Chinese chipmaker Innosilicon recently announced the launch of a new line of highly efficient 28nm scrypt ASICs. The manufacturer claims that their new A2 Terminator line delivers 1.6 to 1.8MH/s at 10 Watts per chip. If the specs are accurate and the boards reliable, the Terminator line represents a major step forward for scrypt-based ASICs, allowing for boxes with up to 150MHs with a 1KW power supply and reduced cooling requirements.
Compared to the graphics card-based systems used by many scryp-based cryptocurrency miners, the A2 Terminator provides twice the hash power at 40 times less energy costs.That said, these powerful chips aren’t exactly cheap. Innosilicon resellers are already pricing the 75MHs miner at $12,500.
Given the recent increase in Litecoin network difficulty and last week’s halving of the Dogecoin reward from 250,000Ð to 125,000Ð, the powerful, low-power chips will be begrudgingly welcomed in the alt-coin mining community even at such a high price. The A2 and its inevitable clones may well be future of scrypt mining this year.
The promotional video for the A2 can be seen here: http://youtu.be/dXA_pV9CyMk