned. Could you please clarify the history of this? Was the option removed due to changing circumstances? Was there a vote held to determine this? I was under the impression that only shareholders would have first-dibs on the hardware before the general unwashed masses..

This was never agreed.  Some people asked for it but that's as far as it ever got.

[MrTeal]

Friedcat, since you have working hardware could you give a number for what your efficiency is for a rack? Preferably including AC/DC conversion and the power drawn by those large fans. How close were you on the 4.2J/GH for the chips?

[DutchBrat]

I guess the stresstesting is over.... full deployment can begin.... 1.5TH now on BTCGuild....

[repentance]

Im surprised no one has setup a passthrough yet. I know there is a trading platform coming but in the meantime a pure passthrough might be the way to go.

Do their rules allow it?  They seem pretty intent on doing everything possible to keep it as a legitimate investment and avoid the kinds of cluster-fucks we've seen in the past due to sketchy intermediaries.  You can almost guarantee that if they allow anyone and everyone to operate a pass-through, someone will eventually scam people who invest in the pass-throughs.

You can't really disallow a passthrough. How would you do it?

I guess I'm thinking of the way you could do it here, which is by setting up a class of shares which can only be sold to other existing shareholders or back to the company (you can essentially attach any conditions you like to share classes in a private company here are long as those conditions are fully disclosed).  If such conditions aren't already baked in, then you'd obviously need a special resolution by existing shareholders to implement them.

It will definitely be interesting to see who operates pass-throughs and how well or badly they manage them.

[Deprived]

Im surprised no one has setup a passthrough yet. I know there is a trading platform coming but in the meantime a pure passthrough might be the way to go.

Do their rules allow it?  They seem pretty intent on doing everything possible to keep it as a legitimate investment and avoid the kinds of cluster-fucks we've seen in the past due to sketchy intermediaries.  You can almost guarantee that if they allow anyone and everyone to operate a pass-through, someone will eventually scam people who invest in the pass-throughs.

You can't really disallow a passthrough. How would you do it?

I guess I'm thinking of the way you could do it here, which is by setting up a class of shares which can only be sold to other existing shareholders or back to the company (you can essentially attach any conditions you like to share classes in a private company here are long as those conditions are fully disclosed).  If such conditions aren't already baked in, then you'd obviously need a special resolution by existing shareholders to implement them.

It will definitely be interesting to see who operates pass-throughs and how well or badly they manage them.

I already tried a few times to get rights to a batch to operate a pass-through to LTC-Global.  But I was always too late or overbid.  Unless there's some barrier to entry preventing buying direct on friedcat's site there's very little benefit another BTC-denominated pass-through can offer.  Buying on the main site where most liquidity is has to make sense for nearly everyone.

[Pipesnake]

Please take the talk of "pass-through" scams out of this thread.  It does not belong here.

[SebastianJu]

Can it be that friedcat now fixed the hashrate to around 2TH/s at btcguild and is running the rest solomining? Can this be found out?

[iCEBREAKER]

Please take the talk of "pass-through" scams out of this thread.  It does not belong here.

This thread must remain absolutely silent or off-topic, because "ASICMINER" shares are not tradable until their exchange opens.

Please take the talk of "ASICs" out of this thread, which is for the topic of "Securities."  It does not belong here.

There is an appropriate "Mining Hardware" section where such discussion may take place.