As the value of Bitcoin continues to grow, an increasing number of startups and other various endeavors related to the mining of Bitcoin and other Cryptocurrencies have been appearing across the crypto landscape. Halong Mining has announced the creation of the DragonMint 16T miner, which claims to be “the world’s most efficient Bitcoin miner.”
While the mining hardware industry is booming, and there are plenty of new companies who are hoping to get a slice of the pie, there is some indication that Halong may have the goods to back up its statement. Cryptographer Adam Back, the creator of hashcash, tweeted his support of Halong: “I can confirm I have seen #DragonMint's operating in person. they are very real, specs as advertised. this is huge, biggest Bitcoin news this year.”
New ASIC Chips: the DragonMint 16T’s Secret Sauce
The DragonMint 16T, which took one year and $30 million to develop, integrates several new mining technologies. Most notable is the inclusion of a newly developed generation of DM8575 ASIC mining chips that run at “85GH per chip with power efficiency of around 0.075J/GH”, according to the Halong website.
Having just concluded the prototype phase in which only a small batch of the miners were produced, the DragonMint 16T will soon be mass produced. Halong says that the DragonMint is only one in a series of products that the company hopes to produce using the new ASIC chips.
From start to finish, it takes about four months for a DragonMint 16T miner to be built. Pre-orders for the miner will begin in March.
Halong Promotes a Collaborative Development Culture Amongst Fierce Competition
It can be said that Halong’s philosophy on the technology of their hardware products is in alignment with the open-source nature of much of the crypto community. Halong states that they would “like to see other Bitcoin mining hardware manufacturers compete equally,” and cites heavy competition and the high entry costs into the industry as deterring factors.
To facilitate easier entry into the mining hardware manufacturing space, Halong has stated that it will make its board designs publicly available. Additionally, Halong plans to make its new ASIC chips available in bulk to other hardware developers.
Hoping to make some of that $30 million back, however, Halong will hold off on the publication of its board designs until after the official release of the DragonMint 16T.
In the meantime, there are plenty of other mining ventures to pay attention to. Another new one - Integrated Ventures - officially launched its own Bitcoin mining operation just yesterday. Competition in this industry is fierce.
While Halong’s new mining hardware is certainly not to be underestimated, the increasing mining difficulty of Bitcoin will require continuous innovation to continue to be profitable. The Bitcoin mining industry is not a sprint; it is most definitely a marathon.
