Avalon ASIC users thread

[ste0024]

example lack of enough cooling pasta

5 tubes artic silver 5 - 12 gr is enough or not for 320 chips

total 60gr

if it resolv problem i do quickly for sure

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[Wesly]

I bought a Batch 1 Avalon and want to replace the power supply with a bigger one. Can anyone suggest a power supply to use that will fit inside the case?

Looking at the 850's they are longer than the 620w that's inside and I am not sure if it will fit?

Thanks

I am using the Corsair TX850M PSU to power my 3-module Avalon.  This PSU is only 160mm in length (max for Avalon is 170mm).  It is also very efficient (85% efficiency) and rated for operation at up to 50° C.  I paid $120, but looks like the price has dropped to just $102.

http://www.amazon.com/Corsair-Enthusiast-Series-Modular-TX850M/dp/B005E98EI2/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1379821025&tag=trusted2-20&sr=8-1&keywords=corsair+850w

[smoothrunnings]

Sadly these PSU's costs more in Canada

[driksson]

so if  the web interface is your problem. disable it..
a 15 digit password and no standard username makes any bruteforce attack on it impossible..
if anyone hacks my units, i salute the for the hours of hashing they might steal from me..
creating a storm in a teacup.

There is more than the username/passwd combo to web interface security

Don't hook random appliances up to the interwebs without any firewalling, just common sense

From default passwords to debug backdoors accidentally left open, I've seen it all in the past

i see, so you have found a backdoor to ddwrt? it is a firewall. maybe post this to them and they can update with your hack for next update! and again, no idea where you get "without firewalling" from. ddwrt is an opensource firewall..
Setting an avalon, which already has a firewall behind a firewall, is no specific added security.. especially if it is a standard dlink or netgear.. A firewall is only as safe as it can be configured. DDWRT is a secure opensource firewall.
Hooking up a pc using cgminer all public ports could not be adviced. However, cgminer in this case is running on top of a ddwrt firewall.
If you want to read more about ddwrt go ere:
http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/What_is_DD-WRT%3F

[GandalfG]

example lack of enough cooling pasta

5 tubes artic silver 5 - 12 gr is enough or not for 320 chips

total 60gr

if it resolv problem i do quickly for sure

Be sure You don't use partially conductive paste (with silver addition).

[aneutronic]

example lack of enough cooling pasta

5 tubes artic silver 5 - 12 gr is enough or not for 320 chips

total 60gr

if it resolv problem i do quickly for sure

Be sure You don't use partially conductive paste (with silver addition).

as 5 is not conductive although it is capacitive unlike mx2 or mx4 (my choice).
Has anyone tried as5 yet?

Here's the thread that compelled me to upgrade my TIM: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=211825.msg2687268#msg2687268
Thanks for the tips @el_rlee!   

and a couple of pics to show why you should at least check your chip temps before attempting any OC.

The chip in the upper left was not getting much thermal relief due to that fold... very sloppy.


The low grade thermal paste was dry and crumbly after just a couple weeks and maybe just a tad inconsistent.    


application tip: after cleaning and priming the heatsink preheat it in the oven at the lowest setting, mine was 170 F, a warm heat sink helps the paste spread easier. I also warmed the paste before application by putting the tubes in a plastic bag and then placing them in warm water. A couple 20g tubes should cover it and run a bead down the side of the heatsink before you screw it back down to the case also.

[ste0024]

i m sure to understand but i can read

Not Electrically Conductive:
Arctic Silver 5 was formulated to conduct heat, not electricity.

http://www.arcticsilver.com/as5.htm

good paste or not ?

[aneutronic]

i m sure to understand but i can read

Not Electrically Conductive:
Arctic Silver 5 was formulated to conduct heat, not electricity.

http://www.arcticsilver.com/as5.htm

good paste or not ?

Correct, as5 is not conductive, the only question I have regarding as5 is that it is capacitive unlike arctic silvers mx2 or mx4.
I don't know if that would be an issue in this application so I chose mx4 over the as5.

[smoothrunnings]

so if  the web interface is your problem. disable it..
a 15 digit password and no standard username makes any bruteforce attack on it impossible..
if anyone hacks my units, i salute the for the hours of hashing they might steal from me..
creating a storm in a teacup.

There is more than the username/passwd combo to web interface security

Don't hook random appliances up to the interwebs without any firewalling, just common sense

From default passwords to debug backdoors accidentally left open, I've seen it all in the past

i see, so you have found a backdoor to ddwrt? it is a firewall. maybe post this to them and they can update with your hack for next update! and again, no idea where you get "without firewalling" from. ddwrt is an opensource firewall..
Setting an avalon, which already has a firewall behind a firewall, is no specific added security.. especially if it is a standard dlink or netgear.. A firewall is only as safe as it can be configured. DDWRT is a secure opensource firewall.
Hooking up a pc using cgminer all public ports could not be adviced. However, cgminer in this case is running on top of a ddwrt firewall.
If you want to read more about ddwrt go ere:
http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/What_is_DD-WRT%3F

I would only be interested in this too if there is something inside the firmware that transmits out to home base some where that would allow someone in. Otherwise I could care less as I don't put my Avalon's on the internet without a firewall in front them as that would be very bad practice!!

