Yes of course is air quality inside is strongly related to outside air quality. Installing a filter system is definitely something we are planing for the future (when more high end miners are deployed). As for the moment we have to make it work without one. But even when we have a filter system I would like to be able to evaluate how good or bad it is working. Thats why I am monitoring air quality.

From my research data centers typically aim for particulate matter concentrations of less than 1µg/m³. I suppose similar thresholds should be applied for mining farms as well. This information can be found at section 3.1 in Table 2 in the following document: https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.362.2554&rep=rep1&type=pdf

Contradicting to this Oliver from the WhatsMiner Support on Telegram (https://t.me/whatsminercommunity) has told me that WhatsMiner devices should be deployed in environments with particulate matter concentrations of < 0.5mg/m³, which would mean < 5000µg/m³.

A limit of 5000µg/m³ seems very high to me. But then again I am not an expert on the topic.

I have been monitoring the air quality inside one of our mining locations for the past 6 weeks with a rather simple setup using a Nova Fitness SDS 011 Sensor.
Little did I know when I started this experiment that I would have such trouble finding information about acceptable limits for crypto mining hardware.

We have Antminer S9 and Whatsminer M20S devices deployed there. I have not been able to find any information about safe values regarding particulate matter concentration. The specific miners are just examples. I am more interested which particulate matter limits would generally be considered excellent, good, or critical for computing devices such as miners.

Thus far I have only been able to find information regarding human health, but I am unsure how this would translate to mining-hardware longevity.

Monitoring results
The sensor is able to detect particulate matter concentration PM2.5 and PM10.
In the past 6 weeks PM2.5 was at an average at 2.60µg/m³ while PM10 was at an average of 4.24µg/m³.
A graph and a table showing the full monitoring data can be viewed here:



Any expert insights or links to useful resources would be greatly appreciated!

I am unsure whether or not this would result in the same level of wearout. I could imagine it depends on the specific implementation of the mining software/firmware and how it handles stopping the mining process. One thing that's different for sure is that fans can keep running a bit longer for cool down and that the control board will not suddenly turn on and off all the time. Given that hash boars are obviously the most important part of the miner this question is something I would really like to get to the bottom of. I'd probably have to ask a hardware engineer or developers of the firmware.

Whatsminer Tool could have been a solution. Unfortunately they only support a 64Bit Windows application, but my existing miners are getting their "should I mine or should I not mine" information from a 32Bit raspberry pi. If nothing else works I could consider setting up an additional computer for managing Whatsminer devices (hopefully not).
Furthermore I am unsure whether or not I will be able to programatically turn miners on and off using the Whatsminer tool.
In the software manual (to be found at: https://qiniu.microbt.com/files/1617348991/WhatsMinerTool%20Operating%20Guide.pdf?attname=WhatsMinerTool%20Operating%20Guide.pdf)
there is no deeper explanation of the included API.

Using an outdated firmware may be another option. I am unsure how well this scales and if there are any security concerns running outdated firmware on a large number of devices. I may be getting some newer Whatsminers (like M30s) down the line as well and they might not be able to run outdated firmware. If the manufactures only stopped closing ssh ports all the time .

As I have already stated, controlling the power input could harm the hardware in the long run. So I am hesitant to try this. Or am I wrong in this regard?

I tried googling the same thing, that's why I asking here. Appreciate your effort!
Unfortunately this solution will not fit to my requirements, as exchange electricity prices (and thus profitability) are not predictable.
I could pay 3 cents / kWh today at 10am and 12 cents tomorrow at 10am.
I need something that will allow me to actually run code to calculate profitability every time electricity prices change.

Also, wouldn't I damage my hardware if I kept shutting it off and turning it on all the time?
I'd prefer to stop the mining process, not turn off the device itself.

Hey guys,

I am running a bunch of Antminers on BraiinsOS, which has an implementation of cron that allows me to periodically execute custom scripts that will start or stop the mining process depending on the current profitability (I have changing electricity prices with high volatility).

So my question is: Is there a way to reproduce this behaviour using something like cron on a Whatsminer M20s?

Does the Whatsminer firmware even support cron (or some other job scheduler)?
Unfortunately I don't have any device to try this out myself.

