As an experiment, I have pointed my "mighty SP20" at the pool just using my existing .alhstick suffix. I will do this for at least an hour or more. This in conjunction with my two sticks. I figure I can see that it's working as I expect using the page for my .alhstick. I'll probably do this again in the future, but I can't guarantee when or for how long.

Is there any particular reason for a .alhdonation suffix? Does that require any work on Phil's part? Right now I am just looking to see that I got all the little things lined up, and I can adjust them later as needed.

That's for setting this up, Phillip!

Whether it's custom firmware or not, does the S7 Beagle-Bone have an SD card slot? Does Bitmain have an S7 "Rescue Firmware" image available yet? Not pressing for me, but some folks might be interested.

Was it Bitmain that released the cgminer extra-nonce update, or Kano?

I wonder how many they made? How many did CrazyGuy order?

OMG: How ever will we secure the network? 

Why the desire to replace the fans? If you expect to reduce noise by simply putting in a quieter fan, plan on substantially reducing the hash rate as well. Bitmain didn't put LOUD fans in on a whim. It takes serious airflow to cool a 1200W heater (i.e. the S7). The fans Bitmain chose push a lot of air, with enough pressure to get it through the dense heatsinks inside the enclosure.

How many S5's are you running off the EVGA 1200W power supply? Two perhaps?

I expect the short answer is: Yes.

One small quibble: You continue to "buy" a lottery ticket by paying the electric bill, which will be a bit higher as a result of the mining ASIC inside. Probably won't matter to most, but it's still there. Unplug it, and your lottery participation ends.

Should I want to add my SP20 for a day or two, do I just use the wallet address without my .alhstick suffix? I would guess that's right, but just thought I would ask.

Looking pretty good for Biodom. tss needs to hit PAUSE for a couple of hours, or Herb will need to light up his undelivered S7's..... 

Bitcoin Difficulty:    59,335,351,234
Estimated Next Difficulty:    60,416,209,406 (+1.82%)
Adjust time:    After 57 Blocks, About 8.9 hours
Hashrate(?):    446,301,366 GH/s
Block Generation Time(?):    
1 block: 9.4 minutes
3 blocks: 28.2 minutes
6 blocks: 56.4 minutes

Thanks for letting me join late, I appreciate it.

Should have 2 sticks cooking along at about 20GH at this time. Best of luck to us!!!

@Phil:

Thanks, I'll adjust my Pi tonight when I get home later tonight.

I've only read back about 5 pages, so I'll ask a simple question:

Is it to late to join? I've got two sticks that are working, and would like to try my hand here. I kinda like the simple share plan that Phil laid out, but I don't want to "overflow" things.

My mistake on the battery within the R1. It seems that it was just today that the product went up on their Shop page.

In any event, I read:

"meaning that as long as the device is powered, you are competing for a chance to solve a block". I take that to mean "Powered from the wall", and not related to the battery, though I guess it's ambiguous. There is no mention of the battery capacity from what I read either.

Even if it could be operated from the battery, it wouldn't likely have much life if used that way.

I don't think you should expect to find a battery in the R1, any more than you would if you purchased a "wall wart" USB charger. When it's plugged in, the USB port is "live" and can act as a charging device, just like just about every other USB port. I'll bet the "It's a charger too" is primarily marketing driven. Whatever it does, it ONLY does when it's plugged into the wall (IMHO).

I tend to agree with much of what you posted. I am however perplexed by the "NDA for Price/Date" information. Assuming you are correct, what's the motivation? How does that help Spondoolies, or the signer of the NDA? Is this not really intended for potential customers, but perhaps investors?

This feels a bit like the SFARDS "announcement", but never answered any of relevant questions for price or date included.

Does the S7 mining GUI have a "shutdown" mechanism? I ask since it might be useful when there is a planned removal of power (e.g. to relocate the miner, re-configure, etc). This won't help if the power fails but it might make things better for folks during their early testing and experimentation.

I always worry about a power shutdown of anything that's got a flash based file system getting corrupted (e.g. a Raspberry PI, maybe the BBB).

If I am reading things right, we might also get a brief respite for the 1st half of the next adjustment. Supposedly Bitmain will be on holiday Oct 1 through Oct 8th. While I expect stuff that is shipped will arrive, there should be a 1 week hiatus on S7 production. I have to beleive that will manifest itself in some positive way (e.g. smaller difficulty increase).

I too would encourage you to resist the urge to buy the cheapest power supply you can find. My reasoning is that a high quality supply will last across mining hardware generations. In a year it's possible the S3 will become unattractive to you, or it may break or whatever. If you have a high quality PSU, then you don't throw it away just because you give up on the S3. You should be able to re-use your PSU on another miner, or sell it for a reasonable price. Consider your PSU as an investment, and not strictly an expenditure.

While a server PSU could serve you well, take note that server PSU's tend be much noisier. My understanding is that the S3 is a pretty quiet miner, and it would be unfortunate to pair it with a server PSU if noise matters to you. Maybe you don't care about sound.

Best of luck with your S3.

Looks to me like Bitmain reduced to some extent the top possible price, since they lowered the price of Batch 2 & 3 of the S7. Spondoolies would seem to have less room to maneuver now in terms of price (IMHO).