Topic: Alpha Technology Litecoin (Scrypt) ASIC Miner Order Batch 1 Now! - page 179. (Read 529096 times)

Keep up the good work VesperWillow.

If you're that daft, I'll just drop out of this thread. The units, if they use electricity, have to be certified themselves. This has been an issue for many "first time ASIC miner manufacturers". HashFast and others ran into the same cockblock, it didn't matter if the PSU was external and certified. Without third party certification, the system will fall under scrutiny and import could be a problem for people.

It was in one of the responses which has since been removed. This thread was halfway into page 77, and now it's dropped a page. Responses have been lost for some reason. Since it's no longer there, obviously there's no proof. I just recall re-reading the paragraph about 3x before posting up and asking folks if I'm mis-reading it.

What motive would I have for spreading any fear, uncertainty or doubt? I don't have any monetary interest or hopeful gains of competitors' products for any mining gear at all right now. I've simply followed AT from day 1.

Oh so your your just spreading FUD for the public good?  There is no CE issues anymore and you know that.  As they're shipping separate and external PSU's that are off the shelf plus already certified.  Which will drastically help with any heat issues.  So why an Earth would they now come out and say special extra colling is needed now.  When they have just made them a lot cooler.

Trollol  

No, it was in one of the things Fiaz said, either a response or a posting of an update. In going back, I see that it has been deleted along with some other stuff. This thread dropped another half page again, posts are being removed.

I have no dog in this game, I have no orders with A/T or their competition. I'm just keeping track of them. They (he?) said that you don't want to rely on just airflow from a fan, but you want supplimental cooling for the units.


They still haven't addressed the CE issue with their equipment. It looks like they tried to dodge the bullet by saying that they're including commercial power supplies in the shipment, which are already certified, but their *miner* has to be CE certified as well--not just the PSU. Another point they're avoiding.

Don't just wave the FUD flag when it's merely unbiased concern.

You assume the wording of the contract is malicious, when I  simply see a company, that wants to protect itself from the unknown.

- AT said Q2/Q3 for delivery at the very beginning
- before Gridseed and Company even came out with their ASICs, AT changed that to July

If I am out to scam people, why would I not just stick with Q2/Q3?
I already have all the pre order money. I could then produce the chips, put them to mine in July, tell people to pay the balance, because I'll ship in September.

Please understand, that I'm just as concerned about some of the things that are going on, as most AT customers are, but I refuse to brand AT as a scam, when there is zero evidence to support it.

Thanks Retro. Like I said, I'm not happy with the situation and hope (not my favorite word) that things work themselves out here.
Perhaps the truth lies somewhere in the middle. Apparently, a lot of what you have posted is true, so things don't look great. 
I wouldn't exactly call me an optimist here, but I'm not a pessimist. I don't even take what has been said as being against me, just
differing opinions and interpretations. Not sure how you all feel towards one another, but this is not at all personal to me with
anyone on this forum. I would easily hang out and talk Bitcoin with most anyone here.      I never lose sight of the fact that this
is essentially about customers and Alpha Technology, and there is no reason for use as customers to be vehemently against one another.
I don't get that feeling even with the disagreements.

Brian - We are not at the deadline yet (lets say end of July) so as far as what we are to receive we can say a 50Mhs unit and not 5Mhs. (or the larger units)
I hope you are wrong with your 6 months from now statement. You may very well be right, but if there is a delay, 6 months would be incredulous considering
what AT is doing is not exactly new (like when the other manufactures entered the field.) Well, the Scrypt part is new I guess.

I'm not sure about the way the contract is worded. Can you post what it is that you are talking about? This might be something Retro can add to his
collection of problems. I follow your example and that was pretty bright of you as it seems many companies do indeed try to cover for themselves
should problems arise. No reason to put stuff in writing if you don't intend to ever use it. So I am very curious about what the contract states.

Take care guys
IAS

I think we should cut IAS some slack. He's one of the few Alpha customers with the balls to routinely post in this forum and although I find some of his posts optimistic and annoying sometimes (sorry mate), he does at least put some thought into them and is big enough to try to defend his position and not just post and run like some of the Alpha supporters.

I may not agree with some of his opinions but I appreciate that he's here making them and not hiding behind the ban hammer on the Alpha forums.

