Antminer S5, Spondoolies SP20 or 3 x Antminer S3?

[RichBC]

Very late to mining, do not know how I missed it, but 4 Days ago bought an ebay S1 for £30 and have been progressing rapidly up the learning curve.

So the S1 is great for learning but at 190 GH/S with 350W at the wall (1.8J/GH) it's a great way of loosing money. However unusually my Wife is happy as it's doing a great job of drying the washing.

So my objective is to have between 800 & 1000 GH/S at the lowest possible wattage. I will buy the hardware second hand and am happy to right off the hardawre cost, because if I wasn't doing this I would be spending money on something else :-)

I am considering the 3 options in the title, and am happy to spend time adjusting and modifying if that will improve the J/GH ratio My initial research shows the following.

Antminer S3 Underclocked & undervolted  x3 ebay price £260 - £300
0.68V, 150MHz, 310GH/S, 180W x 3 = 930GH/S, 930W = 0.6J /GH

Antminer S5 ebay price £300 - £350
0.51 J/GH  (Have seen 0.2 J/GH @ 9V mentioned but can it be done?)

Spondoolies SP20 ebay price £340 -£400
0.47 J/GH

So this is where I need some help. For me it's all about how low I can get the J/GH. I don't mind lot's of playing about or hardware modifications. I have something in mind for the S3 which will make the voltage full adjustable, but more on that if I go down that route.

So what I would like is any inputs you have on J/GH you have achieved on any of the above units and what settings or modifications you used to achieve them.?

Many Thanks

Rich

[alh]

One thing you may want to consider. While I don't own an S1, my understanding is that it's a pretty quiet miner. I think that is also true for the S3. It is most decidedly NOT true for the S5. I do own an SP20, and when pushed for speed, the fan is plenty loud. I am way down clocked for the summer, and it would fit your efficiency desires, it might still be a bit loud for your situation.

You might also want to consider an Avalon 4.1, which is only available on the used market.

I only mention the loudness, due to the reference on clothes drying.

[philipma1957]

the sp20  can do 470 watts at about 1000gh

gui settings around

.605
.605
.605
.605

max volts .611

fan at 10 you are UK based so is your power .12 cents usd?   I guess that is 7 or 8 pence a kwatt.

[RichBC]

Yes I have read the S5 thread looking for any info on J/GH and it's mostly full of people discussing what alternative fan to fit, so got the picture on how loud it is. In practice, within reason, noise not a big issue as the washing is dried in a remote part of the house and I could if necessary move it out to the boiler house. Lowest J/GH for 800 - 1000 GHZ is the main selection criteria.

Power in the UK is a bit expensive, best I can get it at is just under 10 Pence (15 Cents) / KWH. I would really like to get to 0.25 - 0.3 J/GH which I have seen as being possible on the S5. Cannot find at the moment much mention of the SP20 being much less than the quoted 0.47 J/KW but it looks like making the adjustments is fairly easy so I feel it will go lower.

I have just bought a S3 at a good price so will do an undervolt mod on that and see how low I can go, whilst continuing the research into the S5 & SP20.

Any further inputs on actual J/KW and how these were achieved for the S5 & SP20 would be gratefully received.

Rich

[BitcoinNewsMagazine]

With your power cost I think you would be better served by just buying hash on the Hashnest market. UMISOO has the highest yield at the moment, not S5. If you learn to trade you can also make money buying and selling hash with mining income as a bonus.

[philipma1957]

Yes I have read the S5 thread looking for any info on J/GH and it's mostly full of people discussing what alternative fan to fit, so got the picture on how loud it is. In practice, within reason, noise not a big issue as the washing is dried in a remote part of the house and I could if necessary move it out to the boiler house. Lowest J/GH for 800 - 1000 GHZ is the main selection criteria.

Power in the UK is a bit expensive, best I can get it at is just under 10 Pence (15 Cents) / KWH. I would really like to get to 0.25 - 0.3 J/GH which I have seen as being possible on the S5. Cannot find at the moment much mention of the SP20 being much less than the quoted 0.47 J/KW but it looks like making the adjustments is fairly easy so I feel it will go lower.

I have just bought a S3 at a good price so will do an undervolt mod on that and see how low I can go, whilst continuing the research into the S5 & SP20.

Any further inputs on actual J/KW and how these were achieved for the S5 & SP20 would be gratefully received.

Rich

15 us cent or 10 pence = loser  more then likely.

11 us cent or 7 pence = maybe a loser


 8 us cent or 5 pence = maybe a winner


lower then above you can make money

higher then above you will almost certainly lose.




the s-5 is designed to do a flat number  about .52 watts

the sp-20 can get .46  watts low clock and .7 watts high clock

if you have a really efficient 12 volt power source  you can dial down to 11 volts you could do the s-5.

