All I am trying to measure is the additional power consumption of the cards. This is a machine that is always on, and has been always on for the last 3 years. Thus, the idle power consumption is the baseline, as it would be consuming that regardless. Determining the incremental energy consumption is all I am concerned about, and now have a good approximation of that number.
Now if I was building a dedicated mining rig from the ground up, of course the over-all system wattage would be the important number.
And this is precisely my point! This makes your numbers meaningful only to you, and meaningless to all of us on the forum (because most people here favor more efficient systems -- and a dedicated 2 x 7970 miner idles at 90W or so). You should have disclosed your unusually high baseline idle load in your first post. Meaningless? Are you serious? Being able to compare apples to apples the power consumption of an overvlocked/undervolted 7970 to a 5970, ot 5870, or any other number of cards is meaningless? What about those with existing farm of dedicated miners? Might they find some meaning in stand-alone efficiency of cards? Might they find some meaningful cost savings if they can upgrade to more efficieint GPU's? Fail on so many levels. |
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Alright, I went and re-measured the numbers. I think what happened was I screwed up the idle wattage the first time around. Here are the correct numbers:
System idle: 154
Mining with above settings: 512
Hash rate: 1340 MH/s
Soooo, I am getting 3.74 MH/watt.
No. It is nonsense to compute the efficiency as 1340/(512-154) = 3.74 Mh/J... For example, if the cards' idle power consumption would be worse and would be making the machine idle at 350 Watt, would you conclude it would raise efficiency to 1340/(512-350) = 8.27 Mh/J ? Of course not! You are in fact getting 1340/512 = 2.62 Mh/J which is in line with what I have measured on my own HD 7970 machines. All I am trying to measure is the additional power consumption of the cards. This is a machine that is always on, and has been always on for the last 3 years. Thus, the idle power consumption is the baseline, as it would be consuming that regardless. Determining the incremental energy consumption is all I am concerned about, and now have a good approximation of that number. Now if I was building a dedicated mining rig from the ground up, of course the over-all system wattage would be the important number. But in this case I am not dealing with a dedicated miner, thus it is not nonsense. |
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I think I can get close to 4.00 MH/watt, but the system would have to be a dedicated miner. Using other applications causes instability at lower voltages than the 1.08,
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Something is most definitely wrong with your meter or your math, my friend. At that clock/voltage, you should be drawing a bit over 200 watts per card (at the wall). I have three 7970 rigs and they all draw more power at a lower core clock, lower voltage, and a lower memory clock. To top it off, they don't have hard drives either. Hell, my water cooled 7970 rig would draw more power than this. In fact...  I tried to get as close to that clock/voltage as possible (my cards aren't stable at that core/voltage combo). With your same settings but 25 Mhz lower on the core clock, I've got 512 Watts total system power consumption with 2 cards. Granted, this is on a machine with an i7 930, but this measurement was done with no CPU overclocking. All components (including the GPUs) are water cooled. Even if you're just trying to calculate the power draw of the GPUs themselves, your measurement is off somewhere. My pump draws 9 watts. My idle CPU, board, SSD, and a few power controlled fans aren't going to suck up 212 watts. hmmmm, I will slap the Killawatt back on it and re-check the readings. Perhaps I screwed something up, but I thought I was right on. *sigh*...... Alright, I went and re-measured the numbers. I think what happened was I screwed up the idle wattage the first time around. Here are the correct numbers: System idle: 154 Mining with above settings: 512 Hash rate: 1340 MH/s Soooo, I am getting 3.74 MH/watt. I am bummed I was not getting what I thought....but still thrilled to shave subsantial power usage. |
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Something is most definitely wrong with your meter or your math, my friend. At that clock/voltage, you should be drawing a bit over 200 watts per card (at the wall). I have three 7970 rigs and they all draw more power at a lower core clock, lower voltage, and a lower memory clock. To top it off, they don't have hard drives either. Hell, my water cooled 7970 rig would draw more power than this. In fact... I tried to get as close to that clock/voltage as possible (my cards aren't stable at that core/voltage combo). With your same settings but 25 Mhz lower on the core clock, I've got 512 Watts total system power consumption with 2 cards. Granted, this is on a machine with an i7 930, but this measurement was done with no CPU overclocking. All components (including the GPUs) are water cooled. Even if you're just trying to calculate the power draw of the GPUs themselves, your measurement is off somewhere. My pump draws 9 watts. My idle CPU, board, SSD, and a few power controlled fans aren't going to suck up 212 watts. hmmmm, I will slap the Killawatt back on it and re-check the readings. Perhaps I screwed something up, but I thought I was right on. |
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Finally made the plunge on a Killawatt....what fun!
