>until now, no-one has chosen to flex like this.
The two networks have wildly different proof-of-work algorithms, they're incompatible. A BTC ASIC will never mine Monero, ever.
The two networks have wildly different proof-of-work algorithms, they're incompatible. A BTC ASIC will never mine Monero, ever.
Like, trivially, it's an ASIC, so I can use it to simulate a von Neumann[*] machine, hence I can use it to run whatever algorithm I want. Would that be more efficient than using a modern OoO superscalar? Almost surely not, but that doesn't mean it can't be done, just that it shouldn't be done that way.
*: I realize that the ASICs used in Bitcoin miners don't have dram access, but that isn't a general limitation of ASICs, just those ASIC 'chips' (and maybe not even those chips, just their implementations in bitcoin miners)
EDIT: Thanks to everyone who answered! For some reason, I had it in my head that the way we implement fixed function stuff in an ASIC was basically the same as a "burn once" FPGA. Brains gonna brain.
No, that doesn't follow at all. An ASIC doesn't mean a general purpose CPU or FPGA. A chip that only knows how to do, say, video decoding is an example of ASIC. The video chip can't do bitcoin, the bitcoin chip can't do monero. They're not general purpose.
asic does not mean turing complete
good luck simulating a von neumann machine on a sha256 accelerator
Last time I saw that was on photonics processor blockchains
In fact, Litecoin has an optional privacy feature called MWEB, which is probably why Litecoin too got kicked off of being named on some conventional news sites.
BTC will have to move to a proof of stake design to survive. It's unavoidable.
Post-merge ethereum is designed so that the gas fees and the staking rewards roughly cancel out on balance (so overall inflation is around zero), but they are decoupled so even if nobody is using the network you still get a staking yield
Pedantic point: monetary inflation is around zero, not necessarily price inflation (which is what people typically mean when they just say "inflation").
In theory if the entire world was on an ethereum standard with a steady state population, price inflation would also average out to zero
The ASIC manufacturer would also need a backdoor. ASIC manufacturers don't control mining.
Large miners are unlikely to allow backdoors into their mining network.
I dont think you understand the BTC mining ecosystem
It's doomed in general, see the cash fork.