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

[Gator-hex]

Minion ASIC - Tapeout complete
23/02/2014: We are happy to report that VeriSilicon has completed our Minion ASIC yesterday and taped out to Global Foundries today.
Black Arrow is working hard to improve the existing designs of our miners and ensure that the pre-ordered miners will be assembled and dispatched immediately after the chips arrive from the factory.

I had a crypto meetup today and we were talking about BA.
Glad to see the tapeout completed.

BA and Asicminer are on my watch list for ASIC development. Should I pay attention to any others right at the present moment?

BitFury 2nd Gen. But no idea when. Supposedly soon though.

Everything is slated for March even BF2! If you are April or later delivery you're ROI is gonna be toast! Difficulty is rising 50% pm!

[necro_nemesis]

Miners IMHO are all about ASIC cost efficiency. The supporting systems are a significantly lesser concern. It would be nice to have a thread dedicated to comparing proposed ASICs with forecast production dates so one can try and interpolate ROI of a given device.

[Gator-hex]

Think about what I said though, someone out there somewhere is deploying 50% of the networks total hashing power, every month!

And you can bet it isn't us little guys! Mining is a really bad investment right now..

[necro_nemesis]

Think about what I said though, someone out there somewhere is deploying 50% of the networks total hashing power, every month!

And you can bet it isn't us little guys! Mining is a really bad investment right now..

Us little guys fund the the ASIC R&D and we might get thrown a bone with a device that might achieve ROI through the influx of money raising the value of BTC. Once the ASIC production line is up the costs to produce more ASICs for a large scale mining operation are fractional of the first run costs. I wondered why so much emphasis is on power efficiently when it's a small operating percentage to the costs of operating a mining device but it's importance rises if the device cost is minimal and your intent is to employ a lot as is the case in these large mining operations. Unfortunately the device you invest in the development of ultimately competes against you. The only way around this is for the manufacturers to agree not to compete with the folks who fund their business and us to not fund those who do.

In this case the logical "bone" to accommodate for the delay is to double the number of ASICs in the device's to compensate for the increased difficulty at release resulting from the delay. The additional ASICs are probably the most cost effective compromise for missing the target date for which orders were given.

One could just buy AM1 shares and join the party but it would be nice to see bitcoin which was made for the people remain with the people... as long as the people are us miners.

[fpgaminer]

Minion ASIC - Tapeout complete
23/02/2014: We are happy to report that VeriSilicon has completed our Minion ASIC yesterday and taped out to Global Foundries today.
Black Arrow is working hard to improve the existing designs of our miners and ensure that the pre-ordered miners will be assembled and dispatched immediately after the chips arrive from the factory.

Congratulations!

[tokona]

Minion ASIC - Tapeout complete
23/02/2014: We are happy to report that VeriSilicon has completed our Minion ASIC yesterday and taped out to Global Foundries today.
Black Arrow is working hard to improve the existing designs of our miners and ensure that the pre-ordered miners will be assembled and dispatched immediately after the chips arrive from the factory.

Nice!

[ChuckBuck]

Minion ASIC - Tapeout complete
23/02/2014: We are happy to report that VeriSilicon has completed our Minion ASIC yesterday and taped out to Global Foundries today.
Black Arrow is working hard to improve the existing designs of our miners and ensure that the pre-ordered miners will be assembled and dispatched immediately after the chips arrive from the factory.

Thank you so much!   

Great news and looking forward to the finished design of the miner. 

[Biffa]

So average time from tapeout to final chips in hand (as long as there are no problems) is around 2 months?

[Syke]

So average time from tapeout to final chips in hand (as long as there are no problems) is around 2 months?

It can vary alot based on the chip complexity, but that could be about average.

[n00dles0up]

Glad tapeout has been announced. Whats the next thing we can moan about whilst we wait 2 months?

Is this where BA announce on a weekly basis that everything is on track for May delivery and a week before May, we get told about a delay?

Apart from actually posting pictures, its a waiting game now, just 2 solid months before a fully fledged forum riot happens if BA anounce another delay or total failure.

