Any new news on the Pods? Was hoping the silence meant chips have been sourced or in the works.
I gotta admit I've been lurking on this thread without a single post, just waiting for a release date or something solid with the chips before I commit. I know for a fact sidehack is solid and I've bought from him before in the tune of $1,000, me sending first, with no reservations. He has done me right everytime and his breakout boards and miners work great. Big work for a small operation to be sure.
That said, the longer Bitmain puts us off, the less these S5 chips will be worth working with. Its a bit sad for me because I once tried to work with some people on creating a miner based on first gen Avalon chips, and Avalon not providing us with chips when promised killed it. It cost us all more than you can imagine. We spent months non-stop getting things ready for the chips. Im never going through that one again. Mind you this was durring another 10%-20% per adjustment period, just like the one were entering. This kind of diff adjustment makes the pressure on delivery and money lost compounded in a harsh way.
And just so you know (for those who don't, this was mid 2013, and the major topic of discussion on the forum at the time) Avalon claimed that the "Chinese Mafia" (Yes, this was the actual excuse for not delivering the chips) extorted them and...uhmmm...sorry.
Sorry you guys spend tens of thousands on community funded R&D and sorry you collected millions of dollars in funds for the chips. Sorry people spent months of non-stop work on OPEN SOURCE design just to have us not deliver chips and improve on your (now FREE) design.
I've never really gotten over that one and sorry to say I never expected bitmain to ever offer chips despite saying "maybe". I do however support bitmain with my continued business buying miners and they have never done me wrong with direct purchases. I am dubious however of their intentions of ever providing a chip for sale. I'll take a maybe as a no.
Avalon is another story altogether. While I think its clear they have improved as a business, I'll never trust that company again, for good reason.