Quote from: Alik on June 14, 2011, 10:29:01 AM

Is their still room for new miners to start now and still be profitable? (individual miners and people who have money to spent on a couple dozen rigs).

Next difficulty level is around 845,000 and will probably go over a million in 10 days time. Whatever BTC per day rate you have will be halved within 2 weeks, and probably halved again by early July. Will the price go up to compensate? Well, the difficulty is only relevant to miners. Speculators who bought their BTCs at $1 a few months ago, or $10 on Friday, aren't going to care how expensive your power is or how little return you get for a $600 6990.

The only way mining is proftable right now is:

- You bought the gear a month or two ago, and it has already paid for itself

- Or, whatever BTC you generate now you intend to keep. Not worth selling for $20ea as you're looking for more.

On the last point, be aware that there are a lot of miners in the same boat. We saw the BTC price fall 66% within 2 days. Could you hold out and not sell up? At least if you buy the hardware and BTC crashes again you get to keep it. Speculators are left with large losses.