Bitcoin Forum

For those who are getting the chips for their boards, and/or completed Klondike boards, is there any thought being given to designing (or developing a parts list) for an enclosure, in order to minimize the danger to curious pets or children?

I realize no final consensus has yet been reached on the heatsinks and PSUs, but I thought the enclosure discussion might start here...  mine will be a 16-chip unit, for example.

Thanks for any input!

Yes I am considering cases and possible installations into a PC.

I just thought about the same thing.

K16's are pretty small... 10 cm squares (a little less than 4"x4")

So a K64 will be 8"x8" (thereabouts).
That's about the size of the tablet that I type on presently.
Add on a heatsink... They will be a pretty compact BTC machine.

Should fit in a lot of old gear.

I'm looking toward rackmount.

Speaking of tablets, I'm thinking it would be awesome to be able to get the host software running on a Google Nexus 7 tablet, running Linux.  ;D Should make things nice and compact, overall.

Gotta say that when I first read the title I thought it was going to say "Klondike Bar"  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klondike_bar


I am sure there will be a lot of creative cases/enclosures built for these like we have seen with other mining setups.

Something like this;

http://h10003.www1.hp.com/digmedialib/prodimg/lowres/c00687331.jpg

TerraHash's website (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=198489.0) looks like they sell the K16 and K64 boards, but they also sell housings for each of those.

The DX Large houses up to 10 of the K64 boards (total of 180GH/s), and the DX Mini houses up to 20 of the K16 boards (total of 90GH/s).

They're a bit pricey, but each unit "Comes complete with a case, installed boards, power supply and cooling fans."

I'm assuming since they daisy chain, you would only need a single USB connection to plug into a host PC?

I haven't seen any pics or specs, but I also haven't read every post by them.

Yeah, 4" x 4" is a pretty small footprint.

What's the likely neighborhood of the depth dimension, once the heatsink, fans & PSU issues are sorted out?  (I'm assuming the fans & the PSU are going to be necessary...)

- Kevin

Personally I'm looking at modding an HTPC case (since it is unlikely the mini-ITX mount points will line up with the Klondike in any useful manner). Should be plenty of room for expansion after my two Klondike and the Raspberry Pi are installed...

We have a preliminary design ready. This is NOT a final design, and we will make several iterations before finalizing it (e.g. rotating the power supply to face backwards, using brackets to mount the boards, bigger holes for fans etc.)

http://terrahash.com/dx-large-case-design-conceptual-sketches/

http://terrahash.com/dx-large-case-design-conceptual-sketches/

That will be a cooker... need to get fans cooling the fins. Unless you have a whole side of fans and have some vent slats between the rack that houses the K16s.

There are 5 fans, 3 in the front, 2 in the back. The holes will be much larger in the actual case.

Ya but your fins will be blocked according to your rack design... need to free up the fins to the flow. Basically a solid wall of metal the fans won't be pushing air over the fins. The mod design is nice though. Density that way will require a lot of air movement I think spacing between the boards looks good. Might want to back fin to fin configuration and leave holes in the rack for the air flow.

Again, this is NOT the final design. Just a preliminary sketch. Those vertical bars are actually holes in the tray. However, we are removing the tray altogether. There will be metal bars on the top on both sides, into which the cards will be screwed using brackets (just like how you screw in PCI cards. The PCBs will have brackets on both sides)

+1 Off the rack... slot it home might be the cheapest DIY fix really.

Giving you some heads up.... need to have air flowing over the fins especially if you are going to pack what? 10 boards? Consider a direct flow on the fins... some of the reading I have done indicates that is how to get rid of the heat. Some people considering water blocks for such large configurations actually. Depending on ambient temps... really need some hard BLOW.  ;D

Thank you for your feedback. As I said, without the internal tray, there will be tons of open space for the airflow. Also the holes on the sides will be much bigger for a better airflow.