A4 Dominator - Pre-Order Group Buy - 280mh, roughly 1000w, $1800 + shipping

[usao]

Anyone running 1.0.3 on Batch 2 have an update?

I'm still rocking 1.0.0T because it runs somewhere between 48-72hrs before dropping a board but I'm curious if anyone has had better luck with 1.0.3.

Im having good luck with V1.0.3. Hashrates slower on nicehash, but I don't have to pay all the exchange and transfer fees comapred to LTC and other coins.
Ill probably do a 24-hour test of nicehash against litecoinpool to verify the comparative payouts in BTC in the near future, perhaps this weekend.

I still see restarts, but not as many dropping boards which require a reboot to fix.

[citronick]

Anyone running 1.0.3 on Batch 2 have an update?

I'm still rocking 1.0.0T because it runs somewhere between 48-72hrs before dropping a board but I'm curious if anyone has had better luck with 1.0.3.

Im having good luck with V1.0.3. Hashrates slower on nicehash, but I don't have to pay all the exchange and transfer fees comapred to LTC and other coins.
Ill probably do a 24-hour test of nicehash against litecoinpool to verify the comparative payouts in BTC in the near future, perhaps this weekend.

I still see restarts, but not as many dropping boards which require a reboot to fix.

is there a script / timer to auto restart or reboots that you're using?

[usao]

Anyone running 1.0.3 on Batch 2 have an update?

I'm still rocking 1.0.0T because it runs somewhere between 48-72hrs before dropping a board but I'm curious if anyone has had better luck with 1.0.3.

Im having good luck with V1.0.3. Hashrates slower on nicehash, but I don't have to pay all the exchange and transfer fees comapred to LTC and other coins.
Ill probably do a 24-hour test of nicehash against litecoinpool to verify the comparative payouts in BTC in the near future, perhaps this weekend.

I still see restarts, but not as many dropping boards which require a reboot to fix.

is there a script / timer to auto restart or reboots that you're using?

The miner has a built in restart script. It doesn't appear to be on a fixed schedule, so im assuming it's based on some internal measurement which decides a reboot is necessary.
This "restart/reboot" does not resolve the boards which go offline. A full power cycle is needed to resolve that issue AFAIK.
As for the power cycle, I wrote a script and added it into the PI, but found out the API interface to my PDU is not working quite as expected and I need to debug it further. So, im still monitoring and remotely power cycling as needed through the web interface for the PDU when boards drop.

[Longsnowsm]

I still have boards dropping with v1.0.3, and the miner attempted to restart to fix the dropped board, but was unable to do so.  I waited and watched to see what it would do, but it was unable to correct the issue.  So I had to step in and restart it.

So v1.0.3 does not appear to have fixed the issues.  So far the comparison between v1.0.0 and v1.0.3 is that the newer version restarts quite often.  But so far I am not sure that the newer release is any more stable than the v.1.0.0.  I will continue to monitor.

@USAO, I would like to know more about your PDU that you use.  This sounds like a very useful tool to help with these dropping boards.

[usao]

I still have boards dropping with v1.0.3, and the miner attempted to restart to fix the dropped board, but was unable to do so.  I waited and watched to see what it would do, but it was unable to correct the issue.  So I had to step in and restart it.

So v1.0.3 does not appear to have fixed the issues.  So far the comparison between v1.0.0 and v1.0.3 is that the newer version restarts quite often.  But so far I am not sure that the newer release is any more stable than the v.1.0.0.  I will continue to monitor.

@USAO, I would like to know more about your PDU that you use.  This sounds like a very useful tool to help with these dropping boards.

Yea, the restarting doesn't fix my board issues either.
The PDU is "apc7911" which I use to run all my miners.
It's a 220V 30A switched PDU, meaning that it has a network interface/GUI which allows me to toggle individual outlets on-off on demand. It can also schedule the power as well, which helps with my "Time Of Use" plan. From 3pm to 6pm I have to power off because my electricity costs 3x as much during that time. Makes it so I don't have to worry about things and can manage remotely.
Pretty cheap on ebay.
However, my attempt to use the API doesn't seem to be working, so im not able to "automatically" power cycle the individual miner when it detects a board issue. Sill looking at that.
However, Chloe seems to think that Batch 3 doesn't have the board drop issue, however no clarification on if this was a HW or a SW fix.

[Longsnowsm]

I still have boards dropping with v1.0.3, and the miner attempted to restart to fix the dropped board, but was unable to do so.  I waited and watched to see what it would do, but it was unable to correct the issue.  So I had to step in and restart it.

So v1.0.3 does not appear to have fixed the issues.  So far the comparison between v1.0.0 and v1.0.3 is that the newer version restarts quite often.  But so far I am not sure that the newer release is any more stable than the v.1.0.0.  I will continue to monitor.

