The document highlights Ethereum’s “ASIC-resistant” mining mechanism. ASIC devices (application-specific Integrated Circuit) are short for application-specific Integrated circuits. They are Integrated Circuit devices made for a Specific purpose. And the ASIC mining machine for mining, apparently is specially designed to improve mining efficiency and integrated circuit board.
If you compare the mining mechanics of Bitcoin and Ethereum, they are very different, and more specifically, the Proof of Work (PoW). Proof of work is widely used in digital cryptocurrencies as a way to verify “work” (or “contribution”). Simply put, it lets each participant generate data that is difficult to generate but easy to verify. It’s like a math exam: you’re the miner in the exam room, the teacher is the one who validates the results (in the world of cryptocurrencies it could be network nodes or mining pools), and the exam paper is a proof of work mechanism. You need to concentrate and deliberate to get it right, but all the teacher has to do is match your paper with the standard answers in your hand. Thus, proof of work effectively filters out participants with no “bona fides”, leaving the strongest and most loyal, and improving the overall quality of the system.
Bitcoin uses a proof-of-work system known as Hashcash. The system has been widely used in cybersecurity to protect against spam and classic Denial of Service attacks that bring down a server by sending a large number of connection requests in a short period of time. The Hashcash mechanism relies on computer power as its main criterion, giving an advantage to those who can calculate more and faster in the same amount of time. In bitcoin’s early days, there were few miners and little competition, so it was easy to mine using a PC’s CPU. Then the CPU didn’t work, and people started using more powerful GPU graphics cards for mining. As of now, gpus are basically unable to mine bitcoin. Many bitcoin miners have turned to ASIC mining machines, which offer much more efficient computing rates than traditional computer hardware.
However, as bitcoin mining enters the ERA of ASIC, its centralization problem is becoming more and more obvious. China has become the largest producer of bitcoin. Cheap electricity and once-favorable land policies have allowed many “gold rush” miners to locate their factories in hydropower stations in Sichuan and on the great plains of Inner Mongolia. Today, more than 90 percent of bitcoin is mined in Chinese mines. The main reason for this excessive concentration is the high cost and high elimination rate of ASIC, which can be played only by large-scale professional mines. As a result, bitcoins are almost always mined by specialized mines, and most ordinary users can find only a tiny amount.
Ethereum is different. Ethereum’s proof-of-work system, called Ethash, does two main things: it reads memory and mixes data with encryption algorithms. But instead of just doing it once, do it dozens of times. In this process, “mixing data with algorithms” is a task that can be significantly improved by upgrading computing equipment. Bitcoin’s proof of work mechanism is such a process of computing encryption algorithms, efficient ASIC mining machine has a place.
“Read memory” is not the case. No matter what you do to improve the efficiency of a computer, the current memory retrieval efficiency will not change much — the bandwidth for each read is limited, and it is difficult for existing computer technology to make a qualitative breakthrough in this problem. This is why Ethereum is “asIC-resistant” — expensive asics don’t improve efficiency, and the benefits are no better than ordinary computers, so why not?
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There is one more imaginative aspect to ethereum’s resistance centralization. Hold up ASIC, everyone began to use GPU mining. Because gpus are not as single-function as ASICS, there are many other things you can do besides mining, so there are many services that offer GPU leasing on the web, including Amazon’s AWS. In this scenario, will there be another kind of centralization: a few people leasing gpus in bulk for mining? Since it is a lease and a common GPU rather than a single-function and expensive ASIC, the cost is much lower than a dedicated mining machine. Is it just as easy to centralize mining in an Ethereum world without the high cost barrier?
In fact, said so much, always a little, want to make money safely in the currency circle, I’m afraid now only mining! Return to the essence mining is the most basic foundation of blockchain, and mining is undoubtedly the lowest cost, the fastest way, no one. Mining without fear of boring horizontal disk continues to be shadowing and skyrocketing slump, in short, as long as the calculation force in hand every day have money to account! Power mining is currently the only way for the masses to mine your Bitcoin and Ethereum!
