Intel Corporation, the giant in computer chip manufacturing, has recently shared details of an upcoming mining chip that is poised to be coupled with a high-performance 3,600-watt miner, aimed at improving Bitcoin mining efficiency.
Intel made the big reveal of its second-generation Bitcoin mining setup at the IEEE International Solid-State Circuits Conference (ISSCC) 2022, which is particularly dedicated to the electronics and chip manufacturer industry stalwarts.
According to Intel, Bonanza Mine (BMZ2) is a forthcoming ultra-low-voltage energy-efficient Bitcoin mining ASIC that is able to deliver 40 terahashes per second (TH/s).
Intel’s “high-performance Bitcoin Mining” traces its way back to November 2018, when it initially proposed to reduce overall power consumption by roughly 15 percent. Intel executives at that time had shown great confidence in competing against established players like MicroBT, Bitmain, and Nvidia.
The BMZ2 chips are expected to borrow their architecture from the first-generation mining chip, BMZ1, wherein over 300 chips, powered by a 3,600W miner, combine to work together and deliver up to 40 TH/s in a balanced environment.
Intel’s upcoming next-generation Bitcoin miner would also be able to deliver a balanced performance of 40.4 TH/s as it draws 2,293W of power — recording a low energy consumption of 56.97 joules per terahash (J/TH). When compared with Bitmain’s hardware, the Antminer S19j ASIC Bitcoin miner consumes 3,100W and delivers up to 90 TH/s at room temperature. This results in an efficiency of 34.5 J/TH.
The hardware would also have the option of operating in high-performance and power-saving modes for optimizing the energy-cost ratio across various degrees of mining efficiencies.
The company is yet to announce the final date of its official launch, along with the details of the technical requirements of the second-generation mining setup.
The Bitcoin network mining difficulty remains showing an upward trend, representing the growing resilience against network attacks.
At its peak, Bitcoin had recorded a hash rate of 248.11 exahashes per second (EH/s) on February 13 after it jumped 31.69 percent from 188.40 EH/s in just twenty-four hours.
With its increasing hash rate, Bitcoin mining equipment must evolve further in order to deliver higher performance while consuming the same energy comparatively.
