[Project Assistance] Have Access To Free Electricity, but...

[1slickvdc]

In talking with one of my professors, it turns out I could use power on campus **FREE**  if I could somehow turn it into a project that relates to the curriculum. Since I'm in the electronics/electrical engineering department, I figured something involving a Raspberry Pi and a display of some sort showing hash rate, a couple other impressive numbers of some sort, amount of BTC earned per day/total, operating temp, voltage, etc. of the device, along with a little informational text block about Bitcoin in general.

I plan on buying one of those fancy new S7's for this purpose, since at a 0 electricity cost and climate controlled very well, it could ROI by the end of the school year assuming I got it sometime before the end of October. However, I'm no expert at using the API's provided by many pools, exchanges, etc. and would like some help trying to figure out how to get started on this. If I get the help, I'm willing to share some, back to those who helped me get free juice.

Thanks, y'all.

[VirosaGITS]

In talking with one of my professors, it turns out I could use power on campus **FREE**  if I could somehow turn it into a project that relates to the curriculum. Since I'm in the electronics/electrical engineering department, I figured something involving a Raspberry Pi and a display of some sort showing hash rate, a couple other impressive numbers of some sort, amount of BTC earned per day/total, operating temp, voltage, etc. of the device, along with a little informational text block about Bitcoin in general.

I plan on buying one of those fancy new S7's for this purpose, since at a 0 electricity cost and climate controlled very well, it could ROI by the end of the school year assuming I got it sometime before the end of October. However, I'm no expert at using the API's provided by many pools, exchanges, etc. and would like some help trying to figure out how to get started on this. If I get the help, I'm willing to share some, back to those who helped me get free juice.

Thanks, y'all.

Well you sound a bit more related to hardware and electronic, i don't think cheesing your way by using some dashboard like Minera would be showing much effort. But you could do it and then plug your section of text.

Regardless, if you use a pool that give you an api, typically you will need to make a webserver that will read the API and display them nice and pretty, but this is more software and web work, which seem a bit out of your "curriculum".

Anyways, if you get more precise with what you need as help, maybe i and others can help, but i think the most important thing i can tell you right now is that a S7 is incredibly loud.

Make sure a sound blaster at 80dB is actually something you can run on campus without driving everyone nuts and getting expelled. I don't see much upside in a S7, especially if you won't be counting the electricity as a cost.

[1slickvdc]

Well you sound a bit more related to hardware and electronic, i don't think cheesing your way by using some dashboard like Minera would be showing much effort. But you could do it and then plug your section of text.

Regardless, if you use a pool that give you an api, typically you will need to make a webserver that will read the API and display them nice and pretty, but this is more software and web work, which seem a bit out of your "curriculum".

Anyways, if you get more precise with what you need as help, maybe i and others can help, but i think the most important thing i can tell you right now is that a S7 is incredibly loud.

Make sure a sound blaster at 80dB is actually something you can run on campus without driving everyone nuts and getting expelled. I don't see much upside in a S7, especially if you won't be counting the electricity as a cost.

I've got a webserver for other personal projects that's got all the necessary abilities, so that's already taken care of, and the sound shouldn't be a factor, it will be in basically a glorified closet with a display window that's used for nothing more than showing off the engineering department's projects. It's attached to one of the most heavily trafficked hallways, so again, shouldn't be a factor.

I was going to get an S7 anyway, but I figured the free power was cool. At home I get $.075/KWh and +$.15/KWh during peak hours (about 35% of the time). What would be a better unit to stick in there on campus in your opinion?

[VirosaGITS]

Well you sound a bit more related to hardware and electronic, i don't think cheesing your way by using some dashboard like Minera would be showing much effort. But you could do it and then plug your section of text.

Regardless, if you use a pool that give you an api, typically you will need to make a webserver that will read the API and display them nice and pretty, but this is more software and web work, which seem a bit out of your "curriculum".

Anyways, if you get more precise with what you need as help, maybe i and others can help, but i think the most important thing i can tell you right now is that a S7 is incredibly loud.

Make sure a sound blaster at 80dB is actually something you can run on campus without driving everyone nuts and getting expelled. I don't see much upside in a S7, especially if you won't be counting the electricity as a cost.

