Just as an idle conjecture, wouldn't bitcoin prices have to be significantly higher to maintain a network which was primarily gpu based, and therefore less energy efficient ?
BTC is going to die due to Asic's and Chinese Asic building tactics combine with self-mining.
I am in my late 50's and have seen a lot of patterns of commerce unfold.
Eth coin with a deadman's switch to pos has a better take on the game then BTC.
BTC is all about power cost... Due Chinese builder's of asic chips and not spreading them through out the world.
So as a developer that likes the general idea of crypto coins how do a pull a David on Goliath?
I make Eth coin to be followed by Eth 2 new algorithm coin. Thus the general ability of the GPU to mine endless algorithms bitche slaps all asic builders with dirt cheap power that practice self mining tactics.
China will still be able to mine cheaply with gpus ,but they won't have as much control over the distribution of them.
Asic building may die or They will be forced to adapt. By simply allowing chip sales out of their country so developers can make gear suited to the smaller low power guy. I know of 1800 senior citizen home in developments that us electric baseboard radiators all of them would be perfect for an s-3 type unit with a built in psu. That takes the hash out of big ass farms that are wasting the heat by not using it.
At finksy there are at least 100,000 gpus if they were r9 390's mining 24/7/365 mining eth coin certainly enough to catch the attention of Nvidia and AMD. Since it is more then likely it is 300,000 gpus mining some of the time. A gamer now buys the r9 390 and lets it mine while he sleeps. So in a few months his r9 390 only cost him ½ the price.
They will see pushing a new coin after Eth as an advertising cost.
Surely all someone has to do is come up with a way to build a ASIC miner packaged multi gpu box. i.e. buy the GPU's and mount multiples of them on boards like many of the current multi-small-asic miners (antminer, avalon, etc) clock them low enough to be kept cool by heatsinks and large fan combos and you are back in the mining race.
Yes it depends on being able to get raw gpu cores from AMD or whoever, or develop their own programmable asic but given the right incentives (money) someone will come up with a method of concentrating the crunching power into "boxes".
Maybe. Here is what I have been looking at from an economic viewpoint.
AMD and Nvidia are bigger by far then any asic company.
They have a vested interest in finding ways to market GPU's.
Eth coin is responsible for about 100,000 r9 390's in hash power 24/7/365
When you breakdown that 100,000 number we all know that some gamers will mine while they sleep and turn the mining off while they game.
Also some mine with r9 380's so Eth coin has driven far more sales then 100,000 r9's
So both Nvidia and AMD can prop up Eth coin as an advertising cost.
Asrock builds a gpu mining board so they can prop up Eth coin as an advertising cost.
Intel sells cpus they can prop up eth coin as an advertising cost
Amd sell cpus they can prop up eth coin as an advertising cost.
All of the above companies have zero interest or gain from asic chips.
So from an economical viewpoint GPU mining is going to stick around.
I see huge issues for Asic companies down the road.
A simple this ' tape will self destruct ' method for Eth coin. Ie turn it into a pos only coin once an asic builder makes a chip to mine it.
We already have Eth coin 2 in place with a new algorithm to fend off asics. You can keep your Eth 1 coin as pos or convert it to Eth 2 coin as pow
If I was an asic company I would be shitting myself as this could mean death to asic mining.
Note bitmaintech now has come out with a s-7 lite version in my opinion due to eth coin explosion.