So BCP on this page:
http://butterflylabs.com/What do you think these words mean?
65NM TECHNOLOGY PRODUCT LINE
UNITS IN STOCK. IMMEDIATE DELIVERY
I know that the 50GH units are caught up as per the blog, but there was no update Wednesday, so I have no idea where the littles and Jala's are at. I am guessing that the littles would be done or nearly done since I doubt more littles would have been sold than regular singles and I would think that the Jala's would be soon to finish if they have everything else done, as I remember something about a single person being able to build like 12 an hour. If all of the assemblers concentrate on them, I'd think they could crank out a lot. I'm just trying to patiently wait for the mailman to come tomorrow, my tracking number shows it left KC and already arrived in DSM. Since it's only a 30 min drive from DSM, I'm expecting it by noon tomorrow.
Jackrabbit... I don't think it is so much that I defend them, but that I raise the BS flag on those that spout ridiculous nonsense. None of us know the true story as to exactly what happened, but there are several who made outlandish claims that are so far in left field that I can't understand why the more intelligent trolls aren't shaking their heads over the blatant lies told my the rabid trolls. The guy who rose a stink over getting his single with a build date that was 3 weeks old, claiming it was full of dust and had been mined for weeks before being shipped is a great example. Since both PG and I visited the facility, I think he'd agree with me when I say that there just isn't enough room for them to have 3 weeks worth of product sitting and mining as this person claimed and the rooms I remember had their own internal cooling systems, so there should be no dust from external sources getting in as well..
Now, I've never had anything to say about their advertising. I really don't care one way or another. Every company out their makes claims, like KnC claiming to have supplied 70% of the network. This is so blatantly false that I'm truly amazed how blinded the trolls are to reality. The point is this... ever since I came to this forum, I've been repeatedly told that BFL would NEVER ship their products, that it was all a scam and that they would just take the money and run. Month after month went by and they continued shipping products. Now the tune is changed, since they have nearly completed their 65NM order book, the people go on and on about the lies and such. If you stop and think about it, all of the people who said they were a scam and were just fleecing people and would never ship anything are the liars now. Only they cannot admit that they were wrong, they need to shift their focus and find other things to point their fingers at.
The truly sad thing here is that you have a company that was hampered by it's overwhelming success. From recent statements, they had over 40,000 units sold. Josh once said they expected to hit 400 units a day, which would equate to ~100 days *if* there were no problems encountered. 100 days would be 20 weeks at 5 days a week and 16 weeks at 6 days a week. 4-5 months if there were no additional problems. Late June was when they started shipping other than Jalapenos, it's now late Nov and they are almost done... falls in line with the estimates. But, back to the 40,000 a sec... that's a huge number when you stop and consider that when they released their FPGA they only had to build something like 1500-2000. Coming from a background in electronics, I have a better understanding than most about the process of testing needed for items like this. My last posting was at the research and development station for Naval aircraft. I personally would want to do a 24 hour burn-in on any new equipment to guard against failure, but that would be impossible from the facilities I saw there. They'd need 3-5x the space to perform a proper testing based on my guidelines.
One of the other things nobody seems to stop and consider... unlike most of the other companies that are selling product, they are not just shipping out naked boards. Their units can be used by ANYONE with just a little instruction. You don't need to have an engineering degree to understand how to hook them up to your computer and get them running. In addition, unlike the other early ASIC sellers, when they saw the volume of requests, they didn't raise their prices to gouge their customers. The only price increase came when they realized their original specs were not going to pan out and they needed to redesign. So many people praise ASICMiner for selling asics that anyone could use, but no one seemed to care that they were being bent over in the process. If BFL had the same Morals as ASICMiner, then they'd have quadrupled their prices after the first days orders when they saw the demand.
Bick and other harp on the minutia without understanding the process. I've taken my little apart and I know from looking at it that it isn't as simple as ordering a board and slapping a chip on it as Bick expects people to do with his boards. The build process has many steps to it and because of this there is the added element of human error in each step of the process. If someone is tired, and if they are working 6 day weeks, I bet people are tired by now, mistakes are easy to make, but Bick and his cronies would have you believe that this is intentional so as to screw the customers.
I just noticed from the BFL blog that they are caught up on all but jalapenos and expect to be caught up on those in a few days. Obviously a pyrrhic victory at this point, but they did what they set out to do... at least now they won't have to deal with all the repeated "Where is my unit?!?!?" emails and hopefully be able to deal with support issues in a more timely manner.
It was a while back, and I could quite possibly not have a proper recollection of history... I do recall Garr was not entirely without blame as I recall sock-puppetry was involved with Garr needing to admit he was an ass-hat or somethingorother...