I've got a webserver for other personal projects that's got all the necessary abilities, so that's already taken care of, and the sound shouldn't be a factor, it will be in basically a glorified closet with a display window that's used for nothing more than showing off the engineering department's projects. It's attached to one of the most heavily trafficked hallways, so again, shouldn't be a factor.

I was going to get an S7 anyway, but I figured the free power was cool. At home I get $.075/KWh and +$.15/KWh during peak hours (about 35% of the time). What would be a better unit to stick in there on campus in your opinion?

Something that won't blast enough noise to make you deaf if you stay next to it for extended periods of time (Seriously). Maybe a couple of S3's if you want a good unit that won't be too noisy, is fairly cheap and ultimately would be a good ROI since the S7 is insanely expensive per GH/s, its only upside being the lower power consumption(Which is not an upside to you).

S5's are good too, louder than the S3 but more manageable with aftermarket fans. Regardless, either way you'll be generating as much heat as a oven so you probably know better than me what you can fit and what you can't. Just gotta keep in mind the heat dissipation.

In a nutshell, less efficient units are more advantageous to you. Personally i'd get S5's. With free electricity they should ROI in 4~5 months.

[1slickvdc]

Something that won't blast enough noise to make you deaf if you stay next to it for extended periods of time (Seriously). Maybe a couple of S3's if you want a good unit that won't be too noisy, is fairly cheap and ultimately would be a good ROI since the S7 is insanely expensive per GH/s, its only upside being the lower power consumption(Which is not an upside to you).

S5's are good too, louder than the S3 but more manageable with aftermarket fans. Regardless, either way you'll be generating as much heat as a oven so you probably know better than me what you can fit and what you can't. Just gotta keep in mind the heat dissipation.

In a nutshell, less efficient units are more advantageous to you. Personally i'd get S5's. With free electricity they should ROI in 4~5 months.

That's actually a valid point now that I think about it, high W/GH aren't going to be in as much demand anymore, so that would dictate a drop in price. Heat shouldn't be a concern either, that part of the building is usually less than 20 degrees C no matter the outside weather and sticks pretty close even in the full classrooms with all our gear going. Is 80dBa an actual observed level on those? Good god, that's blasted loud. Don't think the girlfriend would let me get away with that one at home either. This advice might have saved me an awkward purchase. Slightly OT but what would be a good unit for at home? I'd like to keep as much GH/s on hand as practical because I'm a gambler and the fact BTC price is low right now and with the reward halving coming up "soon", I kinda wanna rack in what I can at the moment. That probably sounds insanely dumb, but that's what's been in my head.

Back on-topic:
Once the unit(s) been chosen, what would be the best method in going about putting together some sort of flashy UI/infographic display?

[VirosaGITS]

Something that won't blast enough noise to make you deaf if you stay next to it for extended periods of time (Seriously). Maybe a couple of S3's if you want a good unit that won't be too noisy, is fairly cheap and ultimately would be a good ROI since the S7 is insanely expensive per GH/s, its only upside being the lower power consumption(Which is not an upside to you).

S5's are good too, louder than the S3 but more manageable with aftermarket fans. Regardless, either way you'll be generating as much heat as a oven so you probably know better than me what you can fit and what you can't. Just gotta keep in mind the heat dissipation.

In a nutshell, less efficient units are more advantageous to you. Personally i'd get S5's. With free electricity they should ROI in 4~5 months.

That's actually a valid point now that I think about it, high W/GH aren't going to be in as much demand anymore, so that would dictate a drop in price. Heat shouldn't be a concern either, that part of the building is usually less than 20 degrees C no matter the outside weather and sticks pretty close even in the full classrooms with all our gear going. Is 80dBa an actual observed level on those? Good god, that's blasted loud. Don't think the girlfriend would let me get away with that one at home either. This advice might have saved me an awkward purchase. Slightly OT but what would be a good unit for at home? I'd like to keep as much GH/s on hand as practical because I'm a gambler and the fact BTC price is low right now and with the reward halving coming up "soon", I kinda wanna rack in what I can at the moment. That probably sounds insanely dumb, but that's what's been in my head.

Back on-topic:
Once the unit(s) been chosen, what would be the best method in going about putting together some sort of flashy UI/infographic display?

