Finally, after months and months of empty promises, and sad attempts… Vertcoin has a functional AMD friendly mining software available.
Upon release of the miner I was relieved to know that the never-ending project had finally been completed. However, due to the fact that they had missed their promised release time over, and over… I had already lost faith in the coin. Additionally, these promises were broken around the same time that Groestlcoin had begun to steal my heart.
Below I’ve constructed the entire release of the AMD miner through the eyes of myself. Some may not agree with my views, however I find it disgustingly wrong to support a coin in which the developers deliver promises nine months late. Also, the developers didn’t even create the new AMD miner. It was a bounty, that someone else had completed. If that isn’t extra salt on the wound, I don’t know what is.
I don’t hate Vertcoin. I love it, for opening the eyes of many, to the ASIC-resistant mentality.
The Original Promise
The up-bringing of Vertcoin had been perfect, and I supported it. It had appeared to be the latest and greatest ASIC resistant coin. It looked like the definition of Satoshi’s Vision.
The only obvious problem I(and many others) had foreseen with the coin, was the lack of an AMD friendly mining software.
Once the community had expressed to the developers that an AMD miner was needed, and they had finally acknowledged it…
The AMD miner had been promised to be delivered before the coin’s halving. The Vertcoin halving successfully occurred on December 12, 2017. If you haven’t taken anything away hints from above, this deadline was never met.
“I would like an update from a dev this is a bit sloppy” – giuseppesaviero
After the halving, they claimed that the new mining software would be on it’s way soon. They had never initiated a release date, leaving supporters on the tip of their toes, for months.
“It’s been “coming soon” since like November!” – JewHerder
The developers and die-hard supporters claimed that they had been working on it, and that it was functional… Just “poorly optimized”.
“It was functioning in November, but performance was poop due to incompatibilities with the existing compiler. Dude had to go back and write the thing in assembly.” – BDF-1838
This was eight months before actual release.
Heading up toward the realistic development of the software, the developers provided excuses, on top of excuses… Which ultimately lead to the downfall of my belief in the coin.
Failed Attempts
The hype of an AMD miner being released had been in the Reddit, Discord, and Twitter communities non-stop, since the halving. I was tired of constantly being hyped up for something that’s non-existent… For god knows how long.
The biggest hype round-up had been six months away from actual release. When SGminer support for the algorithm had been implemented.
“Any idea when the AMD miner will be released? Thanks!” – auzboo
“Thought it was yesterday” – baileyaye
Once again, for those that had supported Vertcoin… The joke was played on them. Anyone who had attempted to use the new SGminer software had saw a disgusting performance drop compared to any other Nvidia cards. I’m talking 2 MH/S, when similarly spec’d Nvidia cards were making 30 MH/S.
“sgminer doesn’t really work at all for VTC. Best bet until the new miner is done is use mkxminer. New miner is getting close, but the dev working on it has had some health issues recently.” – Blkancients
The Final Release
After all of this time had passed, and everyone’s belief was at a minimum… A Lyra2v2 AMD miner had been dropped by winmkx, called mkxminer. This developer had created the miner due to the fact that there was no functioning AMD miner for the Lyra2v2 algorithm. Since fee’s are enabled, it’s obvious to tell that he was doing this for himself, and not the Vertcoin community specifically.
If it weren’t for this single developer, Vertcoin would still be nowhere with the AMD miner that they had promised.
I personally feel as if the Vertcoin community is giving the developers way more credit than they deserve… For pushing off the creation of the software, then presenting one that someone else made to the community. It’s important for everyone to know that the Vertcoin developers had not assisted in the creation of mkxminer.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy that the mining software is here… I’m just stressing the importance that the software is here, no thanks to the Vertcoin developers.
In my opinion, Vertcoin is lucky to have coincidentally been in such dire need of the software at the same time of the miner release.
Dear Blockchain Developers,
This single elongated empty promise that Vertcoin had committed to had ended up killing a large amount of it’s support(and no, I’m not just talking about myself).
I’m hoping that this situation that Vertcoin had created for itself, can be learned from for future blockchain developers.
If you don’t know how to complete something that needs to be completed(for the blockchains health), find someone who does, and have them work for you, or inspire others to do so.
Don’t waste time and resources attempting to create something in which you are not capable of creating. More importantly, don’t lie about deadlines, push false motivation, or leave a critical feature ignored for nearly a year.
Lies, and failed development are the first signs of a failing or to-fail coin. Quick, and proper development is essential to growth, and support.
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