I don't know if this is unprecedented, but I was able to overclock AND undervolt 2 of my 7970's and drop the power consumption by a huge amount.
my settings:
Core voltage: 1060
Clock: 1125
Mem: 685
This was pretty stunning to me, but I am getting 1300+ MH/s @ 300+- watts.
4.33 MH/watt.
Now I realize this is not impressive when compared to massively undevolted and underclocked GPU's, but this is a massively OVERCLOCKED set-up! As a bonus the temps droppe a good 5 degrees with the same fan speed.
Just throwing it out there.....I was pretty thrilled. I will report back if it stays stable for 24 hours.
That is a pretty good spot to hash at, are you air cooling? It will most likely be stable at that speed. Anything higher than 1125 MHz will increase wattage significantly, voltage will only need to be changed at ~1240MHz (~200 watts). How did you decrease RAM clock, was it through driver? Yes, air cooling with a small external fan blowing on them as well. I decreased Mem clock using Afterburner beta 12.....it is the only tool I can get to clock it that low. |
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Finally made the plunge on a Killawatt....what fun!
I don't know if this is unprecedented, but I was able to overclock AND undervolt 2 of my 7970's and drop the power consumption by a huge amount.
my settings:
Core voltage: 1060
Clock: 1125
Mem: 685
This was pretty stunning to me, but I am getting 1300+ MH/s @ 300+- watts.
4.33 MH/watt.
Now I realize this is not impressive when compared to massively undevolted and underclocked GPU's, but this is a massively OVERCLOCKED set-up! As a bonus the temps droppe a good 5 degrees with the same fan speed.
Just throwing it out there.....I was pretty thrilled. I will report back if it stays stable for 24 hours.
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I am investigating whether water cooling would be cost effective. I will have access to well water in the space, and could run several heat exchangers.....seems very efficient relative to AC.
My only concerns are my lack of experience with waterblocks, and the high capital costs.
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3 phase is likely of no use for you. The reason for 3 phase is to reduce wiring in datacenters. Datacenters are "big" so they gots lots of long wiring runs. So they run 1 3phase circuit to a rack an then split it out as 3x 1 phase 208V circuits. They can power more gear from a single wiring run. The issue is the gear to split out 3phase into 3 separate single phase circuits tends to be expensive and you don't really have to make any massive wiring runs for the gear will cost way more than you will save in wiring. There are other advantages but they aren't really applicable. Simple version is 3phase or not it will need to be converted to single phase before you plug it into your power supply. The good news is that is a premises is wired for 3 phase in the US it almost certainly have a subpanel (and likely outlets) wired for 208V single phase (they take one leg of the 3 phase circuit and create a 208V circuit). In the US if the premises isn't wired for 3phase then it is 120V/240V split phase (same as any residence or office). So either way you will have power available @ 208V Single Phase and/or 240V "Single" Phase (technically it is split phase but nobody calls it by its correct name). The main reason for using higher voltage (208V or 240V) is:a) reduce the # of circuits needed b) power more devices for the same amperage. c) reduce power losses in wiring due to heat (power loss is based on current not voltage which is why transmission lines are thousands of volts) d) improve efficiency of power supplies (ATX power supplies run ~2% to 4% more efficient at 240V) Using a couple of high amperage 208V/240V outlets you can greatly simplify your wiring. For example using a PDU like this you can power ~5 KW worth of rigs from a single (NEMA L6-30R) outlet. http://www.ebay.com/itm/APC-Basic-Rack-Mount-PDU-1U-AP9571-208VAC-30A-IEC-320-12-C13-NEMA-L6-30P-/110850452157?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item19cf33aabd#ht_2994wt_118530A, derated to 24A (code compliance). 24A @ 240V = 5.76 KW 24A @ 208V =4.992 KW APC made something like half a quadrillion of these over the years so finding them on ebay is easy.  Your entire farm could be powered by 5 outlets and 5 PDUs. I did a little research before rewiring my garage and nothing beats these AP9571s. 30A circuit is going to power 50% more rigs than a 20A circuit so these PDU are more economical than 20A ones. You may think well lets just go 50A. I like your style but 50A connectors, plugs, receptables, cables, breakers, wiring, etc tend to be very expensive. 208V/240V @ 30A is the best bang for the buck. I can't help you on the cooling though. You are in the lead in my book....I will see what else comes in over the next couple days. Thanks to everyone who has responded so far! |
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Milk was a bad choice!
