Black Arrow 28nm 100Ghash Bitcoin ASIC from $0.49/GH/s

[elasticband]

is there a TLDR around here anywhere?

[jimmothy]

To be clear, I'm crying for the two bitcoiners, one man and one woman (her in Canada, I believe), who've been trying to get a $147K USD refunded since December, and ~$25K USD refunded since the beginning of January, respectively.

As I've already stated, I didn't (formally don't) want to be here, but glad I'm here now to expose these fucks and help others to hopefully obtain their refunds before the proverbial shit hits the fan. Sadly, those that'll be left holding the bag are ones that don't frequent this forum till it's too late.

To be fair, I have to admit that Black Arrow has structured their enterprise(s) quite beautifully, albeit it's still a SCAM!

~TMIBTCITW

Funny how in the hashfast thread you did nothing besides claim that hashfast has a gay sexworking employee and create a ton of panic and now they are shipping devices which meet their advertised specs.


Who the fuck spends 147k on a preorder that clearly states no refunds, on a half developed product which is not guaranteed to ship on the estimated date?

If you didn't understand that there might be delays, you deserve to lose however much you "invested" in this venture.

For everyone else who wants to buy a miner because you (according to history) are almost guaranteed a profit in USD then you might be interested in preordering an asic.

[alfabitcoin]

So better just buy coins now and hold them to have profit in usd. Why to mine or buy miner?
Edit
 I do wonder that myself.
I bought antminer for 4.5 btc begining of december and till now mined almost 4.5 btc. But then btc were at 1100 usd. So ghat was 4950$.
I know ant price will adjust with time e.g. price will be always brake even around 2 months.
So i wonder why just dont sell it for 1.5 btc what would total of 6 btc worth 4800$ at today exchange.
To compare 4.5 what i gave was around 4900$. So where is my profit usd wise? Nowhere.why to risk aditional time to mine, maybe something will brake when i can get now almost 6 btc and keep them hoping in price rise?

[jimmothy]

So better jut buy coins now and hold them to have profit in usd. Why to mine or buy miner?

Because there is an extremely small chance you end up mining more btc than you could buy.

But yea I agree buying btc is a much better investment but that doesn't mean you can't risk a little on mining.

[tokona]

FUN FACT: Literally EVERYONE who preordered an asic from ANY manufacturer that delivered made a profit in USD if they mined for a week or two then resold the hardware.

The only people who think they are getting scammed are the nerds who think that btc mining must result in a positive ROI in btc and think that the hardware manufacturer can be held accountable for that.

This is going a bit off-topic... but it really shouldn't be left unchallenged.

I think you're taking an exceptionally stupid position here.  You have a stack of USD, you could do at least three things:
(0) Sit on your USD and do nothing.
(1) Buy Bitcoin.
(2) But a Bitcoin miner.

If (2) yields less bitcoin than you would have gotten with (1) you are worse off in every way. The miner takes up space, consumes power, has shipping and delivery risks, and is just as worthless as the Bitcoin if Bitcoin loses value, but is far less liquid. You take all the risks of owning Bitcoin, multiplied by illiquidity, plus some hardware specific risks.

There is no scenario in which (2) is better than (1) if (2) yields less Bitcoin, not if bitcoin goes up in value, not if it goes down, not if bitcoin becomes worthless, not on a boat, not with a goat.

Unless you want to consider incompetent people with no self control who can't manage to buy and hold things on their own— in which case I'll gladly offer second signer service for multisig at far less of a loss than ripoff prices from asic hardware vendors and a lot fewer risks.

I can actually think of a few cases where 2 is better than 1 or 0.

If you receive your miner and btc rate stays constant there would be little incentive for people to pour money in to new hardware or at least as quickly as expected. This could mean difficulty is much less than predicted and everyone reaches roi.

alternatively the price of btc could go up and you might only reach 50% roi but if you resell your miner after using it for a month you could probably reach a positive roi or come very close in btc terms (usd would reach positive roi in this case)

Smart!

[smooth]

If you receive your miner and btc rate stays constant there would be little incentive for people to pour money in to new hardware or at least as quickly as expected. This could mean difficulty is much less than predicted and everyone reaches roi.

This is correct. Imagine that BTC crashes back down $1 tomorrow. People who buy miners now will do much better than (in BTC terms) people who just bought BTC and held on to it.

The problem with the pure ROI argument is that it confuses prospective returns with retrospective returns. Just because you bought something and it didn't ROI doesn't mean it was necessarily a bad investment (and likewise if you did ROI, it wasn't necessarily a good investment).

You have to consider the sum of all possible outcomes, not just the one that actually happened (or even the one that you expect to happen).