[SirWizz]

Guys, let's get serious... there is a > 90% probability in my opinion that we will see additional delays. These guys are not pros like the KNC/OrSoc team and the chance of them being able to get everything right on the first try is quite small. Not zero mind you, they might get lucky... Sorry to be such a downer here but if you honestly believe they will deliver on April 30/May 1st you're likely to suffer another disappointment.

The good news is that by that time we've all probably moved on to the acceptance phase so this will not come as a shock anymore... two months will work wonders, you'll see!  

[K1773R]

anyone got a refund in BTC?

[jimmothy]

Guys, let's get serious... there is a > 90% probability in my opinion that we will see additional delays. These guys are not pros like the KNC/OrSoc team and the chance of them being able to get everything right on the first try is quite small. Not zero mind you, they might get lucky... Sorry to be such a downer here but if you honestly believe they will deliver on April 30/May 1st you're likely to suffer another disappointment.

The good news is that by that time we've all probably moved on to the acceptance phase so this will not come as a shock anymore... two months will work wonders, you'll see!  

Probably right. Bitmine (who also used VS/GF to manufacture chips) took 4 months from tapeout to shipping. I would guess that blackarrow has more experience producing hardware/asics so its possible they ship in ~3 months.

[ernie-]

Anyone know why the tape out was delayed by so many months? One moment I am reading batch #1 due to ship 24th. Feb, next moment people are wondering if tape out will be by 24th. Feb. That's an extraordinary delay which would have been known about months ago.

[nexus99]

I am on vacation first week of May... that is when they will deliver to our homes.

[Powell]

Think he already has contact GF.

[jimmothy]

Think he already has contact GF.

Nope! That's all Virisilicon correspondences, not GF.

Does it really matter though or are you just fishing for something to create fud?

Bitmine uses verisilicon/global foundries and are now shipping

Blackarrow has a confirmed contract with verisilicon. What more verification do we need that its not a scam?

I would think it would be counterintuitive to rake in several million usd in investments and proceed to spend a few million on tapeing out a chip so you can maybe convince a few more people to preorder before you run.

Why not just jump ship as soon as they had a few million in preorders?

[RickJamesBTC]

Have these guys shipped yet? At least you can buy back the bitcoin you are going to lose on them DIRT CHEAP right now

[Syke]

WOW! That's 1 1/7 Fortnights™. Must be some really killer shit they're hashin' there in The Mile High City, speaking of a khanjar vortex.

If anyone has good hash, it's the Mile High City.

[bobsag3]

QUESTION TIME!!!!

Why has MinerSource not migrated over their server/uploaded pictures from the recent trip to meet with BA?

Since the X-3 will be 2 units, will each of them get a 1400 Watt power supply?  Will they be 2 completely separate units that can run independently of each other?  If the power draw on each one is really that high, most people will need to run these in separate rooms of their house or blow a fuse in the US.

Will there be a way to add extra after market cooling (more fans or higher powered fans) since now we need to run these in the summer (May) and not the winter time (March)? 

Will the X-1 and X-3 be quiet enough to run at home?  With that high amount of electricity pulled, I feel like the fans will have to be working pretty hard, and thus be pretty loud.  Are you still confident that the goal of making these quiet is attainable?

These are important questions, because if they are going to be loud, and I need more power than I can pull in my house, then I, as well as others I assume, need to start looking for a place to host our miners.

Because the database has been a gigantic pain in the ass. I have 2 programmers working on it, and if they dont have a solution by friday I will be making them do it by hand.

Each X3 will have a separate PSU
They come with a 1400w, but each unit will not be pulling 1400w from the wall. There should be little issue running the full X3 on a standard US 120V 15A, but I will be double checking that.

I am not sure about the extra cooling, but the stock included cooling should be more than good enough even for OC'ed (based on the revised cooling numbers from the new HS)

They should be fairly quiet (the X1 defiantly), how quiet I do not know yet. Shouldn't be nearly as loud as a B1 Avalon for example.