Topic: Who will be mining a year from now? (Read 2473 times)

But today's diesel family hatchback is faster, safer and more comfortable than the supercar of the 80s.

Less than a year ago I was excited about hitting 500MH/s.  Now I've got 30GH/s, with another 10GH/s on it's way (some soon, some BFL slow).  I'm only a hobbyist, and only buy mining hardware paid for by mining.

The chart is less than two months worth, it's almost all ASIC, the entire CPU,GPU,FPGA net hash was like 50TH/s. or less at it's peak.

What do you think difficulty will be at?
35 billion is certainly within the range of possibility

Referencing historical charts is folly. 

The charts represent disruptive leaps from CPU to GPU to FPGA to ASIC technologies.  ASIC is the pinnacle.  Charts from the ASIC period onward will be relevant, but right now the charts show horse and buggy, Model T's, '57 Chevy, and 2013 supercars. 

Wake me when it shows just supercars.

lmao!! I knew I forgot one critical element in my whole ROI calculation with regards to my BFL purchases. I forgot to freakin have kids!! Talk about a serious oversight on my part.

...or maybe there's a whole different situation after all. Anyone sees a pattern here?

35 Billion?  Care to make a bitbet to that effect???

I can use my mining rig to heat my gym room this winter. I don't know if I'll be mining in a year from now. I've been looking at it 60 days at a time. It doesn't seem to make sense to add more mining hardware in my tiny house. If Bitcoin is still something I'm interested in 12 months from now, I'll probably be buying them or earning them rather than mining them.

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Here is what mining will be a year from now:

- All miners will use 28nm technology.
- Miner power consumption will be roughly 0.5w per GH/s
- The speed of a medium-sized mining machine will be 1 TH/s, but there will be 2+ TH/s machines available. There also will be plenty of smaller machines in the 200 GH/s range.
- The medium-sized 1 TH/s machine will cost in the hundred of dollars range. Probably $400 to $750.
- Difficulty will be around 30-35 billion.
- The vast majority of mining will take place in areas of the world with cheap electricity.
- The average Bitcoin enthusiast will fit into one of two categories:
    - Miners who have very cheap or free electricity (perhaps in an apt or dorm room where electricity is include). They will pay off their device in roughly 6 month to a year and make a very small profit.
    - Miners who do not have cheap electricity but choose to mine for fun or simply to secure the bitcoin network.

I'll be mining my gear until I get no coins anymore. The cold months are beginning so for the next few months I view the electricity costs as heating expenses (heater won't have to be turned on as much so I save what it costs me for electricity) and only look at how much coins I get in.

I tend to believe too, that the transaction fees will be the reward of the future. As per mining; most possible I will be mining too forever no matter the electricity bill. My 60GH/s will render itself non profitable within a month (or two) from now according to the genesisblock calc (I was hoping for May-June '14). I got it for 30BTC back then, and most possible it will never manage to make the half of it...  but I don't really mind, as long as I see the stats rising and the fans spinning.

I'm surprised no one has mentioned transaction fee's yet.
As the reward per block goes down over the years, transaction fee's will become the dominate bitcoin return.


As far as mining, or not. If the goal is to end with the most btc in a given period of time, then with these conditions you'd be foolish not to just buy them directly and hold em.
Mining at a loss, is just..... lost. 

I will be mining possibly forever, BTC price is being held down (my opinion only) I am happy for mining to actually cost me a little at the moment (plus it actually saves on heating in the winter) as I believe I will reap the benefits a few years down the line.

One thing I think could really mess up the big data center miners is if Bitcoin-QT was extended to support small scale mining per node with a shared pool across all nodes.  Many people interested in Bitcoin wouldn't mind the cost of a sub $20 Block Erupter USB and the 2.5W of power consumption.  Get a few thousand nodes out there running these, seeing a steady trickle of BTC as a reward, and it keeps the mining level at a degree where it isn't profitable for the data centers while still providing plenty of blocks to secure the network.  My $150 investment (7 x Block Erupter USB + hub + fan) won't ever turn a profit but at least it will keep the network safe and sound.

I am pretty sure eventually ALL ASIC companies will be selling bulk chips.  HF is talking about somewhat of a middle road in selling bare modules (the ASIC PCB) and letting third parties assemble them into larger systems (host, connectivity, power, cooling, case, etc).  There is certainly a business precedent for doing it.  Look at AMD.  AMD sells no video cards anymore.  They just sell millions of GPU chips and license reference designs to OEMs who sell to the general public. 

I understand there is added value to a datacenter however Bitcoin is all about margin and efficiency.  At $0.20 per kWh (no matter how super duper wonderful it is) it is unlikely you can remain competitive for any extended period of time (say 12-18 months). For example difficulty could rise so high that you have a negative operating margin but someone with lower input costs can still buy MORE rigs because power is only 30% of their gross revenue.

Call it a "glorified" warehouse if you want but if your plan doesn't have a lower marginal cost you have no hope to profit on any long term scale.  The break even efficiency is going to be set by people with lower input costs then you.   Iceland has decent power rates (most of Europe is a dead end for commercial scale mining) but it isn't anything unusual.  The northwest of US has similar low power rates, and mild climate.   I agree with the larger context in looking for low input costs and mild climates just pointing out long term paying $0.20 per kWh using ASICs makes about as much sense as paying $0.20 per kWh using GPU.


Datacenters (anywhere in the world) are going to be money pits for commercial scale mining.   The largest input is the energy cost,  rent is generally cheap.  Hell you could throw in chiller cooling, 24/7 security, and fire supression and end up with an amortized cost of less than $24,000 annually per rack.

One of the things that is happening is the ASiC suppliers are focusing on big farms and not small miners, that trend will continue,  however some ASIC suppliers will end up just selling bulk chips, so the DIY market should continue although it will lag behind the corporate farm shipments. Remember that it's  the lowest Wattage per GH/s that will end up winning, as ther is no such thing as free electricity.

Again, that price isnt for electricity, its for a full service datacenter rack. If you want a glorified warehouse, I still think Iceland could be the perfect place to build it. A few years old, but try to beat this:


Dirt cheap, 100% green and geographically not in the worst place imaginable inbetween the EU and US.

"My garage" was tongue in cheek not a serious offer however you will be competing against people who's costs are much lower.

I didn't realize the price was in Euro well that is just horrible (~$0.20 per kWh).    Like I said not bad for a datacenter but the margin on mining is going to be a lot lower.  When industrial space (think racks in a warehouse) is cheap in parts of the US and China and marginal power rates are $0.05 paying more than double just means you will be the "marginal miner".

I know, but your garage doesnt supply 99.995% SLA's, nor did you include cooling costs (if you have several Sierra's), you probably have very limited theft prevention, no one on 24/7 standby etc. The fact the first quote I asked for a single rack is already competitive with most of our electricity rates alone bodes pretty well. I"ll see if I can work something out.

Oh and your garage probably doens thave 100% green energy. Even if it does, you would be using green energy that would otherwise replace non green energy elsewhere, making no real difference whereas in Iceland it really wouldnt contribute to pollution at all. They have far more (100% green) electric capacity than they can use.

PS, price was in euro, not dollar.