Go by "at the wall" measurements, as nothing on the AMD side reports the power usage of the entire card because AMD's HARDWARE on the card only measures power usage of the GPU itself.

Software like Afterburner and Wattman ALWAYS get the power usage wrong, and UNDERreport it a lot on AMD cards as a result.

I suspect they have already deployed initial units to Hashnest to start replacing L3 / L3+ units there, but it was probably a small batch mostly for engineering/testing purposes to validate the design and to get the software calibrated.

At this point, I'm of the opinion that if that video "claiming" to be about a F3 Ethereum ASIC was about a real miner, it is more likely to be the next generation Bitmain 14/16nm SCRYPT miner that I anticipate showing up in a few months, probably to be known as the L5 and by one report using 1300 watts.
1500+ Mhash of SCRYPT is a significant improvement over anything current on efficiency (about 3 times the hashrate for 1.5 times the power if that 1300 watt figure is correct), so well in line with what we've seen the 14/16 nm node achieve over 28nm on other algorithms.

The AMD beta mining version has LESS support for older cards (not a big deal if you don't mix them with new stuff) than the current 17.50 release, and doesn't support underclock or undervolt at ALL as far as I can tell.
It also has widely reported issues with "doesn't work with VEGA", though there appear to be possible work arounds for those issues in some cases.

My A2 farm was still profitable (though not by a LOT) up to sometime late last month or VERY early this month.

If you're having the work done anyway, why not just have standard NEMA 6-15 or 6-20 outlets installed, 2 to 4 per circuit as appropriate, and skip the PDU entirely?

Which would be an insane assumption, Scypt hashrates haven't been even CLOSE to flat for a very long time now.

They haven't been as bad as that big jump in December 2017, but the average this year has been about 2% per difficulty period.

Comment by someone in another thread was claiming "their friend at Bitman" is claiming the L5 will be 15 GH at 1300 watts.
I think they slipped a decimal point on the hashrate, but the wattage sounds reasonable given recent Bitmain designs.

Litecoin price jumped, therefore Bitmain adjusted pricing on the L3+

Nothing new here, move along move along.

$505 as of a few minutes ago.

Which is not comparable information, he's going by AFTERBURNER reported wattage, not "at the wall" figures.
Afterburner, LIKE ALL SOFTWARE, only reports the power draw of the GPU itself (NOT the entire card) because that's what the AMD Polaris cards report for power draw.

Nvidia is a lot more honest about that, their cards (and utilities like nvidia-smi) report the ENTIRE CARD power draw.

1.5 Ghash is a figure that can be believed.
15 Ghash is NOT.
The 14/16nm node, and even the 10nm node out of Intel and Samsung, are NOT offering that degree of improvement over the 28nm node the L3+ uses.

I suspect you or "your friend" misplaced a decimal point.

1300 watts seems a bit high, but not at all out of line given recent Bitmain miners - I was already anticipating the next gen would soak more power than the L3+.

That is a RIPOFF for anywhere outside of Manhattan (NYC).

Get more quotes.


30 amp outlets make sense because most PDUs are designed to run from a 30 amp outlet.

L3+ is probably a good bet if you have $200 coupons.


I do think it's not much longer for the world though.

Had a couple facts collide in my mind last night.

I am now strongly of the opinion that the video that claimed to be about a "Bitmain F3 miner for ethash" was in fact about a 14/16 nm new SCRYPT miner.

1500ish Mhash would be right in the ballpark I'd expect a new L3+ sized miner to be with a node drop from 28nm.

Bitmain putting the L3+ on sale at what is probably "close to cost" looks like their usual "fire sale the remaining stock of the old model, start selling out the Hashnest units, while we replace them with the initial production of a new more-efficient model" routine.


I'm now anticipating that Bitmain will release the "L5" Scrypt miner in 2-3 months, specified at 1550 -0 +5% hashrate using 1000 watts -0 +10% at the wall when used with an APW3+.
Price will be a big question mark - but I'd not bet on MUCH less than $2000 unless Litecoin price drops noticeably between now and July.


