Hacking KNC Titan / Jupiter / Neptune miners back to life. Why not?

[Searing]

hey searing you got me motivated. I installed that 2nd exhaust fan already, and the sun's only been up less than an hour.  I know what you mean about floor fans, they are .pretty much worthless.  They move the air around, but disrupt  the airflow for the exhaust fan actually making things worse.  

I rigged up a no longer used floor fan as the 2nd exhaust fan, all I had to do was cut a hole. With both fans running together on low it actually feels pretty breezy in there. I'll have to see what it's like around noon time.

I still have to get about 10ft of 14-2 to wire up the ventmatic thermostat to control the fan. I'll set the 2nd fan to come on higher temp than the first fan, dual automatic fan controls

About the only time a fan isn't running is winter and even then it'll usually come on during the day

maybe I'll take some pictures later  

I run my fans 24/7 low to the ground varmits bugs wander in if shutters stuck or with my setup rain shudder. Full out fans rain or bugs or critters not an issue.  

Full out all the time 14c kWh I think I figured it was 14 bucks a month (that's both fans) so screw it...on all the time 😄

I had no luck with the longer ribbon cables 3rd party ones. Stacking cubes also heat issue



thus my setup

Got Qberty Titan bridges and 60 buck Jupiter boards gonna make a mess of 3 cube units around basement. They seam to hash better and cooler and if they dump only 3 cubes down thus the plan. Also 1 cube setup to do detailed setup prob cubes or ones thAt reboot can play bounce and hash Alone

[lightfoot]

Something I did in my older mining days: I would put the units on a windowsill so the hot air exhausted *outside*. Acted as a nice whole-house fan in the summer, and kept the room at ambient temps overall.

These days I'm not in the mining business, although I wish I had bought a Titan. I just fix em. :-)

[Searing]

did you get those qberty boards from the 2nd batch?  or they leftover from 1st batch?  I am still waiting on my 2nd batch order

1st batch one clone bridge working....have 3 clone bridges coming (2 for me 1 for a buddy) and have 3 jupiter boards 2 4 ports and 1 6 port jupiter board (got lucky)

total in the 3 jupiter boards was probably 180 bucks or so.....got the 3rd board because it was 42 bucks with shipping lol

but no have NOT heard/gotten any 2nd batch clone bridges yet....not too concerned...

[lightfoot]

In the meantime I figured out Steve's cube: The problem is subtle: One of the power supplies has a defect and was putting 12v on the SPI bus. This blew out the U19 chip (WHAT IS THAT THING!) so I swapped it with a spare, removed four supplies to find at least one dud, and now it's hashing away at 30+mh. Not bad.

This does also point out that U19 is one of the key parts of the chip side and not the supply side. I wonder again if these components are blowing which takes out the whole board. Hm....

C

[Searing]

Further info on my repaste success of 4 cubes using Maxumark's X bracket mod....Man does it work well. Like a frigging wind tunnel now lol.

anyway here is the link to anyone interested

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1423042.msg15315059#msg15315059

and below here (again) is the list of parts I used and the best places and prices I've found in 3 months as I accumulated them..before my 4 cube (so far) completion.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1283859.msg15286157#msg15286157


I guess this qualifies on this link because it is "hacking ......related"

fun fun

[lightfoot]

Ok, Steve's cube is in a stable state. Hashing at 50mh (not megahertz, megahash). Not bad for a total dud.

Here's the scoop:
Die 0 is working, as is Die 3.
Die 1 is bad. Specifically power supply 2 blew up and took out the die and was nailing the spi bus. That was the nature of the problem. Removed.
Power supply 3 is ok, however there is nothing for it to power, so it is down.
Die 2 is interesting. Power supply 5 was also bad, pulled it and supply 4 is powering the die at 50%. So you can run it at 150mhz, with the other two at 300mhz (well, 325 depending on your inside temps).

That's about as far as I am going to go on this one. I could try to sweat another supply on for supply 5 but my record of success is to put it politely "low" on those and I have no new supplies here. So 50mh cube it is, better than a 0 mhz cube. :-)

One other thing I verified is a failure in the Z17R chip there will show the symptoms of a working cube with supplies that come up but never hash. Interesting. Need to find what those two chips are.

DC/DC   Voltage (V)   Current (A)   Power (W)   Temperature (°C)
0   0.7833   40.1875   31.479   80.500
1   0.7787   40.1250   31.245   87.400
3   0.0046   0   0.000   36.600
4   0.7848   38.3750   30.117   57.700
6   0.7784   42.0000   32.693   64.100
7   0.7811   42.0000   32.806   70.400

KNC 0:       | 50.89/49.78/49.97Mh/s | A:20 R:0+0(none) HW:2/.22%

[s1gs3gv]

Where are y'all sourcing the little dc/dc converter heat sinks from ?