No, you went from having no miner, to having no miner.  You went from 0Mh/s to 0Mh/s. 
Let me word it another way.  They have specifically worded the contract in such a way that they are under no obligation to deliver a device to you in any specific time frame, or even at all.  They go out of their way to make that point clear.  If they have every intention of delivering to you first, and not themselves, why word the contract like that?  Reminds me of a deal I was involved in years ago where the customer wanted to put some ridiculous clause in the contract that in effect, would have allowed them to accept our services rendered, and then not pay us.  I refused naturally.  They argued with me to some length about how they would never actually enforce that clause, it was just something they put in all their contracts.  I argued back that if they were not planning on enforcing it, and wouldn't enforce it like they promised, then it didn't need to be there at all. 
Anyways, the point is, they built a mining operation, and at the same time as they were building their mining operation locked people into contracts with no delivery date.  These were not mistakes or accidents or coincidences.  6 months from now when people actually get their machines no one will even remember what was promised, all that will be there is what is written.  As a general rule, that is how businesses operate.
One thing is for sure, I'm in the wrong line of work.  I need to stop dealing with businesses and start dealing with the general public instead!

Let me try to answer your questions as well as involve some of your replies in the threads that followed.

I'm not sure I follow your analogy. We have went from a 5Mh/s miner to 50Mh/s miner. A few extras were pulled, which would be analogous to bells and whistles in a car, and replaced with a lot more H.P.

Where did I say this is going to turn out well (lately). Maybe in the beginning of the whole thing. I've clearly stated multiple times that I am concerned about what is to come. Have you been reading the thread lately? What I have stated lately is to back off the personal attacks and lets just stick to the facts. It is much more reasonable to read what Retro writes (and admirably spent time collecting, thinking up ,etc.) without all the personal attacks on Fiaz. I'm not saying to not say someone lied, but when you mix facts with subjective derogatory name calling, it hurts the state of the online community here. It serves to disenchant and break down. IT becomes like a group mentality and everyone is pulled down to another level. Let the facts speak to that.

Regarding do I think they will send it to me and not mine. I most certainly do. I'm not sure if you are projecting what you would do, but when a business tells me they are not going to use my device before shipping it AND that they are not getting in the mining industry, I take that at face value. Now, if there were lots of lies along the way, I will re-asses, but thus far the question is "Will they deliver on time." and you are stating that due to greed, they will mine. How could you possibly know, especially when they most clearly stated they are not getting involved with mining on numerous occasions. Again, have you been reading the thread and their updates? Remember that Dexcel is doing the chip work out of India, they are a large company and they risk a lot should they get involved with something that seems illegal to me. Alpha Tech is more the brains of the operation in England. Units will ship from India. Dexcel would have to be actively involved in this operation and if anything like what you are suggesting were to happen, I would hope we could attack it legally. If not, then there is no sense in being involved in the future. Sort of like crowd-funding with little to no rewards.

By doing things exactly the same, I think you are confusing corruptness with things (maybe) beyond their control. This is the unknown. I agree with Retro and Vesper about a lot of the writing on the wall, but we still have 4 weeks and there is not need to pay right now, not for 2 weeks after the payment processor is up. And if they don't have something good to show me at that time, I probably don't pay and seek to remedy the "deposit situation" which seems not to follow the law. I can't at this point in time say that we are not getting our miners.

In your reply to diego2000 you state "Put another way, say YOU had a couple hundred 250Mh/s miners right now.  Would you really head down to Fed Ex tomorrow and ship them off, or would you wait a while, make some money, and THEN sell them?  All due respect, I think it is very naive to think they would leave all that money on the table." This sounds like something you would do and you are projecting it onto others. I would ship them off because I honor my word. Life is not about making as much money as I can. We reap what we sow. I'm not sure how you can judge AT when you are basically saying you would do something that you are accusing them of, because, well, it is the "natural" thing to do.

Maybe they are getting into this business to use it as a funder for mining, but that is disingenuous and me myself would not do that. If I wanted to get into mining and to sell units I would make that point clear, at least when the time arose. I think KNC actually did something like this (got into mining without explicitly saying so at first). Your posts seem really to just focus on corrupt behavior, and I'm not saying that isn't happening, but I am not going to assume the worst when they have said otherwise regarding mining themselves. But yes, a lot of questions need answering and I hope Retro can collect the good ones and we can post it over on their forum.

This thread has gone from fact collections, to name calling and now assumptions on borderline illegal activity. I won't take part in that. That may be the case, but I am not going to get pulled into darkness and projections and fear. However, I will not be ignorant considering all that has transpired, but as I said before, I don't think we are exactly behind schedule though we are in a critical spot (and we need those before mentioned questions answered to know - and yes, it doesn't look great.). A powerful and factual update (with physical evidence) is what is needed. Let's see what happens the next few days and weeks. We don't really have a choice in the matter and perhaps things change. If I'm wrong so be it, but through this, as tough as it may get I will be a human being the best that I can.

Its about sharing

I guess we will have to agree to disagree then.  I think it is very obvious they want to be in the mining business.  They didn't build a cloud mining center just to test these things.  They could have picked any microprocessor industry they wanted to and they picked this one?  Why would they pick Scrypt ASICS if they didn't want to get into mining? 
I think your answer demonstrates a fundamental misconception about how this industry operates.  NONE of these ASIC manufacturers are in this business of  selling miners to customers.  None of them.  When bitcoin (and now Litecoin) became valuable enough for large scale mining operations to be profitable, a number of companies saw the potential of building purpose built machines for mining.  The idea of selling preorders to customers is simply a means of financing that leaves the company with an interest free loan from people who have no claim on their assets and no oversight (banks and venture capitalists demand things like transparency, oversight, risk management, you know, all the things that customers complain about but agree to do without anyway)  Trust me, if these things retained their value at all you would never get anything, they would just refund you.  As it is, with these things losing their value so quickly, it provides them with a great interest free loan, and then a place to dump off their old products when they don't need them anymore.  Meanwhile, people like you think you are an actual [valued] customer and can't imagine why they treat you like crap.  Never realizing that they never wanted customers in the first place.  And besides, they don't have to treat anyone nicely.  They can treat you like complete garbage and still get, what was it you called it?  The benefit of the doubt. 

Anyways, I guess there isn't really anything left to say about this company.  To all who ordered from them, I wish you the best of luck.  Hopefully you didn't lose too much money when the dust settles.  I guess the good news for people who like to throw their money away, GAW just announced their preorders for fourth quarter.  So I'm sure we will be having this exact same discussion again soon. 

You know we could discuss this questions to oblivion. What I highlighted is the real question.

I believe AT wants to be in the Asic business, not the mining (at least not for now). If that is true, then they will send them out as soon as they get them, even if they want to make money mining. With the good press they would get, there would be an immense amount of money coming in for batch 2.

How is it a stretch at all?  We know they are miners.  They have said as much.  We also know that if by some miracle they can pull this off, they will for a very very short period of time have in their hands the most powerful miner on the market.  You honestly believe they are going to leave millions of dollars on the table and ship those miners to their customers?  Really?  Bearing in mind that the contract with their customers specifically states that there is NO guaranteed delivery date and they can deliver whenever they want, or not at all (essentially refunding instead)?  Put another way, say YOU had a couple hundred 250Mh/s miners right now.  Would you really head down to Fed Ex tomorrow and ship them off, or would you wait a while, make some money, and THEN sell them?  All due respect, I think it is very naive to think they would leave all that money on the table.  I only mentioned other companies because to date, no company has picked their customers over themselves when placed in that position.  So it seems to me a bit like a little kid who has stuck his finger in every electrical outlet in the house but he is going to do it one last time because hey, this outlet may be different.  

But the question still stands.  What has this particular company done differently that makes you think this is going to turn out better for the customers than all the other preorders before it?

I do not see anything about having to have a special air cooling system in the update.

Spreading FUD much?

Their cooling lingo just caught my eye, after re-reading their update. They're saying how you'll *have* to have an official air cooling system (air conditioning, etc) to compliment their gear, instead of just relying on fans. That's kindof odd.

I'm not saying it isn't smart, or that it wouldn't help, but it shouldn't be a requirement if the system is designed with proper thermal dissipation in mind. The PCB's need wide copper lines in the right places, and you just need the right cooling on the chip itself. I've seen Blade units stacked in hot rooms without issues, so why would AT's stuff "need" extra cooling? Especially running at lower wattage.

