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taking 3 months of vacation during which I will leave my place empty with 5 miners running, which currently consuming about 2KW power around the clock. I am contemplating whether this is good idea to leave it as running or just completely turn off. Biggest worry is fire safety:
wires can tangle, fans can seize, chips can heat up and sparks can fly. Add to that it is around March to Mid July during which several of tough heatwave is expected.

- option 1:  leave it off and forfeit 3 months of mining revenue.
- option 2: leave it as it is (very anxious about this one)
- option 3: this is interesting one which I am contemplating:
equip home with wireless cam, also just purchased remote on and off switch for motherboard which can be controlled by web, so i can turn on when it is not hot, still need to setup. Cram all the miner in a smaller room and leave the A/C on.
To reduce further the fire risk, I am thinking about putting huge metal or tin foil around the ceiling, floor and around the miners in case sparks fly. I know it is quite paranoid and unliely to happen but if it ever happens, I bought a barn.

If i cant make my mind between three option, most likely going to choose option 1 which is safest one.

I went on vacation for 1 week recently.

I followed everything through camera wirelles, checked temperatures on a thermometer, and left the house keys with a person of confidence.

In my case everything went well.

But 3 months is another story.

since all of them running centos, i can setup cron to start mining during night time only. that is another option.

How about drastically dialing back clock/intensity settings so the cards draw a lot less power? Could be a happy middle ground where you are still earning something but reduce the likelihood of fire, damage, lockups/shutdowns, etc.

Maybe consider selling 5 gpus and buy back when you are back from vacation. For short away time, it can be tolerated but who knows what happens in 3 months of time.

yes already doing that and running at minimum non-idle power at 90-120W range. Max power is 180W.

Dial back the intensity and set your rig on something that can not catch fire. You could set it on tile with nothing near it. I set mine on a wood rack and then 4 tiles below it.

If you turn down power like people mentioned above me and also put the miners on a concrete floor or something of the sort that is naturally fireproof there's going to be very little risk of fire. Third option should work best for you if you're extremely concerned about safety.

You should be putting your miners in a place that isn't at risk of burning up anyways. If you already do this, just being able to remotely control your miners should be enough.

I would just shut it down.

Most likely they will crash eventually to the point of requiring a hard power reset.

Also depending on where you live, the ambient temp might change due to your outside temp. You might have to open the windows more or less.

You get to your destination and the miners aren't responsive? Panic sets in. Did they crash ? Internet down? Or did they burn your place to the ground.

When you have rigs multiple setup with cooling and ventilation, security cameras, monitoring alerts etc.. it's not big deal. For 5 GPU's... I think if you have to ask if it's okay then it's probably not. If it was me in your situation I would capitalize on the high GPU market and sell the cards. In 3 months when you return, you'll probably find better deals and can put together and 8 card rig for the same price.

Option 4: have a backup person you trust look into the rigs if remote troubleshooting doesn't work.
If they're capable enough they can also use different profiles to swtich too according to ambient temps.

You could try to thin out the rigs, lay them out on the floor with each GPU as far from the others as possible. Remove anything easily flammable from the environment like curtains or rugs, cover the floor in aluminum foil.

My rigs are ghetto AF, just loose computer parts sitting on home made plywood shelves covered with fire retardant paint. I never worry about them though since they are in a 100% concrete basement, there's nothing there that can hold a flame for longer than 5 seconds.

i am considering this unit for wi-fi room temp sensor, humidiy (probably not need) and camera. Looks pretty compact and fits the bill:
https://frys.com/product/8506959?site=sr:SEARCH:MAIN_RSLT_PG

There are also compact wi-fi controller wall socket but rated at 10AMP. More than that, it is fire hazard, changes are the miner are not going to surpass this limit but it is lower than the normal home circuit breaker capacity of 15AMP. So i decided to steer clear of this one and look for more heavy-data ones if there is available. I dont expect the miner to go up 10AMP but leaving no room open. I'd rather home circuit breaker move in before going over some commercial stuff's rated amperage.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B074GVPYPY/_encoding=UTF8?coliid=I2FT35EE4X3BTV&colid=1YC02DZ0E8GZ3&psc=1

expecting about 4500$ in three months but could be much less or far more in volatile crypto market.

got carpet, perhaps probably lay a thin foil across the carpet and find some fire proof surface to put on the miners.

sell your cards get water cooled

problem solved.