sorry, had to get it out of my system
YES! and it counts! |
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Just got my card in today  . Going through the paperwork part (registering etc. / grabbing drivers) and going to be installing it shortly. Should have it benched by tonight. watching closely! |
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Hey all,
Those of you who have been around for a while probably are somewhat familiar with my operation at this point. For those of you who are not, here are the broad strokes:
I run 25+- miners in 3 different locations, pushing a total of 23,000 MH/s. All 3 locations are on standard 110v outlets with 20 amp breakers. This has been great so far, aside from the occasional breaker tripping. At this point, I am running up against the limits of what I can comfortably and feasibly fit in the space I have access to. Temperatures are becoming a problem (thought not bad at all), but more importantly I am pretty much maxed out on power draw.
This has led me to start negotiating a lease on some commercial space (holy shit is is cheap still!), where I plan on moving some miners, and also adding others in a high efficiency set-up. This is where the bounty comes in!
What I need instruction/help/assistance with:
-Some discussion on 110v vs 220v power. I have limited knowledge here, and would love a good paragraph or two on advantages, ease of implementation, pitfalls, etc.
-Phase 3 power discussion. A lot of the listings I looked at had this as a feature....I do not want to research this, and would rather pay a bounty for someone to sum it up with common English.
-AC cooling. For those of you working in enclosed spaces....I realize it is almost impossible to cool a sizable farm on AC alone without venting the waste heat. With venting, how much AC power would one need to properly cool a 15-20 GH/s installation? Square footage would be around 800.
I might add more later, and increase the bounty accordingly.
Also, I realize this info is available all over the forum, but I do not have the time to go crawl through all the topics and sift out the good stuff.
THANKS!!!
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169 singles by my rough count....
that equates to roughly 135 GH/s of additional network hashing power......not insignificant.
Have to love the fact that the rush to order these based on their percieved profitability will supress actual profitability once they all hit the network. Assuming stable BTC prices of course.
Assuming people aren't retiring video card rigs in place of these. Judging by what I have seen so far, everyone is treating them as add-ons at the moment. |
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169 singles by my rough count....
that equates to roughly 135 GH/s of additional network hashing power......not insignificant.
Have to love the fact that the rush to order these based on their percieved profitability will supress actual profitability once they all hit the network. Assuming stable BTC prices of course.
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All about density brother and a 5970 is hard to beat...
for me, it's all about what will retain its value the longest. i guess once you spend $400 on some graphics card, everything you make after that is profit, huh? except, a month later, that 5970 will be worth $350. 5970's aren't so bad anymore, though... hell, one sold for $265 on eBay a couple weeks ago, and $210 last week. 5870's are still the best buy, right now (** err, maybe not, seeing what 5970's are selling for now on ebay) Ummm, please show me these! I will buy them all. |
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Maybe this is noobish of me, but doesn't just mining for rewards introduce a lot of variance based on luck? Especially on short term contracts? The difference between making a hefty profit and losing money could be one reward found 10 seconds after the contract expires.
Sorry if my understanding is lacking.
I mine at a zero fee, PPS pool. No variance. |
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Am I able to point the miner at any pool?
No, only rewards. Apologies.....I just won't go re-program 25+ miners spread through 3 locations. |
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I'm so down to buy one of these things. I'm curious to see how fast this thing guzzles gas clocked full out, balls to the wall. And conversely, what it's MH/j ratio is when you underclock/undervolt it.
My guess is it will pull 450+ watts if the clocks are set to 1000+ MHz |
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How many btc for 10 day?
I am not into mining, hence dont know much.
Can you provide fair estimation?
Approximately 150 BTC would be produced over a 10 day period. |
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