ASICMINER: Entering the Future of ASIC Mining by Inventing It

[hdbuck]

thats not really amazing news at all.... 1600PH?!?!
You realize, he just put the rest of all us miners out of fucking business. Yall should be outraged...not jumping up n down with joy!

thats why i sold all my mining gear and bought AMshares

[jimmothy]

thats not really amazing news at all.... 1600PH?!?!
You realize, he just put the rest of all us miners out of fucking business. Yall should be outraged...not jumping up n down with joy!

thats why i sold all my mining gear and bought AMshares

1600ph would equate to 4th/share. Not bad

[Mabsark]

b ) Submitted Questions:
1) What is the order of magnitude of 3rd generation chips ASICMiner anticipates to sell (total / first batch / first 3 months)?
re 1) Order of magnitude: Depending on fab capacity. Total target is 10k to 40k wafers, relying on competitors, Bitcoin price, and other factors. A wafer is rated at 40 TH/s.

Did I read that right? 10,000 - 40,000 wafers, at 40TH/s each, = 400 PH/s - 1600 PH/s total target gen3 capacity?

That number can't be right. Last estimate was 2-20ph.

Your estimate refers to the first batch. What is quoted is the expected overall production from gen3, which depends on the factors stated above. Obviously if bitcoin price collapses to $50, it doesn't make sense to produce lots of wavers and warehouse them.

If that's the overall expected production for gen3, then an obvious question arises. When is gen4 expected? This year? Next year? Never?

If it's this year, then those numbers seem highly suspect. If the answer is never, then those numbers are meaningless. I'd say gen4 won't be out for a year or two going by those numbers, which would see the chips become pretty weak again compared to the competition. Aren't AM supposed to be working on gen4 already though? In which case, surely it won't take a year or two to be released and therefore AM won't be putting out anywhere near 1600 Ph/s.

Basically, those numbers are completely meaningless without knowing the lifetime of gen3.

[Melbustus]

thats not really amazing news at all.... 1600PH?!?!
You realize, he just put the rest of all us miners out of fucking business. Yall should be outraged...not jumping up n down with joy!

No offense, but it's been obvious for quite some time that mining was going to become an industrial-scale domain.

[jimmothy]

thats not really amazing news at all.... 1600PH?!?!
You realize, he just put the rest of all us miners out of fucking business. Yall should be outraged...not jumping up n down with joy!

No offense, but it's been obvious for quite some time that mining was going to become an industrial-scale domain.

Don't forget that many of these chips will be sold to miners.

I'm hoping they release a next gen cube and usb miners.

[freedomno1]

Still a pretty nice outlook AM does remain competitive if not all the year its does improve itself during cycles
Thanks Jutarul mid February isn't that far away gives it I guess 2 weeks in real AM time not BFL time 

[KeyserSozeMC]

What's the price per share?

Thanks

[dmcdad]

If that's the overall expected production for gen3, then an obvious question arises. When is gen4 expected? This year? Next year? Never?

If it's this year, then those numbers seem highly suspect. If the answer is never, then those numbers are meaningless. I'd say gen4 won't be out for a year or two going by those numbers, which would see the chips become pretty weak again compared to the competition. Aren't AM supposed to be working on gen4 already though? In which case, surely it won't take a year or two to be released and therefore AM won't be putting out anywhere near 1600 Ph/s.

Basically, those numbers are completely meaningless without knowing the lifetime of gen3.

No one knows how long gen3 will last, which is one of the reasons for the wide spread of quotes Ph/s. My guess is it will still be a viable (sellable) chip for 9 months to 2.5 years.

As to gen4, that was pretty clearly answered in Jutarul's update:

4) What is the currently anticipated long-term strategy for ASICMiner after the 3rd generation?
re 4) Long-term strategy is to follow the step of Moore's Law, while squeeze all possible efficiency out of each stage of chip design and production.

[empoweoqwj]

What's the price per share?

Thanks

https://www.havelockinvestments.com/order.php?symbol=AM1

[empoweoqwj]

Let's hope the value of BTC doesn't completely tank in the next 6 months and ruin the Gen3 party. If Gox implodes, which it appears to be doing as we speak, there will be a lot of negative sentiment in bitcoinland for a while to come. Of course, Gox is pants and deserves what it gets, but lots of people have their money / BTC tied up in Gox and no way of getting it out.

[Mabsark]

If that's the overall expected production for gen3, then an obvious question arises. When is gen4 expected? This year? Next year? Never?

If it's this year, then those numbers seem highly suspect. If the answer is never, then those numbers are meaningless. I'd say gen4 won't be out for a year or two going by those numbers, which would see the chips become pretty weak again compared to the competition. Aren't AM supposed to be working on gen4 already though? In which case, surely it won't take a year or two to be released and therefore AM won't be putting out anywhere near 1600 Ph/s.