I would leave it running. Just make sure you can monitor the rigs. I would use TeamViewer to reboot the rigs every week or two and also get these smart plugs so you can do a hard reboot from your phone.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2V4AjzldKSw&feature=youtu.be&t=58

If you are really paranoid you could get these extinguishers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BBJEPA79iYE&feature=youtu.be&t=317

A lot of these suggestions are good but they are all overkill.  I don't know where you live but if its the USA then your electrical system should be pretty stable.  You have your circuit breaker that will pop if amps become too high.  If yours PSUs aren't cheap knockoffs then they will certainly shut down also if power usage gets out of control.  Then you also have a surge protector that also has a circuit breaker.  The stuff you hear about causing fires are usually things like space heaters that fall over and ignite something.  I mean if you think about it can you think of any scenario where sparks would start shooting out of your psu or gpu?  Or outlet?  No, not going to happen.  If i were you id be more concerned with the internet going down or power going out and your rigs shutting off.

I mean think about all of the electrical equipment that runs daily without intervention.  Server rooms full of stuff that never ignite.

Yeah, right ... Lol.

I'll add to Digital Drug Lord's unrealistic suggestions ... halon fire prevention system.  Lol.

sound nice, an option 4. you spend an additional budgeting for buying these parts, and maybe also the electricity bill increases because the AC keeps on alive.

in short a story, you go vacation and you always check the RIG on the web using a Mobile phone or Laptop in Airport, on Taxi, in a hotel or everywhere and every time you want. The atmosphere of 3 months of vacation becomes anxiety atmosphere. Although the holiday destination was for fun.

better choose option 5: You canceled the vacation

I don't remember the last time I've been in a three months vacation...

Anyway I always shut everything down when I'm away for more than two days: better safe than sorry.

I went out of country for a week about a month ago. I was going around in circles about leaving my rigs on, but at the last second i decided that i would turn them off. Im kinda worried even going of to work for 9 hours. The rigs put out alot of heat!

i will mostly ended up mining during night hours and early morning hours and off during day. For A/C looks like wi-fi wall with scheduler app available so can schedule it to urn 1-2 hours during evening to remove residual heat accumulated during day.
There is going to be unavoidable anxiety, so will probably make my final decision on the day before :)

buy some of these

https://www.amazon.com/Tonyko%C2%AE-Fiberglass-Fire-Blanket-39-inch/dp/B01FOILJEI/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1518733896&sr=8-4&keywords=fire+blankets


they would be helpful  get the big one it is large and covers a lot of area

If somethings is going to happen it will happen in a few hours, not days or months. It can happen when you go out for shopping. I would probably choose option 3, but it seems that you will worry too much, so maybe it's not a bad idea to sell everything and buy newer (and maybe faster) cards in 3 months.

OP, I think you left out something. While you are gone, in addition to apparently running these cards full out, you need to earn at least $25/day per card to pay for your vacation.  ;D

OP, your question is somewhat ironic, given the number of forum topics of people trying to run their cheap cards at their max settings, with the smallest power supply, for the longest time.

My vote is with the dial back crowd (which is what I do). Usually dialing back also increases efficiency and decreases SW crashes.

Another dial back method would be to mess around with the max temp settings of your mining software. I believe Claymore mining SW will actually dial back to not exceed the max temp that you set. So you could set the temp to stay lower than your default and this would also have the effect of throttling back the cards.

This is a bad idea.  If you can't have someone access your rigs while you are gone I would not leave it running. 

If you have Windows 10 running and have NOT disabled automatic updates you may as well shut your rigs down now. 

If you are determined to leave them up and running dial the clocks down, set temperature and power thresholds down.  This will extend the life of your machines and potentially avoid burnt out fans and power supplies. 

i am running centos linux.

further thought: :)))
- Construct a wireless remote controller mini-toy-car on which mount the camera and the fire extinqguisher.
- Mount fire extinguisher will need some actuator arm to be able to spray and direct the foam in case of fire.
- Both cam and remote toy car will need to have enough batteries or home-in to charging station for replenishment like zoomba vacuum cleaner.
- SMS or email or siren or any combination thereof that can send off notification regarding environment temperature exceeding pre-set level.
- wi-fi Remotely controlled doorlock so in case of fire, neighrborhood or fire enginer personnel can enter withou breaking door.
- Home internet is not perfect and someimes goes offline completely in which case you have to walk up to router to reset it manually. So plug in the router to smart wall socket and schedule 5 minutes of power-off during midnight to reset in case if happens. With that max off-time is a week.

After that I think I can sleep as if I have completely turned off everything.