80dB might be a slight exaggeration but i mean very slight, i get 74dB on smaller units and i think the S5+ was around 76dB and is a similar heat density form factor.
So yes, with the echo you'd be very close to actually observable 80dB, probably just under and also the fans i have, since they seem to use very similar or just the same fan for S4, S5 (that i can tell so far) they also have a high bitch noise. Just to make it even worse. Just don't expect anything under 70dB.

For home mining, this is very hard, since you pay a lot for your electricity, BTC is volatile and there is a reward halving coming. You would have, at the very least to turn them off during peak hours at all cost.

A while back i might of told you, again, the Antminer S5 modded to make less noise and put it in its own room or something but now the difficulty has started rising again so you're kind of stuck in Limbo at the moment.

If the S7 was 30% cheaper i'd tell you to get that. You,re gonna have to do the math yourself, but with the added problem of downtime because of the peak hour cost... :S I can't recommend you anything.

For the Dashboard.

Check current mining Dashboard and popular pool/monitoring sites. I mentioned Minera before, its a linux distro that run on a RasPi. You don't need it for any mining but its dashboard is functional and practical even though commonly used (i think it use some open source dashboard) but i will let you figure that out.

Basically get your inspiration by checking out other practical dashboards. I'm sure some other members could throw in some links... Right? Guys? Hello? Anyone else willing to contribute?

[1slickvdc]

80dB might be a slight exaggeration but i mean very slight, i get 74dB on smaller units and i think the S5+ was around 76dB and is a similar heat density form factor.
So yes, with the echo you'd be very close to actually observable 80dB, probably just under and also the fans i have, since they seem to use very similar or just the same fan for S4, S5 (that i can tell so far) they also have a high bitch noise. Just to make it even worse. Just don't expect anything under 70dB.

For home mining, this is very hard, since you pay a lot for your electricity, BTC is volatile and there is a reward halving coming. You would have, at the very least to turn them off during peak hours at all cost.

A while back i might of told you, again, the Antminer S5 modded to make less noise and put it in its own room or something but now the difficulty has started rising again so you're kind of stuck in Limbo at the moment.

If the S7 was 30% cheaper i'd tell you to get that. You,re gonna have to do the math yourself, but with the added problem of downtime because of the peak hour cost... :S I can't recommend you anything.

For the Dashboard.

Check current mining Dashboard and popular pool/monitoring sites. I mentioned Minera before, its a linux distro that run on a RasPi. You don't need it for any mining but its dashboard is functional and practical even though commonly used (i think it use some open source dashboard) but i will let you figure that out.

Basically get your inspiration by checking out other practical dashboards. I'm sure some other members could throw in some links... Right? Guys? Hello? Anyone else willing to contribute?

So an S5 or two for the on-campus pieces? That sounds do-able.

To keep it "within curriculum" I'll have to add some sort of hardware stuff like temp sensors being read from the Pi instead of the built-in ones, voltage readouts, etc. That's where it gets difficult since my experience with programming isn't very high, but the ADC (analog-to-digital), sensors, etc. I can handle. Any help from anyone would be awesome.

[VirosaGITS]

80dB might be a slight exaggeration but i mean very slight, i get 74dB on smaller units and i think the S5+ was around 76dB and is a similar heat density form factor.
So yes, with the echo you'd be very close to actually observable 80dB, probably just under and also the fans i have, since they seem to use very similar or just the same fan for S4, S5 (that i can tell so far) they also have a high bitch noise. Just to make it even worse. Just don't expect anything under 70dB.

For home mining, this is very hard, since you pay a lot for your electricity, BTC is volatile and there is a reward halving coming. You would have, at the very least to turn them off during peak hours at all cost.

A while back i might of told you, again, the Antminer S5 modded to make less noise and put it in its own room or something but now the difficulty has started rising again so you're kind of stuck in Limbo at the moment.

If the S7 was 30% cheaper i'd tell you to get that. You,re gonna have to do the math yourself, but with the added problem of downtime because of the peak hour cost... :S I can't recommend you anything.

For the Dashboard.

Check current mining Dashboard and popular pool/monitoring sites. I mentioned Minera before, its a linux distro that run on a RasPi. You don't need it for any mining but its dashboard is functional and practical even though commonly used (i think it use some open source dashboard) but i will let you figure that out.

