Bitmain just announced the Antminer E3 for mining Ethash - Look out for a price jump on Ethereum!

Dear Steemit Friends,

It was only two months ago when I first posted about rumors that Bitmain would be soon releasing an ASIC in order to mine Ethereum. We all knew this was inevitable given Bitmain's track record of jumping in and trying to corner the cryptocurrency mining space for the most popular currencies.

Fast Forward a couple of months later to today and as expected, Bitmain has announced their newest ASIC the Antminer E3 for mining cryptocurrencies based on the hashing algorithm Ethash.

Most Ethereum mining today is done using GPUs assembled into an open-frame mining rig. I myself am mining Ethereum using 6 RX 480 GPUs with a combined average hashrate of ~165 Mh/s. I have been mining Ethereum for approximately 2 years now and have luckily already seen an ROI on my equipment.

The Specs for the new Antminer are a bit "hazy," with an expected hashrate of 180MH/s consuming about 800W of power. Bitmain has stated that "These are the conservative estimates and that they expect the miners to deliver higher performance and efficiency when they are ready to ship." Looking at the design of the miner, I would assume that the device is made up of a number of GPU boards similar in design to that of existing mining rigs and GPU servers of today.

I would assume though, that this ASIC has been optimized for mining with many of the non-essential hardware removed to save on space and cost.

Impact on Mining Today

As an existing Ethereum miner, I am both excited and sad about the new announcement. The cost alone for the amount of hashing power that Bitmain offers in this device makes mining Ethereum a lot more affordable. My current GPU rig cost me roughly $1300+ USD to build and runs at an average hashrate less than Bitmain's $800 device. This means I can increase my hashrate with new devices at almost half the cost. On the flipside, this new ASIC will also mean an increase in the overall network hashrate which means an overall increase in the difficulty to mine and a decrease in earnings. Looking at Bitmain's past deployments for previous miners, they will be shipping these out in truckloads to users.

It is expected as well that GPU prices will begin to normalize, which should make gamers happy, but could signal tough times for miners who are looking at resell value of their existing hardware.

What are the concerns?

Vitalik Buterin has always been in opposition of ASICs. Ethereum has fundamentally always been ASIC resistant and for a while now has been one of the goto currencies for GPU miners. With the release of the E3 Antminer, things will definitely change. It is unsure how Buterin and Ethereum will react to the news and if potentially ETH will be forked in order to remain resistant to this ASIC. On top of this, there isn't really much information on the miner itself and the technology "under the hood." In the event that it is decided to fork ETH, GPU miners can simply update the software used to mine in order to continue mining after the update, however, if the technology in the E3 ASIC is based on a GPU configuration, the Antminer could simply update as well. Then again, Bitmain can restrict this update in order to sell new and updated equipment making this Antminer obsolete and useless - which I wouldn't put it past them.

Worth a Shot?

At the current price point of $800, the miner is affordable enough to experiment and take a risk. I myself have pre-ordered one unit in order to test, review, and more than double my existing hash rate. At the current price of Ethereum using the standalone hash rate I would get from the Antminer E3, I stand to ROI on this miner in a little over 6 months.

This of course is probably not going to be the case due a number of factors:

1. The price of Ethereum could increase (which is a high possibility) given historical price performance of currencies associated with Bitmain releases
2. The price of Ethereum could continue to decrease leading to a longer ROI - this given the current performance of currencies over the past couple of months
3. Antminer actual performance vs projected performance - if history is any indicator, this miner will outperform its projected specs and output a higher hash rate

Overall I expect to gain off of the purchase simply because Ethereum is one of the few currencies I support and consider a good investment for the future. The market is in a stagnant state currently, but I expect a heavy uptick near the latter half of the year which will increase the overall value of the currencies I mine and hold.

The very first batch of the Antminer E3 is available to order now and all orders will be shipped as soon the miners are ready, which is projected to be around mid-July. My opinion is that there will be an opportunity early on to ROI and use the miner. If you are interested in purchasing one for yourself, my recommendation is to get in fast since new ASICs typically sell out fast even if Bitmain is limiting the orders to one per household. You should also consider that you are taking a risk, so my recommendation is to only spend money you are willing to lose. This miner will have little to no resell value outside of the first few weeks that it is shipped.

When I receive my unit, you can expect as usual that I will do an unboxing and review of the miner, so if interested, please follow me and stay tuned for updates!

Let me know what you think in the comments section below. If you do have any questions, inputs, or feedback, please also share those with me. I would also appreciate support in the form of Upvoting and Re-steeming my post if you found it informative

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