[el_rlee]

Here's the thread that compelled me to upgrade my TIM: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=211825.msg2687268#msg2687268
Thanks for the tips @el_rlee!   

and a couple of pics to show why you should at least check your chip temps before attempting any OC.
[pics]

You're welcome!
I wouldn't give to much about dielectric properties of the paste. Also please throw away the paper, it's a bad heat conductor! You can put the paste on the PCB and that directly on the heat sink!

[weirdgod]

Today I experienced smoke as well.
After inspection I noticed 2 burnouts on 1 module.
Other 3 modules are already working again...

SO - with this problematic one - any ideas how to make it work again?
Is there any way to make this module work without the burnout part/area?

How to fix this? Is it enough to get burnout parts replaced? (are they anything special or should I get them anywhere?)... Or are the nearby chips damaged too? Any recepie from anyone who went thru this before? Experience and ideas welcome!

[driksson]

so if  the web interface is your problem. disable it..
a 15 digit password and no standard username makes any bruteforce attack on it impossible..
if anyone hacks my units, i salute the for the hours of hashing they might steal from me..
creating a storm in a teacup.

There is more than the username/passwd combo to web interface security

Don't hook random appliances up to the interwebs without any firewalling, just common sense

From default passwords to debug backdoors accidentally left open, I've seen it all in the past

i see, so you have found a backdoor to ddwrt? it is a firewall. maybe post this to them and they can update with your hack for next update! and again, no idea where you get "without firewalling" from. ddwrt is an opensource firewall..
Setting an avalon, which already has a firewall behind a firewall, is no specific added security.. especially if it is a standard dlink or netgear.. A firewall is only as safe as it can be configured. DDWRT is a secure opensource firewall.
Hooking up a pc using cgminer all public ports could not be adviced. However, cgminer in this case is running on top of a ddwrt firewall.
If you want to read more about ddwrt go ere:
http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/What_is_DD-WRT%3F

I would only be interested in this too if there is something inside the firmware that transmits out to home base some where that would allow someone in. Otherwise I could care less as I don't put my Avalon's on the internet without a firewall in front them as that would be very bad practice!!

again, ddwrt is quite surely more secure than the firewall you have in front.
avalons run on ddwrt, whic is a secure opensource firewall. no released hacks to my knowledge..
the person is just trolling..

[johnyj]

Today I experienced smoke as well.
After inspection I noticed 2 burnouts on 1 module.
Other 3 modules are already working again...

SO - with this problematic one - any ideas how to make it work again?
Is there any way to make this module work without the burnout part/area?

How to fix this? Is it enough to get burnout parts replaced? (are they anything special or should I get them anywhere?)... Or are the nearby chips damaged too? Any recepie from anyone who went thru this before? Experience and ideas welcome!

Once I knocked down one of the small capacitors around the chip, but it still hash very well so I don't bother. This one on your picture is a bit large, you might need to get a similar one to re-solder it on, I think there is an open sourced component list provided by bitsyncom a couple of months ago

[weirdgod]

Today I experienced smoke as well.
After inspection I noticed 2 burnouts on 1 module.
Other 3 modules are already working again...

SO - with this problematic one - any ideas how to make it work again?
Is there any way to make this module work without the burnout part/area?

How to fix this? Is it enough to get burnout parts replaced? (are they anything special or should I get them anywhere?)... Or are the nearby chips damaged too? Any recepie from anyone who went thru this before? Experience and ideas welcome!

Once I knocked down one of the small capacitors around the chip, but it still hash very well so I don't bother. This one on your picture is a bit large, you might need to get a similar one to re-solder it on, I think there is an open sourced component list provided by bitsyncom a couple of months ago

Yeah, these two components somehow prevent machine from starting up...
I guess the big one... Will look for the component list and see what can be done..
thanks.

[gyverlb]

again, ddwrt is quite surely more secure than the firewall you have in front.
avalons run on ddwrt, whic is a secure opensource firewall.

It's a Linux distribution with tools useful on a router (wrt is the line of routers for which it was initially built). The standard firewall tools from the Linux kernel are included with an easy to use GUI.

no released hacks to my knowledge..
the person is just trolling..

He's not trolling, he's probably using common sense. The task of a firewall is mainly to filter out unwanted network accesses. The basic rule for any network admin worth its salt is: deny all by default, allow only what is needed.

Apparently the Avalon in question is sitting on a public IP with it's web server (usable only for configuring dd-wrt and the mining software) reachable. So the firewall doesn't do what it should in this context, allowing access to the web server only from local addresses. In the current configuration, a hole in Apache, PHP or the GUI of dd-wrt will be exploitable.

