From the eCoinTalk forum:
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.
Black Arrow response:
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
Wish we heard more from them. Just like an update a week, so customers aren't held hostage waiting to make their next move.