Start it at 12 volts at 300 freq then dial the psu down to 11 volts.



The info below is pretty   good.

no one gets .3 watts on any gear except sidehack's usb sticks.

I have owned s-5's you can get .49 watts a gh

I have owned sp20's you can get .45 to .47 watts at lower gui clocks  of .6 volts and 950 gh

I have owned s-3's  you can get .62 watts a gh

I have owned avalon 4.1's you can get .48 to .51 watts

[sloopy]

A bit outside what you've specified, and the price is too much at the moment.
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=985400.0
I'm betting you will start seeing some goof efficiency from Sfards chips.

It is a hobbyist miner. I will get one, but I will wait for the first price drop and initial reviews.

The SP20 is the top of the heap imo. I prefer those every day.
I have two I purchased in a group buy in December which I've ran the piss out of, and then finally dialed them back due to heat, but the rest of my SP20s get babied.
I think they defined quality in the miner market.

Then if you check the speculation threads you will see Bitmain has hinted to releasing their newest miner by the end of the month. It will be overpriced, way overpriced.

Good luck!

[RichBC]

Hi Guys

Thanks for the inputs. I spend a lot of time playing with electronics so in many respects this is just an interesting learning experience for me. Just buying Hash & Trading is not what I am after, I still remember loosing a lot of money when the Tech bubble burst...

So if you need Electric at 5 Pence (8 Cents) / KW then that means anyone mining in the UK is loosing money and I guess those in the US not making much?

This was my simple rounded / approximate maths based on my very limited experience mining with the S1 on PPS sites like F2Pool, NiceHash & BTCChina all of which gave similar results.

S1 running at 180GH/S consumes 340W @ the wall, ( 2J/GH)  24Hrs running yielded .002 BTC = approx 60 Cents

So cost @ 15 Cents / KWH is approx 8 * 15 Cents = $1.20

So a loss of 60 Cents every 24 Hours, not good but the washing is dry.


So now looking at a miner running @ .5 J/GH so 4 x the efficiency of the S1

So if the miner was running at 800GH/S this would yield approx $2.40 in 24 Hours

Electric cost should be the same @ $1.20  in  24 Hours, so a profit of $1.20 on current difficulty.

I will do the undervolting / underclocking on my S3 and see what "real World" results I achieve and take things from there.

Will read the thread & keep an eye out for the Sfards chips.


Rich

[notlist3d]

Hi Guys

Thanks for the inputs. I spend a lot of time playing with electronics so in many respects this is just an interesting learning experience for me. Just buying Hash & Trading is not what I am after, I still remember loosing a lot of money when the Tech bubble burst...

So if you need Electric at 5 Pence (8 Cents) / KW then that means anyone mining in the UK is loosing money and I guess those in the US not making much?

This was my simple rounded / approximate maths based on my very limited experience mining with the S1 on PPS sites like F2Pool, NiceHash & BTCChina all of which gave similar results.

S1 running at 180GH/S consumes 340W @ the wall, ( 2J/GH)  24Hrs running yielded .002 BTC = approx 60 Cents

So cost @ 15 Cents / KWH is approx 8 * 15 Cents = $1.20

So a loss of 60 Cents every 24 Hours, not good but the washing is dry.


So now looking at a miner running @ .5 J/GH so 4 x the efficiency of the S1

So if the miner was running at 800GH/S this would yield approx $2.40 in 24 Hours

Electric cost should be the same @ $1.20  in  24 Hours, so a profit of $1.20 on current difficulty.

I will do the undervolting / underclocking on my S3 and see what "real World" results I achieve and take things from there.

Will read the thread & keep an eye out for the Sfards chips.


Rich

S3 is good for those with cheap eletricity.   On SFards I would not count on them to soon.  They have been very quiet.

LKETC is also one to watch.  After they get their next gen we know they have been very successful in past at mass production.

[el_rlee]

Antminer S5 ebay price £300 - £350
0.51 J/GH  (Have seen 0.2 J/GH @ 9V mentioned but can it be done?)

They took this out of the manual, probably because it never worked properly anyways. Would be very interested about that myself!

[mazedk]

A bit outside what you've specified, and the price is too much at the moment.
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=985400.0
I'm betting you will start seeing some goof efficiency from Sfards chips.