It's interesting Bitmain is willing to accept LTC and BTC on the L3+, after many months of insistence on folks using BCH for ANY of their miners.
Either they're desperate to move those last L3+ units, or they're finally getting a clue that "insisting on folks using OUR garbagecoin for miner sales is costing us sales".

I've somewhat changed my mind, after a couple facts collided in my mind last night.

I'm now thinking that the video claiming to be a "F3" model was more likely a prototype of a 14/16nm node next generation Bitmain SCRYPT miner (the hashrate is right where I would expect such a unit to end up).

The sale Bitmain started on the L3+ a couple days ago is looking like their usual "fire sale the old model, sell out our Hashnet units, as we replace them with the initial output of our first production run of the more efficient unit".

I didn't say "for profit" - though technically you can make SOME income from running BOINC projects that are on the GridCoin whitelist which is more than they're going to make from moving them to virtual reality.



I had a couple points of data collide in my mind last night - and I'm now VERY STRONGLY suspecting that "F3 video" may have been from a new Bitmain SCRYPT miner on the 14/16 nm node (the L3/L3+ are 28nm) and NOT FOR ETHASH at all.

The numbers make too much sense - 1500 Mhash on Scrypt is well within the realm of where a smaller-node L3+ would be likely to end up, I'd guess somewhere around 1000 watts though to achieve it.
The recent move on the L3+ sure looks like the common "have a fire sale on older-node miners for a month or two once our next gen starts the first production run and we can start replacing Hashnet units with more efficient gear" Bitmain mode.

I doubt they're going to call it the "F3" when it goes on sale though - more likely the "L5".

I had a couple of things collide in my mind last night.

Price of L3+ big drop - indicating a fairly high probability of a new Bitmain Scrypt miner soon.
That video claiming to be from some Bitmain "F3 miner" - and the hashrate in the video.

I already commented a couple places about that video possibly NOT being for an Ethereum miner - but now I'm strongly suspecting it's from a new Bitmain 14/16nm node based SCRYPT miner.

1500 Mhash/s on Scrypt at probably somewhere in the 1000 watt range just makes SENSE for a new-node Bitmain miner to be released in probably 2-3 months.

https://www.phoronix.com/forums/forum/linux-graphics-x-org-drivers/amd-linux/918649-underclocking-undervolting-the-rx-470-with-amdgpu-pro-success

Don't go with their 818 figure on the undervolt though (I'm running about 860 on my Polaris-based rigs), it's turned out to be a bit optimistic for a wide range of RX 470/480 cards.
AMDGPU does NOT support undervolting or lowering clocks out of the box as of the current 17.50 version (or older), you have to hack the applicable kernel module to make it work, though BIOS modding the card for lower voltage and clocks SHOULD work as well.

I'm more worried about another BIG hashrate jump, like the one Litecoin had in mid-December where total network hashrate almost DOUBLED in a bit over a week.
Even without factoring "new miner" and that big hashrate jump into the equation, and just looking at average hashrate growth this year, I'm not sure if a L3+ will pay itself off before it become uneconomic to operate even at the new low price and MY very low electric cost.

Move them to scientific research, like some of the Berkley (BOINC) research projects.

Interesting that he claims 4 but only provides links to 3 (there's a link to someone called "oasis mining" in there as well).

I also don't buy the "larger companies" claims - Samsung has no reports of being interested in making miners, all of the reports to date appear to be about their CONTRACT FOUNDRY work to make chips for EBang, Nvidia has not shown any interest in getting into cryptocurrency at all and has stated multiple times they don't like their GPUs being used for mining, Intel has had a few vague reports of some sort of interest but ZERO confirmed interest.

Sounds like yet another "I want to sound important by repeating vague claims I've not bothered actually checking into" type "journalist".