[ernie-]

This is correct. Imagine that BTC crashes back down $1 tomorrow. People who buy miners now will do much better than (in BTC terms) people who just bought BTC and held on to it.

I don't understand your logic on that statement. If BTC crashes to $1 then the people that bought miners wont be able to cover their power costs and they will most likely switch them off, they will have less BTC than if they had not bough the miner.

[smooth]

This is correct. Imagine that BTC crashes back down $1 tomorrow. People who buy miners now will do much better than (in BTC terms) people who just bought BTC and held on to it.

I don't understand your logic on that statement. If BTC crashes to $1 then the people that bought miners wont be able to cover their power costs and they will most likely switch them off, they will have less BTC than if they had not bough the miner.

Until the difficulty drops...

[TinkerTom]

With all due respect, I have two requests:

• If your post doesn't contain the words Black Arrow, Prospero, Minersource, etc., perhaps it would be better located in another thread.
• If you're only referring to one small part of a conversation, perhaps you don't need to quote the whole fucking thing.

I like to keep up on this thread to see if there's any actual news or information that's on topic and it's hell wading through the vitriol here.

[jimmothy]

I think jimmothy is an example of customers what every asic preorder company desire   no offense

I bought from BFL and made a profit in USD regardless of the ridiculous delays. I don't want people to be mislead and they should know that EVERY asic manufacturer that accepts preorders will miss the deadline. It is not a secret.

Unless you buy from bitmain or asicminer you will not get your asic on time.

What you fudsters forget is that a 2 month delay does not equal a guaranteed loss. It does mean that you will not profit AS much as you would have if you had it earlier but assuming you are already at a loss is simply wrong according to history.

This all ignores the fact that BA may even decide to give out refunds even though they are not obligated in their TOS and they might come up with a better compensation plan for the delays.

Let's say a customer of mine pre-orders barn wood to remodel their home. I give them a date as to when the wood will be shipped to their house. That date passes, whereupon a new date is set by ME, promising two months at the latest as the new deadline. They can not wait that long, thus request their money back plus purchase barn wood elsewhere to complete the remodel. I tell them that due to the ever so changing ToS on my site that there are no refunds and I WILL deliver your barn wood in two months, doing with it as you wish.

Question: Would a judge say that she must accept the barn wood when I get around to delivering it, or would he tell me to remit the refund and stick the vaporware barn wood up my ass?

<strokes beard!>

The thing is BA never guaranteed march delivery. It was an estimate and nothing more. The tos has always said no refunds.

And you keep assuming it is vaporware. Are you aware that bfl jalapenos still sell for more than the 250 I paid for it a year ago? Not exactly vaporware.

[frankenmint]

I take PG at his word because:

A) he has morals

B) he hides these morals through what seems to be searing behavior UNTIL

C) you see that he did this MONTHS after BA had the time to provide further transparency.

I saw that when I questioned their Lancelot Prices on FPGAs which were priced at 450 a peice at the time when block erupters were priced at 300 with current btc price - they said, its still a great deal, that I shouldn't do any dealings with them.

Bottom line - they did what BFL did only they were 10 months late on delivering FPGA hardware.  Don't get things misconstrewed, these are human beings too that screwed up or couldnt meet their deadlines.  That is the way the real world works.  Its a shame that we'll see this year also riddled with hiccups from the likes of BA, HF, and CT.  They will likley deliver, but you can believe that I'm benefiting from them being delayed with my in hand hardware.  I paid a premium for some stuff, but the flip side is that I wasnt trying to be greedy (I've only bought in hand hardware on my 2nd and 3rd go rounds.)  I did give BA an honest consideration and almost pulled the trigger on That or a Cointerra but now that I only got Antminers instead for double that price with less than 1/4 of expected difficulty, I'm feeling satisfied.  

Naysayers have said I screwed up because of BA and CT and HF and the knc neptune (which I think will be the next large bump [I believe the new avalon Gen 2 miners as well as the next asicminer recently announced offerings] those will be the real threats and will push us past the 10B difficulty level)  

[primer10]

Woa ..

the next ASIC manufacturer should just state something like "optimistically to deliver in Feb 2014 with possible chance of delay, +/- 2 months"

[Lloydie]

Woa ..

the next ASIC manufacturer should just state something like "optimistically to deliver in Feb 2014 with possible chance of delay, +/- 2 months"

In fact, exactly what KnC did: delivery Q1/Q2 of 2014.  We are dealing with humans: movable timelines, potential stuff ups, possible scams and pure and simple greed.  

[Biomech]

Woa ..

the next ASIC manufacturer should just state something like "optimistically to deliver in Feb 2014 with possible chance of delay, +/- 2 months"

Nah. They should just drop the preorder bullshit altogether. Bitmain isn't hurting for business. They aren't drawing all the drama, but they are quietly delivering quality equipment. To my knowledge they never did a preorder, and it has been my observation (and hopefully soon my experience) that they deliver in about a week from payment.