How can you honestly suggest something that will never get close to ROI ? - the sfards chips are new, and premium priced (and sold out god knows why with that pricepoint) ... unless they do a 50% discount to bulk buyers that miner is as doomed as the Monarc was as soon as BFL put them up for sales

[RichBC]

I guess one of the growing problems for the "Home User" is that the target market for the manufacturers is now the big spending farms and for them with cheap electricity the key requirement is for GH rather than J/GH?  Do not know what the Farms pay per KWH but will be interesting to see what happens when their return begins to approach zero with the current generation of miners?

What we need is a manufacturer who concentrates on a sensibly priced miner where the key feature is a low J/GH rather than all the emphasis being on higher GH.

BTW, still learning here. Who buys and uses the silly USB miners that do not appear to tick any of the boxes?


Rich

[BitcoinNewsMagazine]

SFARDS SF100 is only 20% more power efficient than the S5 and twice the cost per GH/s. If trading is not your cup of tea I would look into replacing the fan on the S5 to cut noise. Some advice on upgrading the fan at https://www.reddit.com/r/BitcoinMining/comments/322z3a/fan_upgrade_for_antminer_s5/ and https://forum.bitmain.com/bbs/topics/1744

[philipma1957]

I guess one of the growing problems for the "Home User" is that the target market for the manufacturers is now the big spending farms and for them with cheap electricity the key requirement is for GH rather than J/GH?  Do not know what the Farms pay per KWH but will be interesting to see what happens when their return begins to approach zero with the current generation of miners?

What we need is a manufacturer who concentrates on a sensibly priced miner where the key feature is a low J/GH rather than all the emphasis being on higher GH.

BTW, still learning here. Who buys and uses the silly USB miners that do not appear to tick any of the boxes?


Rich

 People that understand home mining is over at the price they are paying for power.  Will buy usb sticks.

 I can justify 10 to 20 usb sticks from sidehack in my house because they burn the least power per gh.  They are quiet.

 They will earn more then the power costs me for about 1 year.



No gear in my house can roi as of today. But I am still committed to BTC on a level that has no:

 MONETARY GAIN FOR MYSELF  IN THE YEAR 2015.

BTW I only made money on this game  in one year 2013.

[RichBC]

People that understand home mining is over at the price they are paying for power.  Will buy usb sticks.

 I can justify 10 to 20 usb sticks from sidehack in my house because they burn the least power per gh.  They are quiet.

 They will earn more then the power costs me for about 1 year.

Well that is interesting. We have discussed that it's possible to get something just under .5 J/GH with the miners in the title. What J/GH are the Sidehack USB sticks achieving and are they actually available?

Rich

[notlist3d]

People that understand home mining is over at the price they are paying for power.  Will buy usb sticks.

 I can justify 10 to 20 usb sticks from sidehack in my house because they burn the least power per gh.  They are quiet.

 They will earn more then the power costs me for about 1 year.

Well that is interesting. We have discussed that it's possible to get something just under .5 J/GH with the miners in the title. What J/GH are the Sidehack USB sticks achieving and are they actually available?

Rich

Phil has a good thread with reviews and vouches in it: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1086011.0

I can say after trying one it is a solid miner with a LOT of options on how fast you want to run.  Even on very low I was still beating Avalon nano on speed.  And if you crank it up, it is an amazing speed for one chip on a usb miner.

[RichBC]

OK I have done a bit of searching on the Sidekick USB and it seems that it can achieve 0.33J/GH which is probably best in class at the moment? So to keep this thread on topic, it's already been reclassified from Hardware to Speculation   This for me begs the question that as the S5 & the Sidekick are both based on the BM1384 chip, if the Sidekick can do 0.33J/GH why can't the S5?

I see 4 possibilities.

1) The S5 can do it, you just need to find the right settings.
2) The generation of the core voltage in the Sidekick is more efficient.
3) There is something in the Sidekick code / chip setup etc that Sidekick have found that Bitmain have missed.
4) Something else.  

Have to say I can't get too excited about a USB stick with 8GH. However I could get very excited by understanding how they have done it and applying it to an S5 or if they have plans for a product with 800 - 1000 GH based on the same solution and J/GH.


Rich

[philipma1957]

OK I have done a bit of searching on the Sidekick USB and it seems that it can achieve 0.33J/GH which is probably best in class at the moment? So to keep this thread on topic, it's already been reclassified from Hardware to Speculation   This for me begs the question that as the S5 & the Sidekick are both based on the BM1384 chip, if the Sidekick can do 0.33J/GH why can't the S5?

I see 4 possibilities.

1) The S5 can do it, you just need to find the right settings.
2) The generation of the core voltage in the Sidekick is more efficient.
3) There is something in the Sidekick code / chip setup etc that Sidekick have found that Bitmain have missed.
4) Something else.  

