Topic: FPGA's after ASICS arrive. (Read 1819 times)
We won't know the profitability of FPGAs after ASICs until we see the effect on difficulty. Personally, my FPGA setups can run until about 45-50 million difficulty before becoming unprofitable.
FPGAs are really nifty. They can do all sorts of things.
The problem is that FPGA mining rigs use boards very few I/O lines, which means that if you want to reprogram the chip for a new life, you have to desolder and re-ball the package for almost any other application. Still, there are plenty of people that can deal with BGA rework that salvage these things, and they are damn expensive new, so there is a thriving market for used ICs of all sorts.
The problem is that FPGA mining rigs use boards very few I/O lines, which means that if you want to reprogram the chip for a new life, you have to desolder and re-ball the package for almost any other application. Still, there are plenty of people that can deal with BGA rework that salvage these things, and they are damn expensive new, so there is a thriving market for used ICs of all sorts.
I suspect most people will be returning them for at least some recovery of their investment. BFL offers a trade up program, and Tom has said that he will pay up to $75 for any Spartan-6 chip, which is pretty much every other miner, like the MMQ, ZTEX, Icarus, X6500, and Cairnsmore1. FPGAs with multiple chips like the MMQ are eligible for up to $300.
FPGA's are programmable hence Field-programmable gate array.
I'd be interested in finding out if they can be programmed for Prime95 http://www.mersenne.org/ or even maybe used for processing SETI data.
I'd be interested in finding out if they can be programmed for Prime95 http://www.mersenne.org/ or even maybe used for processing SETI data.
I was looking through the forum and couldn't find any discussions regarding another use of fpgas after asics arrive(money making of course). If there really is no use would there be any market for selling them.
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