Topic: Buying a Antminer S3 (Read 2447 times)

I want to try to start making babes with bitcoin mining...
hhhihihhihihi

You dont make money mining bitcoin. Sorry

yeah this is good advice.  you do not lose a lot if it ends up BTC is a bust.    the psu can be used for a pc.  the s-3 will provide some heat in the winter so buying one is a decent idea.

Don't pay too much. Buy direct from Bitmain or use a CC at somewhere like https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/antminer-s3-group-buy-credit-cards-accepted-now-batch-5-682528 for $500 instead of $550. Buy a new single rail 600w (or higher) PSU from Amazon, newegg, or some other reputable retailer.

There is a real risk in mining but Bitmain's S3 is a reasonable option given the current choices. I recommend buying new to avoid burnt out hardware.

Yea, well, read this first.

http://www.ihavebitcoins.com/featured/sustainability-small-scale-bitcoin-mining/


As of July 8th, 2014, not one bitcoin mining company can ship a machine that profitably mines bitcoin (even with free electricity). Overtime you could possibly make your money back; however, it is contingent upon the price of bitcoin going up.

Consequently, today’s rational decision from a financial standpoint is to buy bitcoin instead of mine.

KncMiner currently ships the most powerful ASIC miner on the market. Their $5,999 bitcoin miner claims to hash at a guaranteed 3 TH/s, consuming an average of 1,710 watts.

The graph above uses the bitcoin network mining reward formula. It incorporates the amount of hash power, current difficulty, and BTC rewarded per block. It will be recalculated in 2016 when the block reward amount changes.

The graph is approximate, not exact (+/- 1 BTC). However, I feel an average difficulty increase of 16% every 12 days is realistic; considering the most recent increase was 24.9%.

If you were to purchase a KncMiner, it would cost you a retail price of 9.675 BTC (at current prices). This means in order for mining to be profitable, you must mine at least 9.675 BTC. At the 16% average difficulty increase, 6.92 BTC is mined. Not enough…

After just three months, daily mining revenues are cut in half. At the end of 12 months, the miner won’t even produce enough bitcoin to cover your electric bill.

On the contrary, say you invest $5,999 in bitcoins. Today you will have 9.675 BTC, and after 12 months you will still have 9.675 BTC. If the price stayed the same after a year, you would still have $5,999 worth of bitcoin. If you bought the miner and the price was the same, you would end up with around $4,300 ($620*6.9 BTC).

Hmm…So why would anyone ever mine bitcoin as opposed to buying it?

As of today, anyone who understands the bitcoin network should realize mining at a small scale will never be profitable.

It seems as if the bitcoin network is moving faster than our latest ASIC technology. Three months ago, the majority of bitcoin miners on the market would generate attractive returns. Today, since the network continues to experience exponential growth, the required amount of hash power to cost-efficiently mine has reached a new plateau.

Innovation will drive a future company to supply the market with new “state-of-the-art” miners that hash at a whopping 10+ Th/s. Bitcoin enthusiasts will jump on this opportunity. However, the bitcoin ecosystem is designed to adapt to this type of innovation.

The first to get their hands on the miners will be making tons of bitcoin. Then, all of a sudden, Deja Vu…

History will repeat itself and we will be in the same position as we are today.

For individuals wanting to mine on a small scale, the bitcoin price must be contingent upon the cost of mining.

Never pay for a miner with more bitcoin than you predict it will generate. If it costs 9 BTC to buy a miner, and it will only mine around 6 BTC, don’t buy it!

The goal is to buy a miner with a small amount of bitcoin and turn it into a large amount. When this is achieved, you have essentially hedged you position in the bitcoin ecosystem.

I really like btcinvest.net's calculator in comparison to the others I've seen. I estimate that with future diff increases of 15% (based on last 6 months), your return on the $550 miner would be about $400 - assuming 100% uptime. Now, if you're into mining and hoping for a profit - then you're hoping that the future diff increases won't continue to be 15%. To break even, they'd have to be at about 10% from here on out.

http://btcinvest.net/en/bitcoin-mining-profit-calculator.php?diff=16818461371&dcosts=550&diff_mincrease=15&blpbtc=25&dhsmhs=478000&diff_mincreasedecrease=0.0&btcusd=600&dpowcon=366&btcusd_mincrease=0&pcost=0.13&calcweeks=15&dleadtime=1&action=calc

Mining now for profit is tough for small miners due to the ever increasing difficulty rate.  You will definitely enjoy mining and the S3 is great for starting.  If you only see profit as fiat in the hundreds with the one miner you'll have to wait for the btc value to go up.  But again the days of small investing and large payouts may be on there way out.  I say get it and enjoy learning, watching payouts hit your wallet.  It really is a fun hobby and potentially a huge investment for the near future.  If your not interested in it for the hobby aspect just buy btc directly, in a few years you'll be glad you did.  If looking for profit buy one now and purchase a second when you can, then a third.  I imagine the heat on the S3 can't be worse than the S1 ( just 2 heated my small house during the winter) and they're not that loud.  Enjoy!

LOL, thanks for the corrections

You forgot to add "in the same day"

Corrected you, Have faith! 

For one thing, you are figuring this at the current difficulty level only, your not considering that the difficulty changing around every 2 weeks.  Another thing that you aren't considering is that the price of the bitcoin itself fluctuates and can either rise to $1k or drop to $350 per btc.

Bitcoin mining profitability calculator
Enter your set up information in the form below. Do not enter commas, only dots for decimal separator.
Bitcoin difficulty 16,818,461,371
Bitcoins per Block (BTC/block) 25
Conversion rate (USD/BTC) 623.71
Hash rate 470 GH/s
Electricity rate (USD/kWh) 0.13
Power consumption (W) 366
Time frame (months) 12
Cost of mining hardware (USD) 600
Profitability decline per year 0.61

Results
Difficulty   16,818,461,371.00
Mining Factor 100   0.00 USD/24h@100MHash/s as in these charts
Average generation time for a block (solo)   4 years, 318 days (can vary greatly depending on your luck)
Hardware break even   84 days
Net profit first time frame   1509.04 USD
Coins per 24h at these conditions   0.0141 BTC
Power cost per 24h   1.14 USD
Revenue per day   8.77 USD
Less power costs   7.62 USD
System efficiency   1284.15 MH/s/W
Mining Factor 100 at the end of the time frame   0.00 USD/24h@100MHash/s
Average Mining Factor 100   0.00 USD/24h@100MHash/s
Power cost per time frame   417.09 USD
Revenue per time frame   2526.13 USD
Less power costs   2109.04 USD

I don't think your calculation is right, you shoulnd't ROI if you have a high electricity charges. (0.13 is consider high)

I want to try to start making money with bit coin mining. I have used a bit coin calculator and I would make money and lose none over 12 months. I have found one (http://minersource.net/products/bitmain-antminer-s3-available-july-26th) and a psu (http://minersource.net/products/thermaltake-smart-series-sp-750m-750w-atx-psu) but im wondering if I should follow through on this. My electricity costs are about 0.13/kWh. I really want to buy one too. Im worried about the bitcoin market. I cannot predict what will happen but im assuming the flow is controlled so it doesn't inflate or deflate. Im still new to bitcoin mining. Should I buy it? Thanks And Could someone link a guide/support link to the Antminer S3 if there is one?