Intel Is Supposedly Entering the Cryptocurrency Mining Market with a New Chip Called the ‘Bonanza Mine’

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Intel, the world’s largest semiconductor company, may be set to make a significant entry into the crypto and Bitcoin mining hardware markets as it prepares a presentation on a new breakthrough mining chip.

The international technology conglomerate is slated to debut its “Bonanza Mine” processor at the International Solid-State Circuits Conference (ISSCC), which begins Feb. 20.

Intel’s presentation is set for the “Highlighted Chip Releases” category and will highlight the new chip, which the company describes as a “ultra-low-voltage energy-efficient Bitcoin mining ASIC.”

ASIC stands for application-specific integrated circuits, which are well-suited for the number crunching required for cryptocurrency mining.

Intel’s entry into crypto mining puts them in direct competition with Bitmain. A spokesman for Intel told technology news source Tom’s Hardware:

“Intel has spent many years developing SHA-256 optimised ASICs, starting with pathfinding work conducted at Intel Labs. We will provide further information in the future.”

Raja Koduri, the graphics processor’s chief, revealed in a late December live webcast that the business was developing specialist crypto-mining hardware and methods. Koduri said that the new chip would be entirely distinct from graphics processors (GPUs), which will “handle graphics, gaming, and all those lovely stuff.”

The business has already made significant progress toward developing new mining-specific CPUs. Intel patented a unique processing system in 2018, Tom’s reported, that employs an improved SHA-256 cryptographic data flow for high-performance Bitcoin mining.

Gamers are already suffering at the hands of cryptocurrency miners due to a worldwide scarcity of graphics cards, which was exacerbated in part by the COVID-19 outbreak. In several countries, a secondary market for GPUs has developed, with three-year-old graphics cards now costing more than they did when they were new.

Intel, which disclosed a $780,000 position in Coinbase shares last year, will launch its first line of discrete gaming graphics cards this year, codenamed Intel Arc Alchemist, in order to compete with Nvidia and AMD in a field that desperately needs new competitors.

America has benefited from China’s decision to prohibit Bitcoin mining activities. The exodus has concluded, and hash rates have completely returned to a new all-time high of 207.2 EH/s (exahashes per second) on January 15.

The United States leads hash power with 35.4 percent of the total, according to Cambridge University’s worldwide mining map (which hasn’t been updated since August). A significant chunk of this will be accomplished by renewable energy, whereas China has vanished from the map.

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