Basically, those numbers are completely meaningless without knowing the lifetime of gen3.

No one knows how long gen3 will last, which is one of the reasons for the wide spread of quotes Ph/s. My guess is it will still be a viable (sellable) chip for 9 months to 2.5 years.

In order to be viable 2.5 years from now, AM would basically have to give the chip away. 14nm will be readily available by then and most manufacturers will have produced far more efficient chips. 2.5 years is far too long a life for gen 3.

As to gen4, that was pretty clearly answered in Jutarul's update:

4) What is the currently anticipated long-term strategy for ASICMiner after the 3rd generation?
re 4) Long-term strategy is to follow the step of Moore's Law, while squeeze all possible efficiency out of each stage of chip design and production.

If you think that's clear, then tell me when gen 4 chips will be released, based on that information. All that that paragraph say is that AM will try to double the number of transistors every 2 years while making the chip more efficient.

Let's say that gen 4 will be out in 2 years from now and 1600 Ph/s of gen 3 chips were produced. That would mean AM would have to produce about 2.2 Ph/s every day. With wafers at 40 Th/s, AM would need to package 55 wafers per day, producing 171,875 chips per day.

That sound pretty damn implausible to me.

If 400 Ph/s of gen 3 chips were produced in that 2 year period, 14 wafers per day would need to be packaged producing 43,750 chips.

These numbers are clearly ridiculous and they're over a two year time period. As far as I'm aware, it's not even possible to produce and package 1 wafer per day. If that's correct, then it would take AM decades to produce that many chips.

[dmcdad]

In order to be viable 2.5 years from now, AM would basically have to give the chip away. 14nm will be readily available by then and most manufacturers will have produced far more efficient chips. 2.5 years is far too long a life for gen 3.

No one knows what BTC/USD exchange rate or difficulty is going to do over the next 2 years. If there is a crash or stall, then yes, 2.5 years could very well be the life expectancy of gen3. Do I think that is likely? No. But it is an upper bound. 9 months is my lower bound, which I think is also unlikely. But it is still reasonable to think in min/max caps when doing projections.

Who cares about nm size? Do you buy the camera with the highest MB pixel count, or do you get the one with a good aperture and optics that produces the best photo quality? Based on the specs AM is about to release chips that are over 2x efficient as their competitors 20nm chips. If competitors want to spend a boat load of money to do 14nm nodes, then I say they can knock themselves out.

If you think that's clear, then tell me when gen 4 chips will be released, based on that information. All that that paragraph say is that AM will try to double the number of transistors every 2 years while making the chip more efficient.

Well I think it is about as clear as it can be. It means they aren't hanging up the towel after gen3. Gen3 isn't even taped out yet but you want a specific date when gen4 is going to be done? Please...

[neilol]

This is to inform that friedcat met with the board yesterday and provided some updates.

General Update
==========

Thanks for the update Jutarul

[Mabsark]

Who cares about nm size? Do you buy the camera with the highest MB pixel count, or do you get the one with a good aperture and optics that produces the best photo quality? Based on the specs AM is about to release chips that are over 2x efficient as their competitors 20nm chips. If competitors want to spend a boat load of money to do 14nm nodes, then I say they can knock themselves out.

How would a 40nm AM chip compare to a 2nd or 3rd gen 14nm BitFury chip? Who cares about nm size? Everybody with a scrap a sense because it allows you to increase the number of transistors in the same size package or produce a smaller, more power efficient chip. Is process size everything? No but to pretend it's meaningless is just silly. A highly efficient design on a 14nm process would completely destroy AM's 40nm chip. Is such a chip available now? No but 2.5 years from now though, there will be far better designs than AM's 40nm chip. That's how technological progress works.

If you think that's clear, then tell me when gen 4 chips will be released, based on that information. All that that paragraph say is that AM will try to double the number of transistors every 2 years while making the chip more efficient.

Well I think it is about as clear as it can be. It means they aren't hanging up the towel after gen3. Gen3 isn't even taped out yet but you want a specific date when gen4 is going to be done? Please...

I don't want a specific date, I want a rough estimate in order for those numbers to be meaningful. It doesn't matter though because those numbers posted are pure bullshit given that it would take decades to produce that many chips. Then again, I could be completely wrong and it may be perfectly possible to produce and package 14-55 wafers per day.

So, how many wafers can be produced and packaged per day?

[dmcdad]

Jutarul did say "Depending on fab capacity", so I am sure scheduling enough fab time might be an issue.

