Cryptocurrency Mining Industry Sees Influx of New Hardware

On April 3, 2018, the Chinese based firm Bitmain Technologies had launched it’s latest miner the Antminer E3. The new pre-manufactured mining rig processes the hashing algorithm Ethhash, the PoW consensus protocol for the Ethereum network. Lately, Bitmain has been releasing a bunch of new products including the Antminer X3 which mines Cryptonight algorithms for coins like monero, and a slew of other mining devices.

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The Latest Ethhash and Cryptonight Miners

Bitmain is a well-known manufacturer of cryptocurrency mining hardware and other related services. The company was founded in 2013 by Jihan Wu and the firm has made quite a name for itself over the years. Last year the company produced a whopping revenue of over $4 billion, making it one of the largest technology companies in China. The company has been making BTC miners for quite some time, and soon offered both dash and litecoin miners as time passed. Just recently the firm has officially launched two more miners which have caused heated discussions among network participants throughout a few cryptocurrency ecosystems.

This week the company launched the Antminer E3; a cryptocurrency mining device that processes the Ethhash (an ethereum ETH) hashing algorithm. The machine boasts a 180MH/s and the company has started shipping batch one. The E3 launch announcement had riled up a bunch of ethereum community members who are quite sour that an application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) device of this magnitude has been released to the public. Members of the ethereum community are already calling for a faster hard fork to avoid these types of ASIC miners. Some ETH community members explained that the creation of these devices supported the need to have “a regularly scheduled PoW change, like monero.”

The monero (XMR) community has been facing the same dilemma, as Bitmain has just launched the Antminer X3 which mines the Cryptonight hashing algorithm. This means coins like monero, boolberry, and other Cryptonight-based coins can be mined using the X3 at a rate of 220KH/s, according to Bitmain. Because of this new mining device situation, the privacy-centric cryptocurrency monero plans to hard fork and call itself moneroV (XMV).

Halong Miners Dragonmint Claims to Produce 16 Terrahash and Utilize ASIC Boost Technology

Bitmain has competition coming as well as development teams from DMM, GMO Group, and more. Further, this week individuals started receiving their Halong Mining Dragonmint 16T1 SHA-256 miners which, according to the company, are highly efficient cryptocurrency ASIC processors. Halong says the miners are a brand new generation of devices that claim to produce 16TH/s and also advertise the devices use of overt ASIC Boost technology.

The news follows the great controversy surrounding ASIC Boost, alongside the anonymous character Cobra Bitcoin, the co-owner of Bitcoin.org, calling Halong Mining a scam operation. Many cryptocurrency community members were skeptical of the legitimacy of Halong’s machines, but machines were delivered to customers this week. There are multiple videos of individuals opening boxes of Dragonmint machines and even side-by-side comparisons to Bitmain chips. At this moment in time, it is hard to say if Halong machines perform as well as the company’s claimed specifications but it is likely reviews of these machines will come shortly.

 The New Avalon 841 SHA-256 miner

Then there’s the new release by Canaan Creative’s new 8th generation SHA-256 miner. The Avalon 841 is a mass-produced miner that claims to possess a power consumption of .099 Joules per Gigahash and a hashrate of 13TH/s. The device is powered by 104 Canaan manufactured A3210HP 16nm ASICs. Canaan’s Avalon series miners have been a reputable brand for quite some time compared to large firms like Bitmain. Additionally, Canaan has stated that it is in the midst of working on the next generation Avalons 861, 921, and the 10 series miners.

Over the years mining devices are becoming increasingly more efficient and semiconductors are just getting smaller and faster. Just recently the Japanese firm GMO Group claims it will be launching miners with 7-nanometer technology. It’s safe to say that the cutting edge innovation and competition within the mining industry is sure to heat up even more over the next few years.  

What do you think about the latest mining devices coming to the market? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.

Images via Pixabay, Bitmain, Halong Mining, and Canaan websites. 

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