TL;DR: Computer scientists at Chicago-based bloXroute have published results of a highly anticipated Bitcoin Cash miner block propagation test. Working with Bitcoin Cash (BCH) miners primarily in China, they were able to garner promising results, propagating “large blocks (32MB) between 2–18 seconds compared to up to 193 seconds” when under normal conditions without their proprietary software.

Bitcoin Cash Miner Test Shows Promising Results

When CoinSpice last interviewed COO Eyal Markovich of bloXroute, hopes were high. “We have taken a unique approach to solving the scalability bottleneck,” Markovich claimed, “by tackling the network layer, underneath the blockchain. We have developed a Blockchain Distribution Network (BDN), that allows blockchains to scale to 1000s of transactions per second.”

For two months of live ammunition used on the BCH testnet, its BDN was designed to allow “miners to hear about and send large blocks faster, allowing miners to mine more efficiently. The purpose of this test was to measure performance with and without bloXroute under circumstances that more closely mirror the real world,” recently published findings insisted. “The BDN propagates large blocks (32MB) between 2–18 seconds compared to up to 193 seconds without bloXroute. (Propagation times include block validation, which we have seen take between 1–5 seconds on large blocks).”

The full results of the Bitcoin Cash Miner Test are published! We partnered with the largest mining pools in #BTC & #BCH to test the BDN in conditions closely mirror the real world. This is a huge milestone for the entire blockchain community.https://t.co/bdjVH4goHc pic.twitter.com/fTj3mj9JyJ — bloXroute Labs (@bloXrouteLabs) July 10, 2019

As expected China-based miners caught the best improvements. “For example, a node in Beijing processed large blocks between 17–151 seconds without bloXroute and 3–7 seconds with. Block compression technology, such as Compact blocks, improved with the BDN as transaction propagation allowed mempools to be more in sync,” the company explained. “The BDN sped up fork recoveries (e.g. recover missed transactions included in compact blocks).”

Mining companies BTC.com, F2Pool, Rawpool, and Great North Data all participated in the two-phase test with control, demonstrating close to real-world conditions for connectivity, peer selection, and geographic dispersion. “We plan on running our Ethereum Mining Test later this month and launching the BDN on the bitcoin (BTC and BCH) mainnets (GitHub and directions to come),” bloXroute promised.

DISCLOSURE: The author holds cryptocurrency as part of his financial portfolio, including BCH.

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