Basically get your inspiration by checking out other practical dashboards. I'm sure some other members could throw in some links... Right? Guys? Hello? Anyone else willing to contribute?

So an S5 or two for the on-campus pieces? That sounds do-able.

To keep it "within curriculum" I'll have to add some sort of hardware stuff like temp sensors being read from the Pi instead of the built-in ones, voltage readouts, etc. That's where it gets difficult since my experience with programming isn't very high, but the ADC (analog-to-digital), sensors, etc. I can handle. Any help from anyone would be awesome.

I see, that would be pretty cheap to be fair, since the built in miner report the temps and you can use the cgminer API to display the temps and it would not be much work worth being gratified over;
https://github.com/ckolivas/cgminer/blob/master/API-README

However you could use external sensors and it being display on some small LED screen. Or something.

Otherwise having the RasPi read the Temp is the same as reading it from your Antminer webserver, after all the software that would run on the RasPi would do it the same way the webserver does.

But; trying to use an AntMiner over a RasPi is in a way kind of a pain, since the Antminer is self sufficient and would not run off the miner application on the RasPi.

Personally i run M's Miner Monitor on Windows and it monitor the miner over SSH, so that's another thing you should check out, but you'll have to more clearly decide how to make it fit in your curriculum and what your setup will be.

Ultimately the easiest way to do this would be to simply run a USB stick miner on a Rapsi and then maybe "engineer" some led screen to display the temps being read from the miner's API.

For the purpose of your curriculum its not any less or more than getting a real miner that actually make you some money. (Check Sidehack's usb stick)
But of course since you want to make some money off of it too, check out the Antminer S3's. Also check out the S1, undervolted with simply a graphite pen would probably give you the cheapest quietest unit that will earn you a bit of money.

[1slickvdc]

I see, that would be pretty cheap to be fair, since the built in miner report the temps and you can use the cgminer API to display the temps and it would not be much work worth being gratified over;
https://github.com/ckolivas/cgminer/blob/master/API-README

However you could use external sensors and it being display on some small LED screen. Or something.

Otherwise having the RasPi read the Temp is the same as reading it from your Antminer webserver, after all the software that would run on the RasPi would do it the same way the webserver does.

But; trying to use an AntMiner over a RasPi is in a way kind of a pain, since the Antminer is self sufficient and would not run off the miner application on the RasPi.

Personally i run M's Miner Monitor on Windows and it monitor the miner over SSH, so that's another thing you should check out, but you'll have to more clearly decide how to make it fit in your curriculum and what your setup will be.

Ultimately the easiest way to do this would be to simply run a USB stick miner on a Rapsi and then maybe "engineer" some led screen to display the temps being read from the miner's API.

For the purpose of your curriculum its not any less or more than getting a real miner that actually make you some money. (Check Sidehack's usb stick)
But of course since you want to make some money off of it too, check out the Antminer S3's. Also check out the S1, undervolted with simply a graphite pen would probably give you the cheapest quietest unit that will earn you a bit of money.

Being a non-credit project (this just needs to fit curriculum enough to not have it chucked in the bin by the Facilities staff), I'm allowed a bit more freedom, so I think a simple GUI or web front-end that monitors what the unit is up to is what he was asking for. I just figured to make it look cooler I could throw some hard sensors in there. I'm also still a little sick and not thinking completely on track.

[VirosaGITS]

I see, that would be pretty cheap to be fair, since the built in miner report the temps and you can use the cgminer API to display the temps and it would not be much work worth being gratified over;
https://github.com/ckolivas/cgminer/blob/master/API-README

However you could use external sensors and it being display on some small LED screen. Or something.

Otherwise having the RasPi read the Temp is the same as reading it from your Antminer webserver, after all the software that would run on the RasPi would do it the same way the webserver does.

But; trying to use an AntMiner over a RasPi is in a way kind of a pain, since the Antminer is self sufficient and would not run off the miner application on the RasPi.

Personally i run M's Miner Monitor on Windows and it monitor the miner over SSH, so that's another thing you should check out, but you'll have to more clearly decide how to make it fit in your curriculum and what your setup will be.