[psycodad]

Where are y'all sourcing the little dc/dc converter heat sinks from ?

See this post from tupsu (2 pages before): https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1283859.msg15072425#msg15072425

[lightfoot]

Ok, two boards shipped, back to thinking here. It looks like it will take forever to get my micro drill bits (under 1mm sizes) does anyone know of a source that is not in China with a 2 month ship time?

I'd like to try drilling a board to see if I can clear the faults.

In the meantime I have one extra KNC controller board that I fixed as a spare, just the board not the bridge/pi or BBone. 3btc if interested

[s1gs3gv]

Ok, two boards shipped, back to thinking here. It looks like it will take forever to get my micro drill bits (under 1mm sizes) does anyone know of a source that is not in China with a 2 month ship time?

I'd like to try drilling a board to see if I can clear the faults.

In the meantime I have one extra KNC controller board that I fixed as a spare, just the board not the bridge/pi or BBone. 3btc if interested

Googling 'PC board drill bits' will get you a variety of different suppliers.

[Searing]

Where are y'all sourcing the little dc/dc converter heat sinks from ?

here is where I'm getting all of it...I've found cheaper prices..but the guy in ebay I link to ...the shipping is free so he is like 4 to 6 bucks less
even from the newegg prices (unless it changed)

anyway best prices I've found..just got the last of my stuff today...so at 14 cubes (including the 1 die working cube I tried to get back but did not do so ...60 bucks shot..
it mocks me)

but again ....at 60 bucks about a cube (including a 3 buck a cube cost for the paste ..spendy the paste is but seems to do the trick) that is

$820 bucks total! Then again for a 10c to 15c temp drop on the dc/dc's and the fan rocks...I just have sucked it up and paid it


here is the link of all the stuff and best prices found again

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1283859.msg15286157#msg15286157

I have found a new way to pay for such ...'attic mining' you take crap out of attic and put it on ebay for sale..the only home mining that works  these days

(whatever the frack gets me back 820 bucks in my own mind)

so it goes

[lightfoot]

I got my repaired board back, looks good running about 50-60 mhs, at 325 Mhz

nice job salvaging those dies on a 100% dead board

Sweet! You shouldn't have to worry about the plug, just keep an eye on that single power supply's temp. It's in the back though so it should get enough cooling air.

Drill bits arrived. Heh heh....

[lightfoot]

And damn! Drilled out the vias on one board here that has a shorted power supply die (the one I thought was the shorted overall die) and pin 6 still reads low ohms. Drat. Also broke several bits.

Back to thinking board. In the meantime sent out a larger repair batch of 4 controllers. Off to FedEx land they go to happy homes or something.

[TriAxis]

I did some Titan modding using the info Searing provided.
1. Got some of those Noctua fans.
2. Resurfaced the CPU with some Artic Silver.
3. Sawed away most of the main heat sink plate to make room for some DC/DC heatsinks.
4. Installed 8 tiny DC/DC heatsinks per cube.
5. Removed the PCI power port plastic adapters and connect directly to the 6 pins.

I live in Florida and my Titan runs in a closed garage with no ventalation. Before the mod my CPU ran at 70C and my DC average temp was 95C. Post mod my CPU is 56C and DC average temp is 76C.

I was never too concerned about CPU temp, but my DC temps were really high. Getting rid of all that greasy thermal rubber and opening up the airflow seemed to help a lot. The DCs are running 19C/34F cooler now. Also I found out by accident that the cores will start rebooting once the DC temps reach about 110C.

[Searing]

I did some Titan modding using the info Searing provided.
1. Got some of those Noctua fans.
2. Resurfaced the CPU with some Artic Silver.
3. Sawed away most of the main heat sink plate to make room for some DC/DC heatsinks.
4. Installed 8 tiny DC/DC heatsinks per cube.
5. Removed the PCI power port plastic adapters and connect directly to the 6 pins.

I live in Florida and my Titan runs in a closed garage with no ventalation. Before the mod my CPU ran at 70C and my DC average temp was 95C. Post mod my CPU is 56C and DC average temp is 76C.

I was never too concerned about CPU temp, but my DC temps were really high. Getting rid of all that greasy thermal rubber and opening up the airflow seemed to help a lot. The DCs are running 19C/34F cooler now. Also I found out by accident that the cores will start rebooting once the DC temps reach about 110C.

Just a note

I'd get from Maxumark (10 bucks i think they are) the X bracket replacement for the knc kludge heat sink with the 4 point screw downs
seems to balance better for more even setup imho.

