Bitcoin Forum

How did BFL tune down the Jalapeño to 4.5 GH/s, is it an actual hardware difference or was it simply firmware? If so can it be undone?

Thank you

when they got their chips they graded 'em

some will do 3-4GH/s
some will do 4-5GH/s

So then I assume it cannot be fixed? lol

Thanks for the reply!

Don't you need a hardware jtag interface?

it can be done soley with a raspberry pi and some GPIO wires :P will try to find link


just note that flashing it will void warranties and theres no going back after going bla.. i mean custom

I think the warranty only stands as long as they are making those devices.When the Monarch starts shipping,the warranty is over on 65nm stuff.....................................

Thank you sir! I'd love to give it a shot. I am not too worried about the warranties as Butter Fly Crap is the worst company I have ever had to deal with.

Looking over the RPi flashing of a Jalapeno on http://randomcontent.wolfnexus.net/RandomSite/reflashing-a-butterfly-labs-jalapeno-with-only-a-raspberry-pi/

I see the last post, when a customer had gotten his Jalapeno mid-October, that something failed and there were no success posts following.  He had erased the firmware but hadn't succeeded in getting the new firmware installed.  A reply from Wolfnexus states:

Looks like one of the settings in the STEPPINGS file is incorrect or missing. This is due to the change in MCU that the Jalapenos are now using. I haven't yet had time to look into what needs to be changed, nor do I have one of the newer Jalapenos to test with. Any other users out there care to share what they did to resolve this issue?

Since mine was shipped about the same time as the one that failed to take the new firmware, I'm hesitant about giving it a try myself.  Mine is marginally above about 10% less than the 5GH/s expected.  They indicated they would give 5GH/s because the power figure was so much higher than what was specified at the time the pre-order was placed but then they said Hell, those pre-orders went so cheaply we'll ship most of those (non-upgraded) as a little better than 4.5GH/s. ???

I had mine apart and looked for the buck converter which required faster FETs than they had been using but only found a no-name replacement in its stead.  So, they're using different, cheaper, chips now. 

On the other hand it could be that Wolfnexus gave a face-saving reply to the user he suspected of not following procedure to the letter.

So, anybody who managed to replace the firmware in a Jalapeno manufactured after the first week in October, I'd appreciate knowing.

I'm the webmaster of that site, and my post is hardly a face saving reply, I based my reply purely on what James posted. BFL changed the MCU they used between the initial version of Jalapeno and later versions. The only real difference is the older ones have more flash memory to store the programming in, and I believe the new Jalapenos also have a newer version of the ASIC with functional engine 0, although this doesn't affect whether or not you can use JTAG to upload new firmware.

Sadly I haven't got any of the newer version of Jalapenos, so I can't test and update the procedure to suit...

So at least another 12 months.