The fact that dd-wrt includes firewall capabilities doesn't mean they are used securely.

[exahash]

Today I experienced smoke as well.
After inspection I noticed 2 burnouts on 1 module.
Other 3 modules are already working again...

SO - with this problematic one - any ideas how to make it work again?
Is there any way to make this module work without the burnout part/area?

How to fix this? Is it enough to get burnout parts replaced? (are they anything special or should I get them anywhere?)... Or are the nearby chips damaged too? Any recepie from anyone who went thru this before? Experience and ideas welcome!

Looks similar to the burnt components I ran into a couple weeks ago (back a few pages in this thread).  I decided to bend the pins where the bus plugs into the module, since I don't have soldering skills and finding the components and someone to do the work would be more time and effort than one worker is worth.  The rest of the workers on my module seem to work just fine.

[Bogart]

again, ddwrt is quite surely more secure than the firewall you have in front.
avalons run on ddwrt, whic is a secure opensource firewall. no released hacks to my knowledge..
the person is just trolling..

Incorrect.  Avalons run OpenWRT.

Personally I would have no problems putting my Avalons directly on the big bad internet.   If they get owned, so what?  I won't lose any sensitive information, and if they're already in front of any other firewall(s), it's not like they can be used as a platform to leapfrog into the rest of my network.  At worst I'll lose a bit of mining time/revenue and have to reflash them.

As an aside, dd-wrt does not have a flawless security record: http://www.dd-wrt.com/site/content/dd-wrt-httpd-vulnerability-milw0rmcom-report

[SolarSilver]

i see, so you have found a backdoor to ddwrt? it is a firewall. maybe post this to them and they can update with your hack for next update! and again, no idea where you get "without firewalling" from. ddwrt is an opensource firewall..
Setting an avalon, which already has a firewall behind a firewall, is no specific added security.. especially if it is a standard dlink or netgear.. A firewall is only as safe as it can be configured. DDWRT is a secure opensource firewall.
Hooking up a pc using cgminer all public ports could not be adviced. However, cgminer in this case is running on top of a ddwrt firewall.
If you want to read more about ddwrt go ere:
http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/What_is_DD-WRT%3F

my avalons are running OpenWRT not DD-WRT

again, ddwrt is quite surely more secure than the firewall you have in front.
avalons run on ddwrt, whic is a secure opensource firewall. no released hacks to my knowledge..
the person is just trolling..

Running any kind of pubic service on a firewall weakens the integrity of the system

Are you one of those smart people running a network fileshare on their firewall thinking the firewall is safe anyways?

Don't run public webservers on a firewall, or at least restrict access to the interface to the internal network and not the public interwebs

The question is not if it's interesting to hack it, as the avalon has no available storage or content.

But if people get in and they use your system as a proxy or relay, then that would explain the extra network traffic (which was the original question)

[driksson]

again, ddwrt is quite surely more secure than the firewall you have in front.
avalons run on ddwrt, whic is a secure opensource firewall.

It's a Linux distribution with tools useful on a router (wrt is the line of routers for which it was initially built). The standard firewall tools from the Linux kernel are included with an easy to use GUI.

no released hacks to my knowledge..
the person is just trolling..

He's not trolling, he's probably using common sense. The task of a firewall is mainly to filter out unwanted network accesses. The basic rule for any network admin worth its salt is: deny all by default, allow only what is needed.

Apparently the Avalon in question is sitting on a public IP with it's web server (usable only for configuring dd-wrt and the mining software) reachable. So the firewall doesn't do what it should in this context, allowing access to the web server only from local addresses. In the current configuration, a hole in Apache, PHP or the GUI of dd-wrt will be exploitable.

The fact that dd-wrt includes firewall capabilities doesn't mean they are used securely.

and the fact that apache is enabled doesnt make it insecure either..
its like saying all apache webservers are insecure and should not allow web access.
until you find a working exploit, we must consider it safe.

[weirdgod]

Today I experienced smoke as well.
After inspection I noticed 2 burnouts on 1 module.
Other 3 modules are already working again...

SO - with this problematic one - any ideas how to make it work again?
Is there any way to make this module work without the burnout part/area?

How to fix this? Is it enough to get burnout parts replaced? (are they anything special or should I get them anywhere?)... Or are the nearby chips damaged too? Any recepie from anyone who went thru this before? Experience and ideas welcome!

Looks similar to the burnt components I ran into a couple weeks ago (back a few pages in this thread).  I decided to bend the pins where the bus plugs into the module, since I don't have soldering skills and finding the components and someone to do the work would be more time and effort than one worker is worth.  The rest of the workers on my module seem to work just fine.

O, this is awesome. I did not think of that, because all workers are interconnected .... so I thought that one not working breaks the chain... But - cant wait to try it out.
Thanks!