I promised I would follow up on my purchase experience with BigSkyASICs once I received the CK5 I bought from them. Spoiler alert, @Aaron_Raycove and BigSkyASICs are most certainly legit. The longer version of my review is below with some additional insights.
In late November 2021 BigSkyASICs hit my radar as a possible reseller I would do business with. I contacted two forum members directly who had said they had done business with them. They both came back saying they had no issues with their transaction. The fact that BigSkyASICs is located literally in the same county in Montana that I live in added a degree of ease.
After calling Aaron a couple times asking “vetting” questions I felt comfortable enough to make a purchase. I sent a wire on 12/3/21 to him for a CK5. He told me to anticipate a time frame of 2-4 weeks for delivery. Looking back and judging from what forum members are saying about their wait times, this may have been a bit optimistic. I don’t believe this had anything to do with Aaron and was not his fault…ASIC’s are just taking a long time to get recently.
I checked in with Aaron via email every Friday to get an update on shipping. This is one thing I would change about the entire purchase experience if I were Aaron. I was the one checking in with him instead of him proactively checking in with me for updates. This being said, he was quick to respond to my Friday emails.
On Friday January 7th Aaron sent me the tracking# for my CK5 that had shipped out from China the day before, January 6th. The device was delivered to Aaron a couple days later on Sunday January 9th. I waited until Monday afternoon to email him about receiving my miner. He replied the next day saying he was traveling on business but his partner would flying back to Montana that night and we could arrange a place and time to meet up so I could get my miner the following day, Wednesday.
If anyone has every lived in Montana you know that the weather can change extremely rapidly. As luck (or bad luck in my case) would have it, Wednesday morning’s road conditions were so bad that the state closed a large part of the main highway for an hour due to “extreme road conditions”. By early afternoon I didn’t care and put my Jeep in 4X4 and headed out to Clinton, the town where his operation is. I got my miner and met Aaron’s partner who had flown in the night before.
When I got home I plugged the miner in and hooked it up to my network. The miner lit up and the fans started spinning. Within a minute or two, the miner showed up in the mining pool I’m trying out. It’s been almost 24 hours since I plugged it in and it has an average of just over 12 TH. The temp has ranged from 65C to 71C where it is now.
In summary, Aaron communicated with me well throughout the process, provided updates when I asked for them, and provided the expected product. The miner landed in Montana just over 5 weeks after I paid for it. Overall, it was a pleasant experience!