Any hints are appreciated!

I've been mining with 9x Antminer S9 inside a Windmill for about a year now using 4G.
Its working pretty good. Haven't really had any problems with shares being transmitted too late or anything.
I can't tell you though how good this scales as I haven't tried with more than 9 devices simultaneously.
I will expand this operation later this year though and if I encounter any problems I will let you know!

UPDATE:

A few weeks ago the retailer send back my defective hashboard.
They put my hashboard into a different S17+. This caused the miner to not even start hashing on any of the boards.
From what I understand this means that my hashboard cannot work together with hashboards from a different S17+.

Therefore I am left with 2 options:

• 1. Do nothing and have my miner run with 2 "new" hashboards
• 2. Send my miner in, and receive a used S17+ as replacement

Option 1 will leave me with 2/3 of a new S17+
Option 2 will leave me with 3/3 of a used S17+

I am not really sure whats better, given that 3/3 of a used S17+ may have a shorter lifetime compared to 2/3 of a new S17+.


Any thoughts or recommendations? I am eligible for a used replacement miner  until December 2020.

Thank you for recommendations.

Before I run out of my 180 Day warranty I will send in the faulty hashboard.
I read that a different board my not work with my S17+ as it has a different "board-code"

But sometimes it will work. I will give it a try and report back when I receive the "new" board.

So if your diagnosis is right, it seems there is a serious hardware error. I was hoping there wasn't (like some loose cable on the PSU or something). In that case I suppose sending it in for repair and hoping for the best is the smartest move?

Putting it on the side actually did work for me before. I read about this somewhere in this forum. Tried it again today, this time without success.

The nature of my project does not allow for constant electricity supply. I do have free electricity from time to time, but at other times its rather expensive. The miner is supposed to be installed inside the tower of a windmill.

Thats why I am coding a control software that will tell my miner what to do, based on the current price of electricity (if selling the energy is more profitable I won't mine). By my calculations it will be able to run profitable about 70% of the time though, which should result in profit long term.

Regarding your tips:

1. time saving is not important right now. This is a research project and I need a functioning S17+ to do proper research. Profitability is not relevant (yet).
2. I am running BraiinsOS on all our S9s (12 in total). It has not released yet for S17+ (but will be this year). I am planning to use it for this S17+.

I have also tried Awesome Miner Firmware. It has the same issues (missing hashchain). Setting a low power profile did not resolve this.

---

The retailer that sold me the S17+ offered me to send in the defective Hashboard and get a (used but working) Hashboard as replacement.

I think I will try this. Even though I am unsure about potential issues when replacing a Hashboard with another one.

I have a brand new S17+ (70TH). From time to time Hashchain 0 is missing.

I found the following entry within my logs:


I have heard that this may be a common problem on the S17 series. What I don't understand though, is that this problem seems to come and go randomly.

When I turn off the miner and turn it on the next day it can occur. It can remain like this for a couple of days. Then without any clear indication why, all three Hashchains are found and working again. (Without any problems).

The problem either appears or disappears only when I turn off the miner and turn it on the next day. Once it's running (with 2 or 3 boards), it stays like that.

I turn the miner off every night (going to sleep mode first, too cool down). The past 6 days the miner was started every morning without any problems. Today the problem occured again. A number of reboots, power disconnects did not solve the problem (like the last times).

All temperatures are within a normal operating range.

Things I have tried:

• different power cables & outlets
• switching data cables (results in other hashboard number not being found, depending on how i switch them)
• Install Control Board Recovery Image: https://support.bitmain.com/hc/en-us/articles/360033757513-S17-S17Pro-S9-SE-S9k-Z11-control-board-program-recovery-SD-card-flashing-with-customized-PW-
• Reset Miner using web-intercace & hardware reset button

The thing is I don't really want to send it in for repair, as it seems all parts of the hardware (can) function properly. (and it will take forever).

What may be the cause of this, and is there a potential fix?

Thank you for your replies guys, you have been very helpful.