I'm grabbing at least one and hopefully a bit more at tax time.

I still want faster machines, and probably will get them, but I don't wanna do the preorder thing. Too many flighty operators.

[BlackArrow Matt]

I can't keep up with this thread. The reading I've been doing has been disappointing. I'd appreciate it if everyone could cut the trolling and flaming and just speak about the issues at hand. Telling each other to F-off looks bad and the off topic conversations causes those with actual questions to get drowned out.

I have no updates at the moment.

[Lloydie]

I can't keep up with this thread. The reading I've been doing has been disappointing. I'd appreciate it if everyone could cut the trolling and flaming and just speak about the issues at hand. Telling each other to F-off looks bad and the off topic conversations causes those with actual questions to get drowned out.

I have no updates at the moment.

Tell us this: which country are you based in? What is your relationship to BA? How come you didn't know the tapeout target was missed? Who made the decision to go ahead with the chip? What was the date of that? Why weren't we told about that decision before it happened?

[BlackArrow Matt]

I can't keep up with this thread. The reading I've been doing has been disappointing. I'd appreciate it if everyone could cut the trolling and flaming and just speak about the issues at hand. Telling each other to F-off looks bad and the off topic conversations causes those with actual questions to get drowned out.

I have no updates at the moment.

Tell us this: which country are you based in? What is your relationship to BA? How come you didn't know the tapeout target was missed? Who made the decision to go ahead with the chip? What was the date of that? Why weren't we told about that decision before it happened?

I didn't know about the tapeout target because I'm not an engineer and I just deal with troubleshooting tickets and trying to answer questions. I am not one of the two or so people who have access to bank accounts or bitcoin wallets. I do not know who made the decision to go ahead with the chip. I'd guess it was the highest level of BA since I wasn't a part of the decision. I don't know the date either.

[Lloydie]

I can't keep up with this thread. The reading I've been doing has been disappointing. I'd appreciate it if everyone could cut the trolling and flaming and just speak about the issues at hand. Telling each other to F-off looks bad and the off topic conversations causes those with actual questions to get drowned out.

I have no updates at the moment.

Tell us this: which country are you based in? What is your relationship to BA? How come you didn't know the tapeout target was missed? Who made the decision to go ahead with the chip? What was the date of that? Why weren't we told about that decision before it happened?

I didn't know about the tapeout target because I'm not an engineer and I just deal with troubleshooting tickets and trying to answer questions. I am not one of the two or so people who have access to bank accounts or bitcoin wallets. I do not know who made the decision to go ahead with the chip. I'd guess it was the highest level of BA since I wasn't a part of the decision. I don't know the date either.

Ok. Then you have nothing and cannot help. I am sorry, but those are the facts. BA still has not levelled with us.

[Lloydie]

I can't keep up with this thread. The reading I've been doing has been disappointing. I'd appreciate it if everyone could cut the trolling and flaming and just speak about the issues at hand. Telling each other to F-off looks bad and the off topic conversations causes those with actual questions to get drowned out.

I have no updates at the moment.

Tell us this: which country are you based in? What is your relationship to BA? How come you didn't know the tapeout target was missed? Who made the decision to go ahead with the chip? What was the date of that? Why weren't we told about that decision before it happened?

I didn't know about the tapeout target because I'm not an engineer and I just deal with troubleshooting tickets and trying to answer questions. I am not one of the two or so people who have access to bank accounts or bitcoin wallets. I do not know who made the decision to go ahead with the chip. I'd guess it was the highest level of BA since I wasn't a part of the decision. I don't know the date either.

Ok. Then you have nothing and cannot help. I am sorry, but those are the facts. BA still has not levelled with us.

Tell us who is running BA? Is it one person? Multiple people? Who pays your wages? And what is the address of the factory in Shenzhen?

[BlackArrow Matt]

I can't keep up with this thread. The reading I've been doing has been disappointing. I'd appreciate it if everyone could cut the trolling and flaming and just speak about the issues at hand. Telling each other to F-off looks bad and the off topic conversations causes those with actual questions to get drowned out.

I have no updates at the moment.

Tell us this: which country are you based in? What is your relationship to BA? How come you didn't know the tapeout target was missed? Who made the decision to go ahead with the chip? What was the date of that? Why weren't we told about that decision before it happened?

I didn't know about the tapeout target because I'm not an engineer and I just deal with troubleshooting tickets and trying to answer questions. I am not one of the two or so people who have access to bank accounts or bitcoin wallets. I do not know who made the decision to go ahead with the chip. I'd guess it was the highest level of BA since I wasn't a part of the decision. I don't know the date either.

