My quest to to purchase a new state-of-the-art Bitcoin Miner started in January.
At that time miners had already been waiting for months for their preorders to be delivered. There were advertisements that made it appear delivery of these items was just a short time away. On the discussion board it seemed almost frantic that you had better order these $1500 items right now or you would lose out! How Bitcoin mining works is that it solves a cryptographic problem which gets more difficult as more people are doing it. It is like a race to the gold rush. So I order 2 units on my credit card. Bitcoin Mining – What’s it all About?
What Problem is Solved by Bitcoin Miners?
For the next couple weeks talk was upbeat and positive so I ordered 2 more. Soon things fell apart and each day a new story came out. It quickly became apparent that no units would ever be delivered. It took a few week to straighten out my credit card refunds but I eventually got a refund. On to the next vendor. I quickly learned it is difficult to get the real story about who is delivering what. The primary source of information is BitcoinTalk in the custom hardware section. However, there are all sorts of posts and it takes quite a bit of effort to understand the customs of the forum. For instance, some users have several red “X’s” by their name which is called a “scammer tag. ” Another user is listed as an “Untrustworthy Hero Member. ”