Have to say I can't get too excited about a USB stick with 8GH. However I could get very excited by understanding how they have done it and applying it to an S5 or if they have plans for a product with 800 - 1000 GH based on the same solution and J/GH.


Rich

3 is close enough to the right answer.

Now part of it is the 1384 chip seems to need a kick of power to start.

So  an s-5 can't start at 10.5 volts  it can start at 12 volts and if you set it on freq 300 vs 350 start it at  12 volts then dial  down the psu you

can drop to 10.5 or 11 volts.

So you need a server psu plat or gold quality that will allow power to be dialed down to 10.5 - 11 volts  .

Someone sells a server psu that allow voltage to be lowered.

if you do all this   I think you get 11/12 x .52 =  .47 watts a gh.

to better then this you need a different board design.

I not trying to be negative I am just point out why home mining is dying.

Look at it like a big business.

 What is easier to do make better mining gear or find cheaper power?  The answer is cheaper power is a much safer way to do BTC mining.

In the USA Washington state has 3 to 5  cent power.
In China there are areas with 3 to 5 cent power.
In other places of the world there are areas with 3 to 5 cent power.

So  I  make a 1000gh machine it uses 320 watts  I have 8 cent power.  I spend 60-90  days building it .

you use 1150gh s-5's you have 3 cent power. you wait 6 days for it to ship to you

you crush me . Just do the math.


So if you are bitmaintech  you rather make .52 watt s-5's since they are easy to make and you have 3 to 5 cent power.

[RichBC]

To be honest I am more interested in coming up with a way of having 0.33J/GH & 1000GH than actually using it. It's not about making money or any concern for the time or money that it costs, for me these things are often more about the journey than arriving.

So I find it interesting that Sidekick have achieved 0.33J/GH, also worth remembering that Bitmain initially billed the S5 as being 0.2J/GH capable with these magic words.

When better power efficiency is needed in the future due to higher network difficulties, you may want to buy some special PSUs 9V DC with more than 10A output, which will allow you to have a 0.2J/GH mining efficiency, but at lower hashing speed.

This being supported by the BM1384 data sheet that shows. 0.6V - 8.25 GH/S - 3.43A - 2.058W - 0.249W/GH

So from what you say part of the problem is that the S5 does not like to be started at much less than 12V, but can be dialed down to 10.5V giving around 0.47W/GH

Although good this is still some way short of 0.33 or the 0.25 in the data sheet. So either they were optimistic, or further changes are needed to get lower?

I can see that others have already played with this, however I feel that something prompted Bitmain to put 0.25 in the data sheet and that Sidekick have shown that 0.33 is possible. I feel that finding a way of pushing an S5 into 0.3 and possibly high 0.2 territory would be an interesting project. My experience on other projects has often shown that a modified manufacturers product is a much quicker & lower cost way of coming up with a better product than starting from scratch.  

However before having a go at the S5 I am going to continue up the learning curve of undervolting & frequency lowering with my low cost S3  

Rich

[philipma1957]

To be honest I am more interested in coming up with a way of having 0.33J/GH & 1000GH than actually using it. It's not about making money or any concern for the time or money that it costs, for me these things are often more about the journey than arriving.

So I find it interesting that Sidekick have achieved 0.33J/GH, also worth remembering that Bitmain initially billed the S5 as being 0.2J/GH capable with these magic words.

When better power efficiency is needed in the future due to higher network difficulties, you may want to buy some special PSUs 9V DC with more than 10A output, which will allow you to have a 0.2J/GH mining efficiency, but at lower hashing speed.

This being supported by the BM1384 data sheet that shows. 0.6V - 8.25 GH/S - 3.43A - 2.058W - 0.249W/GH

So from what you say part of the problem is that the S5 does not like to be started at much less than 12V, but can be dialed down to 10.5V giving around 0.47W/GH

Although good this is still some way short of 0.33 or the 0.25 in the data sheet. So either they were optimistic, or further changes are needed to get lower?

I can see that others have already played with this, however I feel that something prompted Bitmain to put 0.25 in the data sheet and that Sidekick have shown that 0.33 is possible. I feel that finding a way of pushing an S5 into 3 point something and possibly high 2 point something territory would be an interesting project. My experience on other projects has often shown that a modified manufacturers product is a much quicker & lower cost way of coming up with a better product than starting from scratch.  

However before having a go at the S5 I am going to continue up the learning curve of undervolting & frequency lowering with my low cost S3  

Rich

I bolded part of your response as I think that way often.

  And I got one of my 2 sticks to do .31 watts  which is nice work on sidehack's part.