That said, worldwide 40nm fab capacity 2 years ago was 4 million wafers per month. So on the high end we are talking about AM using a fraction of a tiny fraction of worldwide capacity. As an example, Global Foundries alone has capacity to do 50K to 100K+ (depending on wafer size) / month at 40 nm.

[Mabsark]

Jutarul did say "Depending on fab capacity", so I am sure scheduling enough fab time might be an issue.

That said, worldwide 40nm fab capacity 2 years ago was 4 million wafers per month. So on the high end we are talking about AM using a fraction of a tiny fraction of worldwide capacity. As an example, Global Foundries alone has capacity to do 50K to 100K+ (depending on wafer size) / month at 40 nm.

If AM develop a chip to be produced by GF, then it could only be produced by GF as far as I know. Each fab requires their own mask because their technology is different. So AM can use a single fab and they'll have top share that capacity with the fabs other customers. It takes a good few week to produce wafers. If you look at how long it took the other ASIC manufacturers to package their wafers into chips, you'll see that it took them a good few days (and in some cases a couple of weeks) to get just their samples packaged.

This is where an expert needs to step in. Let's say it takes 2 months to produce wafers and AM continuously produces them. Each batch of wafers would need to be packaged before the next batch arrives for packaging. So how many wafers can AM have packaged in those 2 months? That's the bottleneck I'm talking about, not total fab capacity.

Based on what we've seen from all previous bitcoin ASIC manufacturers, it just doesn't seem possible for AM to produce the stated amount of chips in a reasonable time frame.

[Rival]

Based on what we've seen from all previous bitcoin ASIC manufacturers, it just doesn't seem possible for AM to produce the stated amount of chips in a reasonable time frame.

http://www.internetnews.com/hardware/article.php/3817066/Idle+Hands+in+Chinas+Chip+Business.htm

The Chinese government heavily subsidized the production of integrated circuit manufacturing capability all through the 90's and 00's. Today the amount that is just sitting idle is just staggering.

There exist facility after facility available to be brought online if only someone had something that needed to be produced. Announcing a chip order in Shenzen is like throwing a porkchop into a den of starving wolves. The misallocation of resources we normally associate with centrally-planned economies appears to have worked in AM's favor in this particular instance.

[minerpumpkin]

Based on what we've seen from all previous bitcoin ASIC manufacturers, it just doesn't seem possible for AM to produce the stated amount of chips in a reasonable time frame.

http://www.internetnews.com/hardware/article.php/3817066/Idle+Hands+in+Chinas+Chip+Business.htm

The Chinese government heavily subsidized the production of integrated circuit manufacturing capability all through the 90's and 00's. Today the amount that is just sitting idle is just staggering.

There exist facility after facility available to be brought online if only someone had something that needed to be produced. Announcing a chip order in Shenzen is like throwing a porkchop into a den of starving wolves. The misallocation of resources we normally associate with centrally-planned economies appears to have worked in AM's favor in this particular instance.

The question is, whether this applies to all process sizes. We need capacities for 40nm, which is not super small but also not something incredibly old and outdated. We'll see. I think friedcat knows better than us.

[minerpumpkin]

I've yet to chime in to thank Jutarul for submitting our questions to friedcat. Thanks a lot! I think the answers served well to sort out some burning questions remaining on our side.
I'd like to do this more often if possible. Collect questions for friedcat and the board and submit them. I think bi-weekly is something we can't expect, but maybe something every month or so. If friedcat has specific questions I guess it's easier for him to answer them than to guess what we'd like to know. What do you think? Would that work and be OK with you, Jutarul?

[Puppet]

If AM develop a chip to be produced by GF, then it could only be produced by GF as far as I know. Each fab requires their own mask because their technology is different. So AM can use a single fab and they'll have top share that capacity with the fabs other customers. It takes a good few week to produce wafers. If you look at how long it took the other ASIC manufacturers to package their wafers into chips, you'll see that it took them a good few days (and in some cases a couple of weeks) to get just their samples packaged.

This is where an expert needs to step in. Let's say it takes 2 months to produce wafers and AM continuously produces them. Each batch of wafers would need to be packaged before the next batch arrives for packaging. So how many wafers can AM have packaged in those 2 months? That's the bottleneck I'm talking about, not total fab capacity.

Based on what we've seen from all previous bitcoin ASIC manufacturers, it just doesn't seem possible for AM to produce the stated amount of chips in a reasonable time frame.

Packaging is done by specialist houses. Neither the fab, nor AM (or any other asic vendor) does the packaging themselves. Clearly if the industry produces 100's of 1000's of wafers per month, those packaging houses have the capacity to slice and package as many chips as are on those wafers. Its not like we are piling up unpackaged wafers.

That said, I also find AM numbers (far) too high to be believable, but its not like the semicon industry (fabs+packaging houses) would have any trouble with that kind of volume.