Ok. Then you have nothing and cannot help. I am sorry, but those are the facts. BA still has not levelled with us.

Not necessarily true. An engineer answered questions a few days ago:

Posted 31 January 2014 - 03:53 PM
terrorist96, on 29 Jan 2014 - 11:12 PM, said:
 
1. Did Blackarrow lie to us when they said they had their final specs on Jan 3?
 
2. If they've just now taped out, shouldn't it take 49 days (considering Cointerra) to make it to production? It should be done by late March..This makes no sense.. Some explanation on this would be nice.
 
3. Why weren't the customers consulted when Blackarrow knew that the chip would ship with 1.5W/Gh without delay and ASKED us customers if we were okay with that OR delay the shipment 2 months to achieve 0.75W/Gh? If Blackarrow KNEW in early January that there would be a delay, why did you wait until the END of January to tell people? An option of shipping on-time but with the 1.5W/Gh would have been nice since some people have free electricity and don't give a fuck!
 
4. When will we see real pictures of production? Otherwise this whole thing just seems like a giant scam. It's easy to promise people more things in the future.
(Yes, I know they've had pictures/videos of the bitfury. I'm talking about the Prospero)
 
5. How can we trust Blackarrow anymore since they've betrayed our trust already? How do we know that it won't get delayed even past May 1? Where are the reassurances?
 
6. The Prospero X-3 has 20 chips inside it. According to the statement put out, "TT corner @ 25C which is expected to run at 120Ghash/sec". Does this mean that in total, the X-3 will have a hash rate of 2400Gh/sec? If so, with the 25% (of 2000Gh/sec would be 500Gh/sec) added for 4 months, one X-3 mining rate would be 2900Gh/sec for the first 4 months, then drops to 2400Gh/sec from then on out. Is this correct?
 
7. What about the option to host Bitfuries for us, proportional to our order amount, starting Feb 24 until the Minion chips are ready to ship?
 
8. It has been mentioned that Globalfoundries are being used to manufacture the chip. However, Globalfoundries does not have any foundries in China. They are located in Singapore and Germany. I thought the chip was being made in China. I understand that VeriSilicon has a location in China though.
 
I think I speak for all your customers when I say we would like all these questions answered.
If anyone else has additional questions, post them here.
 
 
 
 
1. We did not lie on Jan 3. We were planning to tape out before the Chinese New Year. On Jan 3 we were informed that the back end team cannot reach their target and need to try another layout. This meant to do some changes in the RTL code and start back end process all over again. We have immediately announced the worst date we could think of for batch 2 and not announced details about batch one because we did not had them. We just got the final data from the back end team 5 days ago. They have now reached their target and are now 99% sure that they'll tape out 1 week after Chinese new year (15-20 Jan).
 
2. We have looked into our competitors claims together with Global Foundries. GF is obviously not at liberty to discuss the specific projects with third parties but they assured us that it is impossible to finish 28nm in 49days and to cover every step. 28nm is very complicated and DRC/LSV and JDV checking takes at least 14 days. The wafer manufacturing takes 0.8days / layer at their highest speed. Our conclusion is that our competitors have deliberately omitted several steps in their advertising and were only referring to wafer manufacturing.
 
3. The tapeout costs millions of dollars. We do not have a customer that paid that much to make a tapeout just for them. We had to think further than 1 month. 1.5W/Ghash is not only electricity problem. The whole power translates into heat, therefore more things are required: power chips, heatsinks, AC, new case design, etc.
 
4. We cannot produce the PCBs without the exact pin layout of the chip. This has not been yet received.  We could not produce the case without the exact heat estimation.
 
5. Black Arrow is the only Bitcoin ASIC manufacturer that has not betrayed customer's trust. While others let the deadline pass by and did not announce anything we have clearly informed our customers of the situation.
The tapeout is almost complete and the path from here to ASIC is clearly drawn in the industry.
 
6. Yes, we should be able to run at 120Ghash/sec according to our tools and Verisilicon. Verisilicon gives us the SS corner for speed and TT corner for power. FF corner can be even faster.
 
For those who do not know:
SS = slow slow - absolutely lower limit (speed & voltage) where it can run
TT = typical typical - normal usage; note that 28nm is rated at 25C but leakage increases dramatically with the temperature. The real power consumption at 60C is only a guess at this stage.
FF = fast fast - higest speed, highest voltage, also the highest power consumption. - we have no data on this, it's only discovered while testing real chips.
 
7. We only have few Bitfuries left. It would mean to give everybody less than 1% of what they have ordered. This i more trouble than it worths.
 
8. The chip is designed in China, manufactured in Germany, packaged in Taiwan. Finally the Prospero will be assembled in China

http://ecointalk.net/topic/463-we-want-answers/page-3