Ultimately the easiest way to do this would be to simply run a USB stick miner on a Rapsi and then maybe "engineer" some led screen to display the temps being read from the miner's API.

For the purpose of your curriculum its not any less or more than getting a real miner that actually make you some money. (Check Sidehack's usb stick)
But of course since you want to make some money off of it too, check out the Antminer S3's. Also check out the S1, undervolted with simply a graphite pen would probably give you the cheapest quietest unit that will earn you a bit of money.

Being a non-credit project (this just needs to fit curriculum enough to not have it chucked in the bin by the Facilities staff), I'm allowed a bit more freedom, so I think a simple GUI or web front-end that monitors what the unit is up to is what he was asking for. I just figured to make it look cooler I could throw some hard sensors in there. I'm also still a little sick and not thinking completely on track.

Then let it simmer and come back to me/us/here when you're decided. You'll probably want to take the API output and run it on a webserver and err, ask a friend or something to help you with the "web design" so it become your original work and not just piggybacking off an opensource Dashboard where you just "shake n bake" it -> done.

You'll just need to check how to have the webserver print the value from another url's output (The API) which is also something i need to learn. (Found a script from edonkey (user) that does just that so as soon as i care to...)

Then maybe just run a simple "refresh pages every 5 seconds" thing and it'll be almost real time tracking or something .

Make it light up red when there's an error, etc. Sound like fun but its not exactly engineer work, more fun software related stuff.

[1slickvdc]

Then let it simmer and come back to me/us/here when you're decided. You'll probably want to take the API output and run it on a webserver and err, ask a friend or something to help you with the "web design" so it become your original work and not just piggybacking off an opensource Dashboard where you just "shake n bake" it -> done.

You'll just need to check how to have the webserver print the value from another url's output (The API) which is also something i need to learn. (Found a script from edonkey (user) that does just that so as soon as i care to...)

Then maybe just run a simple "refresh pages every 5 seconds" thing and it'll be almost real time tracking or something .

Make it light up red when there's an error, etc. Sound like fun but its not exactly engineer work, more fun software related stuff.

Fun is what they're after in that display closet; the more flashy stuff in there the better, they say. Yeah I'll chew on it a bit and come back to ya in a bit. If anything else comes to mind in the mean time, let me know.

Thanks in advance.

[adaseb]

You can do this but you won't be able to keep any of the Bitcoins or Fiat money, its belongs to the University actually.

Read your Terms and Conditions or seek an advisor.

[1slickvdc]

You can do this but you won't be able to keep any of the Bitcoins or Fiat money, its belongs to the University actually.

Read your Terms and Conditions or seek an advisor.

It was the director of the Department who approved this idea, why I figured it was legit.

[NotFuzzyWarm]

You can do this but you won't be able to keep any of the Bitcoins or Fiat money, its belongs to the University actually.

Read your Terms and Conditions or seek an advisor.

It was the director of the Department who approved this idea, why I figured it was legit.

But still get it in writing from someone who can authorize it that any income from it belongs to you and not the University. Better safe than sorry I'd think that the dept head/director would be a position for that and if it later turns out that they are not authorized to do that - it's their problem not yours.

[notlist3d]

You can do this but you won't be able to keep any of the Bitcoins or Fiat money, its belongs to the University actually.

Read your Terms and Conditions or seek an advisor.

It was the director of the Department who approved this idea, why I figured it was legit.

But still, get it in writing that any income from it belongs to you and not the University. Better safe than sorry

I think this is important.   Does the university pay for the projects?  Or are you footing the bill on the miner?

Get permission first before sinking money into a miner.   And if you have a good advisor it can make a huge difference.  I have had good and bad one's and you would be surprised how much of a difference an advisor on your side can make.

[BLOCK_C]

As an EE major I'm sure you are aware of how electricity works.  A lot of those old dorms have outlets that are daisy chained together.  So if lots of people try to copy you you could start tripping breakers or burn the building down.  I would look into the electrical system of your dorm and make sure you're not going to run any risks of fire etc.  If your project is successful everyone is going to want to do what you do and the dorm probably doesn't have the power for it.