Also we have not had any luck with the artic sliver...indeed got a guy's cube that did a mod like yours with the arctic silver and
it could only do 300mh and was quite ugly when i repasted it ..and it was supposedly done jan 2016

i used this stuff...it is a bit thick to put on...bu man it seems to do the trick

http://www.ebay.com/itm/181852749369?_trksid=p2060353.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

that is the best price...the artic silver from what I've seen is just too thin...this stuff is the best imho above link

anyway...just a thought on how this seems to work better imho

my temps are 50c / 60c as a result 84F in basement

my highest cube of all dies on 10 cubes is 71F

so anyway .....the bracket is slimmer...then the cut mod...also the large spiky copper heatsinks seem to work better also with the fan

but it is MOSTLY the fan for the improvements imho

anyway this is our results (maxumark has like lots and lots of titans) and myself (4 titans)

anyway just my 2c in that i just pulled apart an arctic thermal paste cube and was not impressed...was hottest cube
and also now can do 325 adv page settings at 41 amps and 64c highest die temp whole cube temp is 43.5c

where as when I got it in Feb...he said most it could ever do was 300mh...now doing 325 cool as heck and again basement at 84F...

so after my complete repaste and clean of all my 10 cubes with these mods...I went from like 700.5mh to 745mh ..so man what a diff

most of the diff was the cleaning (quite quite dirty) and the fans move a heck of a lot more air

here again is the parts list i use

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1283859.msg15286157#msg15286157



for what it is worth

later

[ganth]

Hi.  I have a KNC Titan controller that has a bad ASIC Port 2 where the first data ribbon to a cube plugs. It was working fine for over a year but today I noticed hash had dropped and that the connected cube wasn't mining.
Culprit was a moth attracted to the LCD display I found on the bottom board by Port 2.
Inspected board but don't see anything amiss.
Swapped data cables between two connected cubes and issue stays with Port 2.  It did not follow the cube.

Thoughts.  Can this be repaired.

[Searing]

Hi.  I have a KNC Titan controller that has a bad ASIC Port 2 where the first data ribbon to a cube plugs. It was working fine for over a year but today I noticed hash had dropped and that the connected cube wasn't mining.
Culprit was a moth attracted to the LCD display I found on the bottom board by Port 2.
Inspected board but don't see anything amiss.
Swapped data cables between two connected cubes and issue stays with Port 2.  It did not follow the cube.

Thoughts.  Can this be repaired.

yank out the LCD and use this port instead is the quick fix ..if I understand the above correctly?

[lightfoot]

Hi.  I have a KNC Titan controller that has a bad ASIC Port 2 where the first data ribbon to a cube plugs. It was working fine for over a year but today I noticed hash had dropped and that the connected cube wasn't mining.
Culprit was a moth attracted to the LCD display I found on the bottom board by Port 2.
Inspected board but don't see anything amiss.
Swapped data cables between two connected cubes and issue stays with Port 2.  It did not follow the cube.

Thoughts.  Can this be repaired.

Searing's got it. Never seen anything like that, possible the fpga output on that line shorted. I'd use another port and not worry about the display. Say, is the FPGA hot to the touch? If so it's on the way out, put a fan to keep it cool and when it goes send it over for fixing.

[ganth]

Hi.  I have a KNC Titan controller that has a bad ASIC Port 2 where the first data ribbon to a cube plugs. It was working fine for over a year but today I noticed hash had dropped and that the connected cube wasn't mining.
Culprit was a moth attracted to the LCD display I found on the bottom board by Port 2.
Inspected board but don't see anything amiss.
Swapped data cables between two connected cubes and issue stays with Port 2.  It did not follow the cube.

Thoughts.  Can this be repaired.

yank out the LCD and use this port instead is the quick fix ..if I understand the above correctly?

That worked great.  I should've thought to try that.  Now to remove the other LCDs so nothing is attracting insects.

[Searing]

Hi.  I have a KNC Titan controller that has a bad ASIC Port 2 where the first data ribbon to a cube plugs. It was working fine for over a year but today I noticed hash had dropped and that the connected cube wasn't mining.
Culprit was a moth attracted to the LCD display I found on the bottom board by Port 2.
Inspected board but don't see anything amiss.
Swapped data cables between two connected cubes and issue stays with Port 2.  It did not follow the cube.

Thoughts.  Can this be repaired.

yank out the LCD and use this port instead is the quick fix ..if I understand the above correctly?

That worked great.  I should've thought to try that.  Now to remove the other LCDs so nothing is attracting insects.

you may want to go back and see my prev posts on re-pasting etc my stuff was plenty dirty.....heh ...I also put a piece of glass under (from picture frame) the
titan controller board...seems to help keep it cool imho.....rather then have it sit on metal/or wood workbench

my setup here

lostgonzo.imgur.com

or at least part of it.....have equiv of 4 titans now ..1 hosted...other parted out in other part of basement etc