Unless it's their way of legally wiping their hands of instability issues down the road, with chips with high variance of quality.

Is it just me, am I mis-reading their wording?

Your friend paying the entire order in BTC makes no sense at all because:

-BTC payments where not available for pre order deposits (if I remember correctly...go ahead and correct me, if I'm wrong)
-paying the balance was not necessary, since it was made clear by AT, that you have two weeks after credit cards where accepted to pay

What am I missing?

Oh man...you ain't even right!!  Didn't lose any money personally with these guys but a good friend of mine paid for his entire order in BTC.

I know you asked IAS, but I hope you won't be offended if I jump in.

The highlighted above is a bit of a stretch, since you are basically saying that all people (and companies) are the same.
I choose to give someone (or a company) the benefit of a doubt, before I crucify them.

The question on my mind is not, whether AT wants to do right by their customers. I truly believe they want to.
The real question is if they can.

Our position as customers is not actually that bad, since we have two weeks from the date that the payment processor is up, to pay the balance. By then, they should have something of importance to show us.

So, right now, we have the luxury of being able to wait for the real update, since this last one was forced by many on their forum.

My 2 cents

Its About Sharing,

The thing is all those things you mentioned were promised in the original deal that customers payed for.  It would be a little like paying an extra 5k to have leather seats in your car, then you go to take delivery and the seats are cloth, and the sales guy tries to tell you how cloth is better cause you won't burn yourself on a hot day (but of course won't give back the 5 grand). 

You like to ask questions, so here is one for you.  Why do you think this is going to turn out well?  It is obvious to anyone that doesn't have stake in this company that they will not be completed on schedule.  And even if it is, do you really think they are going to send it to you?  They are very open about also building a cloud mining operation.  Do you really think they are going to give you machines first and then themselves?  Given that they have no contractual delivery date with you can deliver whenever they feel like it, or not at all?

It isn't like this company came along and said they know how preorders have gone in the past and they wanted to do it different, and then did things different.  This preorder has gone so far exactly like every other proerder ever, and we all know how those turned out for customers.  So my question to you is, given that they have done things exactly the same, why do you think this will somehow turn out different for customers?

I know this can be a serious problem but chances are probably pretty good that these chips work fine due to 3 reasons: 1 - Very simple design relative to CPU's and more complicated processors. 2 - They have been working on the design a while so hopefully they got it right. (I know, there is that word again). 3 - They are not the first to design ASIC's. A bit has come before them and hopefully they have done their DD. But point taken, it is a chance. And all the more reason to extend the payment cut off date as I said above.

Those chips should either be finished or just about finished as it has been, what, 2+ months now?

Agreed

Isn't this the same as any miner, regardless of where the PS units are? I would even venture to say that external PS's are better for cooling as it is that much more heat removed from the cases.
I have just a 50Mh unit on order. 400 watts should be fine in my room, as long as there is adequate air flow. I will probably have to replace the stock fans with something more quiet though, as I have a feeling they will be on the loud side.
But for those who have the larger units, yes, they better be ready for all the wattage (draw) and heat. And very good point about the rack mountability. Perhaps the depth of the rack is enough to place the PS's in the front or back and out of the way of the air flow? No idea.

Agreed

Mostly agree. They mentioned that the components in their miners will be industrial. I would greatly hope that they stick with that plan there and extend it into the PS's. I have a now decommissioned 80Gh/s btc miner (group buy) and the new High End PS unit (albeit a newer model) lasted about 4 or 5 months before cutting off under 24X7 use. So this is a concern. Amazon offered me a refund as they had no more in stock, so I figured the 80 bucks put into BTC is more than I would mine back minus costs over the next year.



You have a nice collection of questions and points. To have this organized with the input of other people and to be posted on their forum seems reasonable.
Thanks for the information.
IAS

We all know how it went with BFL. Enclosed link for their timeline and its execution. Good (short) lecture about some potential bumps on the road.

https://forums.butterflylabs.com/announcements/692-bfl-asic-status.html

Please notice, that when it comes to updates, BFL had done very good job actually. They were much more informative than Alpha currently is. You could see a lot of WIP pictures of wafers, test chips, chips, boards as the progress continued. Right now Alpha wants to compress the process, that BFL needed 5 months to complete,  to 2-3 weeks.