[notlist3d]

As an EE major I'm sure you are aware of how electricity works.  A lot of those old dorms have outlets that are daisy chained together.  So if lots of people try to copy you you could start tripping breakers or burn the building down.  I would look into the electrical system of your dorm and make sure you're not going to run any risks of fire etc.  If your project is successful everyone is going to want to do what you do and the dorm probably doesn't have the power for it.

Reread up on his second post it is not dorm mining it will be in " it will be in basically a glorified closet with a display window that's used for nothing more than showing off the engineering department's projects.".   So it's to show off projects of engineering students.

I personally would never dorm mine with the sound. (One could make a argument for the avalon 4.1's)  I don't think it is something that will catch on and bunch of students in dorm do.

[VirosaGITS]

As an EE major I'm sure you are aware of how electricity works.  A lot of those old dorms have outlets that are daisy chained together.  So if lots of people try to copy you you could start tripping breakers or burn the building down.  I would look into the electrical system of your dorm and make sure you're not going to run any risks of fire etc.  If your project is successful everyone is going to want to do what you do and the dorm probably doesn't have the power for it.

Reread up on his second post it is not dorm mining it will be in " it will be in basically a glorified closet with a display window that's used for nothing more than showing off the engineering department's projects.".   So it's to show off projects of engineering students.

I personally would never dorm mine with the sound. (One could make a argument for the avalon 4.1's)  I don't think it is something that will catch on and bunch of students in dorm do.

Yes OP explained that the project would run in an engineering section, on some sort of display case/closet. The place is cooled and maintained. He is not going to sleep next to a 75dB miner. Of this we made certain.

As such we are merely waiting for OP to clarify/consolidate his plan.

[notlist3d]

As an EE major I'm sure you are aware of how electricity works.  A lot of those old dorms have outlets that are daisy chained together.  So if lots of people try to copy you you could start tripping breakers or burn the building down.  I would look into the electrical system of your dorm and make sure you're not going to run any risks of fire etc.  If your project is successful everyone is going to want to do what you do and the dorm probably doesn't have the power for it.

Reread up on his second post it is not dorm mining it will be in " it will be in basically a glorified closet with a display window that's used for nothing more than showing off the engineering department's projects.".   So it's to show off projects of engineering students.

I personally would never dorm mine with the sound. (One could make a argument for the avalon 4.1's)  I don't think it is something that will catch on and bunch of students in dorm do.

Yes OP explained that the project would run in an engineering section, on some sort of display case/closet. The place is cooled and maintained. He is not going to sleep next to a 75dB miner. Of this we made certain.

As such we are merely waiting for OP to clarify/consolidate his plan.

If he sticks with one pool, depending on the pool it could show a lot of the data.  Anything from total BTC earned to hashrate with nice graphs over X days.

So showing data I think is easy.  It's just just getting the permission to put a miner in it.  I could see a little trouble with it as not developed by a student they might not really care about it.  So might take something extra to get them to add it to room.

[VirosaGITS]

As an EE major I'm sure you are aware of how electricity works.  A lot of those old dorms have outlets that are daisy chained together.  So if lots of people try to copy you you could start tripping breakers or burn the building down.  I would look into the electrical system of your dorm and make sure you're not going to run any risks of fire etc.  If your project is successful everyone is going to want to do what you do and the dorm probably doesn't have the power for it.

Reread up on his second post it is not dorm mining it will be in " it will be in basically a glorified closet with a display window that's used for nothing more than showing off the engineering department's projects.".   So it's to show off projects of engineering students.

I personally would never dorm mine with the sound. (One could make a argument for the avalon 4.1's)  I don't think it is something that will catch on and bunch of students in dorm do.

Yes OP explained that the project would run in an engineering section, on some sort of display case/closet. The place is cooled and maintained. He is not going to sleep next to a 75dB miner. Of this we made certain.

As such we are merely waiting for OP to clarify/consolidate his plan.

If he sticks with one pool, depending on the pool it could show a lot of the data.  Anything from total BTC earned to hashrate with nice graphs over X days.

So showing data I think is easy.  It's just just getting the permission to put a miner in it.  I could see a little trouble with it as not developed by a student they might not really care about it.  So might take something extra to get them to add it to room.

OP seem to have already discussed it with a teacher getting the greenlight, he would have to set up temp and not use software report of the miner however. So its not about permission its more about making it fit in the engineering curriculum. Other than that he is probably fine.