I am thinking the price of the sample chips reflects, to an extent, the final retail price of chips to future buyers. That, though, would rule out making any market-worthy miner. So sfards, is this sample chip pricing only effective until you release your own rigs, or (assuming there are no further improvements in chip tech) is this the real price we'd also have expect after you release your own rigs?
The point of the pricing is that only those who will actually do something useful with them will buy them. Yes its high, but yes supply is extremely limited.
Waffle! What does it cost them if they sold the sample chips at a fair price and they are not put to good use? In any case, what is good use ...? And by the way, sfards is not bitmain where you get the privellege of taking pretty pictures of their rigs accompanied by waffle.