In case someone else may be interested you can see my updated formula below:

bitcoinPerDay = ((minerHashrate * (blockReward + avgRewardFee) * numberOfSecondsPerDay) / (estimatedNextDifficulty * 2^32)) * poolFeeMultiplier;

For reference:

I have used the API from BTC.com to calculate the average block fee reward of the last 8 mined blocks.

• Documentation: https://btc.com/api-doc#Block
• Endpoint that I have used to get all blocks of a given date: https://chain.api.btc.com/v3/block/date/20200730

The results of my FPPS calculation are now also pretty close to the results of the mining calculator at https://btc.com/tools/mini-mining-calculator.
The accuracy may be improved by including more than 8 blocks into the average block reward fee calculation. I will be testing this, but for now I am quite happy with the performance.

I am currently working on a formula to calculate my bitcoin earnings for a 24h timeframe on BTC.com pool.

The formula I have come up with so far is the following:

bitcoinPerDay = ((minerHashrate * blockReward * numberOfSecondsPerDay) / (difficulty * 2^32)) * poolFeeMultiplier

The results I am getting are pretty good. They are very close to the results that the mining calculator at https://btc.com/tools/mini-mining-calculator is giving me.

At the moment my formula only works for PPS payout. Using the calculator I can see that in FPPS earnings are about 10-15% higher. I would like to know how I can include the FPPS-Reward/Transaction-Fee into this calculation.

Any hints are appreciated!

This reference is very helpful, thank you!


As I will be mining using 4G and varying electricity I cannot go for anything else than pay per share reward systems. Thank you for your input!

I can't really seem to find any information about viabtc offering FPPS, only PPS and PPLNS.
F2pool on the other hand seems like a good alternative. 315TH or more should be doable for me looking forward.
I will take a loot at novablock after the weekend, though I currently would prefer joining a rather large pool.

Furthermore I think I may have misunderstood the 48 hour warning from BTC.com
Their support told me that this only applies when a payout wallet is changed. If this is true I will gladly stay with them (unless anybody can give me good arguments why I shouldn't?)

Thanks to all of you for your further suggestions!

Slushpool is no option for me as they do not offer FPPS or PPS. viabtc may be an option, but the high pool fee of 4% seem a little too high for me. Also online reviews are not too positive.  

Anyway thank you for your suggestions!

Anybody else know any alternative that matches my criteria?

I am looking for a bitcoin pool with FPPS or PPS reward system that will allow me to receive mined Bitcoins as soon as the minimum payout amount is reached. I want to exchange my mined coins to FIAT as quickly as possible. Low pool fees are obviously very a big plus as well.

I have been mining on BTC.com for a while, but there I need to wait 48hours to receive my mined coins for "security reasons".  

Any suggestions are appreciated

Hello Kano,

Thanks for sharing your thoughts! The things you've said are very interesting and I will definitely keep them in mind going forward.

As brainsOS is the only decent open source solution I have found thus far there is a strong incentive for me to use it. Sadly the latest releases of braiins don't implement cgminer API as the old Cobalt releases did. Anyway as for now I feel comfortable continuing to write my own code to modify the configuration file to change the desired properties myself. So far its working pretty well.

What you said about noting the obvious. Of course you are absolutely right that there is a large degree of uncertainty involved. Depending on the scale of the mining operations it may at least be possible to minimize the timeframe between mining and selling. The results and profitability predictions will not be completely accurate, but I hope to make an educated guess about whether or not it could be profitable to mine given certain parameters. As for now the entire thing is more of a research project and in case of success I am considering to deploy it at a larger scale.

Hey taserz, thank you for your reply!

I don't plan on changing voltage and frequency on my miners more often than necessary. Of course I would have to find a good balance with that.
Given that I have electricity prices between 0.0$ and 0.20$ / KWh over the year I need to adapt my miners though. Running at 16 TH/s when electricity is "free", running at around 9-10 TH/s when it is above 0.03$ and not running at all above 0.05$ is my goal. Of course those thresholds will be variable and multiple presets may exist.

I am hoping - though I don't know for sure - that this method will give me better results even with autotuning turned off. If you disagree I'd love to hear your arguments!

Sure thing, I will give you an update once I've made substantial progress!

In the meantime, if anyone experienced with cgminer API has some insights to share let me know. I Want to explore every possibility.