I'm taking my chances with KNCminer rather than shady russians, american escrow exporting lol. At least knc has a reputable company that has been doing this for 12 years, not some gay asian in a basement like Avalon. Even KNC is a risk with all their expertise.
Wheres the proof of the 12 years? 
Topic: What is the story with Metabank and Bitfury miners... - page 2. (Read 4851 times)
I'm taking my chances with KNCminer rather than shady russians, american escrow exporting lol. At least knc has a reputable company that has been doing this for 12 years, not some gay asian in a basement like Avalon. Even KNC is a risk with all their expertise.
You sounds like very Racists..
I detect more ignorance than racial undertones.
Either way Yifu is a bit of a freakin' legend in my book...(so far
) 
I'm taking my chances with KNCminer rather than shady russians, american escrow exporting lol. At least knc has a reputable company that has been doing this for 12 years, not some gay asian in a basement like Avalon. Even KNC is a risk with all their expertise.
You sounds like very Racists..
I think the "export scam" risk can be mitigated by the fact that russia being russia and a bunch of us, know a guy who knows a guy, who knows a guy in low places in Russia.
I think just like Avalon chips sales businesses springing up, while not as endearing, I can see some enterprising russians setting up a cottage industry of enforcer types reminding exporters of their responsibilities. I think a group of angry scammed miners would be willing to chip in a couple of BTC each to encourage shipment. Obviously worst case scenario for everyone.
I guess we will see... I ordered 1 this morning (but I am a bit of risk taker). I guess going with two different groups could mitigate the risk and amortize the cost delta (eggs/basket... etc.).
I think just like Avalon chips sales businesses springing up, while not as endearing, I can see some enterprising russians setting up a cottage industry of enforcer types reminding exporters of their responsibilities. I think a group of angry scammed miners would be willing to chip in a couple of BTC each to encourage shipment. Obviously worst case scenario for everyone.
I guess we will see... I ordered 1 this morning (but I am a bit of risk taker). I guess going with two different groups could mitigate the risk and amortize the cost delta (eggs/basket... etc.).
From what I understand Bitfury has credibility, but is not an engineer. He clearly doesn't want the hassle of dealing with overseas payments and shipping. I don't blame him, especially as he has local knowledge, and more importantly concerns w.r.t. Russian government, revenue and customs. If he is uncertain, what the hell should you be??!
Metabank's role in this is where it becomes unclear.
Almost certainly there will be scams involving intermediaries as they act as exporters. To me this is the weakest link in a convoluted chain.
This one currently is wayy above my risk comfort level base on common sense...
Metabank's role in this is where it becomes unclear.
Almost certainly there will be scams involving intermediaries as they act as exporters. To me this is the weakest link in a convoluted chain.
This one currently is wayy above my risk comfort level base on common sense...
I'm taking my chances with KNCminer rather than shady russians, american escrow exporting lol. At least knc has a reputable company that has been doing this for 12 years, not some gay asian in a basement like Avalon. Even KNC is a risk with all their expertise.
Personally I'm no less inclined to deal with a 'mad Russian' then I would be dealing with 'crazy Chinese' such as Avalon at a early stage. Of course there are risks involved, but from my research the possibility/chance that Metabank/Bitfury does indeed deliver is greater then it being a scam, and their price/gh is attractive enough that even if you drop the delivery/scam chance to 50/50 it's a investment that statistically looks very attractive.
This is a good idea for a thread.
I can add a snippet of info for you: Luke-Jr has ordered one of the units (presumably with his own BTC) to add BFGMiner support:
https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.2351778
On that same thread there is some discussion of the legality of exporting the hardware from Russia. BitCentury believe there is no reason you can't but they are getting their lawyers to double-check.
BitCentury seem OK and appear to have already thought about many of the issues, but as a non-Russian it is harder to verify Metabank's reputation, apart from the fact they have been in business for a while. There is to me a fair bit of risk about the project that in my mind is moderated by the reputation of Bitfury and the progress already made in developing the ASICs (i.e., the masks have been made and the engineering run is complete). He is expected to receive the engineering run batch of chips in about a week or so - if they check out, the full production run will happen shortly thereafter. So at least we should know very soon whether the production run of chips is a go or no-go.
I can add a snippet of info for you: Luke-Jr has ordered one of the units (presumably with his own BTC) to add BFGMiner support:
https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.2351778
On that same thread there is some discussion of the legality of exporting the hardware from Russia. BitCentury believe there is no reason you can't but they are getting their lawyers to double-check.
BitCentury seem OK and appear to have already thought about many of the issues, but as a non-Russian it is harder to verify Metabank's reputation, apart from the fact they have been in business for a while. There is to me a fair bit of risk about the project that in my mind is moderated by the reputation of Bitfury and the progress already made in developing the ASICs (i.e., the masks have been made and the engineering run is complete). He is expected to receive the engineering run batch of chips in about a week or so - if they check out, the full production run will happen shortly thereafter. So at least we should know very soon whether the production run of chips is a go or no-go.
I'm taking my chances with KNCminer rather than shady russians, american escrow exporting lol. At least knc has a reputable company that has been doing this for 12 years, not some gay asian in a basement like Avalon. Even KNC is a risk with all their expertise.
I have been mulling over Bitfury/Metabank the last couple of days.
Waiting for Avalon Batch 3 to ship and the rising network hash rate will do that.
Here is a summary of what I believe to be the facts:
- bitfury is well respected and a confirmed expert in the FPGA mining space
- metabank is a somewhat respected smaller bitcoin exchange like the russian version of campbx
- bitfury has designed a 65nm asic with compelling second generation specs
- metabank is selling a 120GHs miner based on Bitfury's chip design for ~19BTC but only selling within Russia
- the miner will not be standalone and will require specially provided mining software and eventually cgminer (though maybe not initially)
- bitcoin talkers with russian connections are setting up export businesses to pass through the domestic only sales for btw 3 and 8 BTC in profit
- most of these exporters are small operations and can't front the capital for a useful form of escrow (ie. if metabank doesn't deliver)
Risks:
- When prices/power are too good to be true... they probably aren't true... Bitfury miner is bordering on too good to be true.
- If bitfury is designing the chip but not the system, there are integration risks to the schedule
- Metabank might not be legit
- The export business isn't legit
- Miner may not be compatible with non-Russian power standards
- Miner for security reasons may not be exportable from Russia
Here are my Questions:
- Is bitfury building the whole machine too or just the asic (like BFL selling their chips) and Metabank has the first batch of chips with which to build their miner?
- Have any of the Russians here dealt with Metabank?
- Do they seem legit (i.e. is their business established enough that they would have more to lose by failing to deliver?)
- Will the miner be "easy" to use outside russia?
What other questions do people have?
Jump to: