Z9 performance and general discussion

open again, at least at the time of this post.

The carrot has been placed on an ever-lengthening stick. I feel itā€™s important that everyone think real hard about how much (and if!) they want to invest in ZEC mining now more than ever; itā€™s going to be really easy to get sucked into a never-ending loop of buying and upgrading ASICs to try and stay relevant, all the while chasing (but never attaining) ROI. At least with GPUs, there was stability regarding hash rate order of magnitude on the timescale of years.

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I agree with what you say in generally. Itā€™s like always with Asics, a risk buy, as nobody knows how many more units will be sold, how many more producers will come up with an equihash asic and really nobody knows how all the other coins (the ones that didnā€™t fork yet) will do in future. So someone has to agree, that all over itā€™s a riks investment.

While there was, as you mention, a stability with gpuā€™s, this has changed as well in my opinion. Especially this and next year will be the POS year in my opinion forcing the gpuā€™s to go to less and less coins, lowering profit per gpu unit as well. I have my doubts that any gpu bought now will ROI either.

They can, and they will @boxalex. ( Roi that is )
But not the way is was, and it is for a long time already.
Those who read in on white papers and look into new coins, will have the upper hand. They will start mining from the start, every shitcoin has a pump, then you should have your sell orders ready. Asking here or on Bitcointalk which coin to mine, will not give you answers anymore. You have to do research and based on that you still take a gamble, but Cryptho always has been a gamble :wink: knowledge will even be more powerful if the biggest group has no clue

What you referr to is how a handfull of miners are playing the game, i would say <5%. The rest 95% just point their rigs/gpuā€™s/asics just to nicehash or the top coin on whattomine.

Remember how everybody and his grandma was referring to the X3 for example that no coin is left to mine? There are still above 30 projects on cryptonite, some even really good ones, but just not listed on whattomine where 95% are looking for where to mine.
So what i said, applies to ~95 miners, no matter you, some other random guy or me, are doing things different.

So you agree, its still doable :wink:
But yes, it takes some work and some thinking and a large group will come to a stop or will be mining ETH hehehe Thatā€™s why I love WTM and donā€™t follow themā€¦

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Serious question guys as im looking for a bit of guidance hereā€¦ Im highly considering purchasing 9 Z9ā€™s to go along with my gpu farmā€¦ I would have all ASICs and all GPUā€™s on zcashā€¦ Can anyone on here take an educated guess at if youā€™d be able to overclock the Z9 to say 60K sols? Because i know stock they are rated at 40.8K solsā€¦ I did some calculations and based off current price,difficulty, Hypothetical Hash rate of 60k sols per each Z9 when overclocked, difficulty & price i pay for electricity i get a figure of around 28K a month for income after paying for electricity and accounting for ROIā€¦ Just donā€™t wanna make the wrong decision hereā€¦ I understand figures like that might not always be right and in the future it could go way up or it could go downā€¦ Thank youā€¦

No one knows yet. Consider the overclock increases hashrate and power. If the z9 behaves the same way your power would be closer to 1800w so you would need a 2400w psu. This would put you at 2 z9 per 30amp.

since they have not been released it would be purely speculation.

Also keep in mind, it says on Bitmain website, if you overclock you ā€œvoidā€ the warranty.

@Hannibal,

have in mind the following:

  • nobody knows yet if the Z9 (maxi) can be overclocked. Most Antminers can, beginning from D3, L3, up to the Z9 mini, but some canā€™t, like the S9 and the latest B3 for example. As mentioned allready itā€™s pure speculation IF it can be overclocked.

  • i personally would go with Z9 for several reasons:
    a.) you can for sure overclock them
    b.) you can if needed at some time, split the hashpower among different pools and/or coins.
    c.) at some time easier to sell, you know something at USD 800 is easier to sell than somethng at 3000$
    d.) less risk. In case a unit gets out of order with a mini itā€™s less of a deal than with the maxi.
    e.) easier power distribution with the minis

The disadvante is that you need more space, more cables, more everything at all. But as said, i personally would go with the minis.

About your ROI, have in mind it will be way less than you see now. I personally would make the ROI calculation with USD/10 per mini and while you calculate with 28k a month i think 10/11k is more realistic having in mind you will have the miner soonest in 2 months (including shipping/custom).

I was in a similar dilemma these days. First i didnā€™t want to buy anymore hardware at all, than i see good profit with the 1x Z9 mini i have, than i have some bunch of coupons and i considered what to buy. I went with 2 minis with 2x 250 USD coupons as something that is at least less risk with 1-2 weeks sooner shipping and less investment. As i said/wrote allready, the profit will be around 10 USD in 2 months (personal opinion). These 40k-50k units from Bitmain, Innosilicon and Asicminer just will drive down the profit.

Just my 2 cents.

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So if Iā€™m understanding this correctly your saying it will drive it to 10 usd a day due to difficulty increase from the ASICS? Cause I have been looking at difficulty and itā€™s remained rather stable but I know it could change at any given momentā€¦

Hash rate has been swinging between 500-700 in the last month. I expect it to be 750-1000 around mid-september. Most GPU miners should be leaving around that time which will help buffer the increase. I donā€™t think it will be 1500 until next spring actually.

If the Z9 is overclockable I would expect between 50-60k. It may not go to 50% like the mini can. I am also wondering if there will be a 3rd batch of miniā€™s. I imagine there will be until the price of the Z9 goes down by half.

I think the $10/day figure is a stock Z9 mini. I do expect it to get to that level by the end of the year. I donā€™t think it will be that low in September. I bought some miniā€™s from the 2nd batch and I think they will ROI in 2 months with the coupons.

Difficulty will sky rocket pretty soon. Innosilicon and bitmain are shipping late august and I would expect at least a 15% increase. I would say that in september we will be hitting 1000M in hashrate (30-45% more hashrate).

ROI is still very feasable but profit canā€™t be garanteed since the zcash co can always ban ASIC with a short notice (april 2019 being the first window)

Hmmm i see both the Z9 minis and the big Z9s arenā€™t exactly tied to only zcash though correct? just the equihash algoā€¦ which the only coin to fork so far has been BTGā€¦ so i would still have some other options on things to mine if zcash co decided to go anti asic right?

All other equihash coins hash an absolete hashrate in comparison.

If 15%-50% increase happens to zcash it will be even out through all other equihash alt coins.

Thatā€™s just my personal opinion and prediction and i wrote it more to make it clear that the profit will NOT be the same like it is now as your calculation was based on todays factors which will be different in 2 months for sure.

Right now we do not see a huge increase in difficulty just because asics drive out gpuā€™s that are on zcash. At some time, there will be no more gpuā€™s that can be driven out, and than difficulty will go up faster with each new shipped asic that comes online. Just common sense.

My prediction of USD 10 doesnā€™t need to be correct, it could be as well USD 15 or USD 5. Only reason why i bought 2 more minis is that power is USD ~1 per day to run it and with 2x additionally Z9 minis i bought each USD 600 (after coupons) itā€™s somehow no big deal and worth the risk investment. Now with 9 Z9 maxi it would be a bit different, but itā€™s your money and your business and your risk, just NEVER ever use the current profit for long time calculations but better set it way lower. When in the end the profit is higher, great and no harm done. But when the profit is lower than in your calcuation than a lot of harm is done.

Same like me, just due the coupons i took for the last time the risk.

However, my $10 prediction is not for stock, but for overclocked. Right now the profit for the stock is around USD 15-18, up to the coin that gets mined, it will half in my opinion the next 2 months. IF only the minis are on the market it would look way better, but thatā€™s not the case. The 40k-50k miners will increase the network hashrate way faster than the Z9 minis did for the following reasings:

  • right now the Z9 faced only GPUā€™s, which are driven out, this will stop soon and only asics are on the network
  • asicminers 40k isnā€™t shipped yet and not online
  • bitmains 40k will come online in 2 months, i guess some 5000 - 10,000 units
  • Innosilicon for sure will work on another batch as well. Eventually a more powerfull one.
  • when all the above happens in it will be a direct increase in difficulty and not like until now a shifting of hashpower (gpu out, asic in).

Of course thatā€™s just my opinion and my prediction following logic and common sense, which always seems a to be a good advisor. Now of course things could be totally different if Bitmains Z9 maxi batch is only 500 units, Innosilicon doesnā€™t make another batch and the asicminer 40k wonā€™t enter production/shipping ever.
But iā€™am not counting on that, hence my USD 10 prediction which is still a perfect one, having in mind USD 1 for electricity gives you USD 9 profit, not bad at all for some time. And in my opinion the cheap Z9 mini with coupons has a good chance to ROI as well.

Here you can see all forked and still mineable coins for equihash:

Hello,

thanks for all the useful post. Iā€™m much more confused than beforeā€¦really.:joy:

I will receive, together with a group of friend, 10 units at the beginning of September, we will switch them on in Shenzhen directly. Iā€™m the lucky, and confused, bastard in charge for the ignition.

Iā€™m wondering one thing, Iā€™ve seen in other manual it is possible to back up the configuration, what about a generic cfg file to download and, maybe, edit with the workers parameter?

Thank you

In the meanwhile, Z9 minis sold out on the bitmain websiteā€¦