Intel has shared the details of the first-generation Bonaza Mine blockchain accelerator chip. The company has launched a new 3,600-watt mining rig comprising 300 BMZ1 chips. The BMZ1 chip is an application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC). It carries out specific tasks such as mining bitcoin.
It is considered better at mining per watt of energy than a GPU. Intel highlighted that the BMZ1 will save a ton of energy. It outlined that setting 300 chips into a 3,600-watt mining rig produces a machine with a system hash rate of 40 terahashes per second (TH/s).
Intel has done design work on SHA 256 optimized ASICs for several years beginning with pathfinding work done in Intel Labs. The BMZ2 follows an architecture similar to BMZ1 – a first-generation mining chip. The next-generation BTC miner by drawing 2,293W of power will be able to deliver a balanced performance of 40.4 TH/s. It will record a low energy consumption of 56.97 joules per terahash (J/TH).
Intel claims that its miner’s underlying BMZ1 chips are the cleanest and most powerful on the market. The new chips have also received several high-profile preorders like Jack Dorsey’s company Block and Argo Blockchain.
With the new set of chips, Intel intends to ride high on the boom of crypto and NFT mining operations. The company believes the chip is an energy-efficient accelerator that can make blockchain tasks faster and more environmentally friendly.
