Progressive Automation lets you automate mining pretty early. The mod looks tacky and it gets out classed by most tech mods, but wood and stone level farms have the ability to get you out of the early game faster.
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Unless I am missing something about the miner from progressive automation isn't it kind of pointless? By default it digs a one by one hole to bedrock just like mining well but also needs the appropriate tools and doesn't mine diamond unless you upgrade it all the way to iron.
Now, I know you can upgrade its range but that costs 1 redstone per block and I believe 8 (might be wrong on that as it is a while since I used it) of the same material as its level.
The tools also gain damage on their durability and thus need to be replaced every so often thus in summary:
You either have a machine that can only mine things you can mine with a stone pickaxe, as a result it won't be possible to upgrade it with the materials it mined as it can't mine redstone. However other then that the upgrades are relative cheap. The machine also needs a lot of maintenance due to tools breaking and needing to be replaced.
Or you go up to iron in that case
You get a machine that can't be fully automated and although it can in theory upgrade itself with the items it gathers the needed upgrades are a lot more expensive. The cost at keeping it running also increases (due to it needing an iron pickaxe if you want to take full advantage of it).
Where as with an mining well from buildcraft you can also rather easily mine a 1 by 1 hole, doesn't need to consume tools and it may even be faster if you give it enough power (never tested that). I am also not certain about the costs of the 2 machines.
Note that I am not trying to bash it or anything, this is just my view on that machine and I am interested to know if there is something I am over looking.