@USAO, I would like to know more about your PDU that you use.  This sounds like a very useful tool to help with these dropping boards.

Yea, the restarting doesn't fix my board issues either.
The PDU is "apc7911" which I use to run all my miners.
It's a 220V 30A switched PDU, meaning that it has a network interface/GUI which allows me to toggle individual outlets on-off on demand. It can also schedule the power as well, which helps with my "Time Of Use" plan. From 3pm to 6pm I have to power off because my electricity costs 3x as much during that time. Makes it so I don't have to worry about things and can manage remotely.
Pretty cheap on ebay.
However, my attempt to use the API doesn't seem to be working, so im not able to "automatically" power cycle the individual miner when it detects a board issue. Sill looking at that.
However, Chloe seems to think that Batch 3 doesn't have the board drop issue, however no clarification on if this was a HW or a SW fix.

I would hope that if it is a HW issue they will be swapping out our batch 1 and 2 miners or making some special arrangements for these early batches.  These are not reliable in the current configuration.  I hope it is only a software issue.  

Thanks for the info on the PDU.  

[citronick]

so to summarize....

Batch 1 - suppose to be the fastest chip but boards dropping. v.1.0.0

Batch 2 - with slower chips but boards still dropping. New firmware to fix board dropping. v.1.0.0 now replaced by v.1.0.1. Still no improvement to boards dropping and frequent restarts. v.1.0.3 released.

Batch 3 - new batch with newest firmware v.1.0.3..... some improvement but only 240MH/s instead of advertised 280MH/s?

Has anyone running an A4 without any problems whatsoever?

[naron]

so to summarize....

Batch 1 - suppose to be the fastest chip but boards dropping. v.1.0.0

Batch 2 - with slower chips but boards still dropping. New firmware to fix board dropping. v.1.0.0 now replaced by v.1.0.1. Still no improvement to boards dropping and frequent restarts. v.1.0.3 released.

Batch 3 - new batch with newest firmware v.1.0.3..... some improvement but only 240MH/s instead of advertised 280MH/s?

Has anyone running an A4 without any problems whatsoever?

Batch 3 started delivery from Nov.20th, so probably now nobody can confirm the improvement. This is just the promise from Innosilicon that the third batch machines with the newest firmware solved the problem with unstable hash rate.

[wheelz1200]

This is starting to look really bad unfortunately.  Has anyone contacted inno to see what the latest they have in regards to fixing this disaster.  I would rhink they would be privy to this forum and would start doing some damage control but nope, looks as though they are going the way as almost every other hardware manufacturer, real shame, was excited when these were coming out 

[Eyedol-X]

so to summarize....

Batch 1 - suppose to be the fastest chip but boards dropping. v.1.0.0

Batch 2 - with slower chips but boards still dropping. New firmware to fix board dropping. v.1.0.0 now replaced by v.1.0.1. Still no improvement to boards dropping and frequent restarts. v.1.0.3 released.

Batch 3 - new batch with newest firmware v.1.0.3..... some improvement but only 240MH/s instead of advertised 280MH/s?

Has anyone running an A4 without any problems whatsoever?

Batch 1 - suppose to be the fastest chip but boards dropping. v.0.0.0

Batch 2 - different hardware with slower chips but boards still dropping. New firmware to fix board dropping. v.1.0.0(T) now replaced by v.1.0.1. Still no improvement to boards dropping and frequent restarts. v.1.0.3 released.

Batch 3 - new batch with newest firmware v.1.0.3..... some improvement but only 240MH/s instead of advertised 280MH/s?


Put some corrections in your summary but that about sums it up.

In regards to your question: I don't think there is a single A4 owner without an issue right now but as it stands today I would still purchase mine again.

I'm waiting for the open source software that was promised so people can really start fixing these things.

[Nowayz]

Just a though guys.

Why would you try to reset with a PDU if you could easily just kill cgminer and after restart check if boards came back if not kill cgminer again untill all board are back online .. i have had this running with batch 2 and it worked almost all the time flawless.

ps. for board drops i used the cgminer api to detect.

Edit:
Opensource ? i would like to hope so but innosilicon has no intensions to opensource as i asked them frequently .

[Eyedol-X]

Opensource ? i would like to hope so but innosilicon has no intensions to opensource as i asked them frequently .

...and boom goes the dynamite

Thanks for your kindness! We've decided to open source the software after internal discussion. Please stay tuned.

[Nowayz]

  i hope this is true. as i like to tweak the setting and solve board drops.

But strange thing here is i got my answer this week stating No Opensource in the future ... so could innosilicon shine a light on this ?

[Longsnowsm]

i hope this is true. as i like to tweak the setting and solve board drops.

But strange thing here is i got my answer this week stating No Opensource in the future ... so could innosilicon shine a light on this ?

Inno told us here they plan to opensource it.  So we will have to wait and see when that happens.

My v1.0.0 dropped a board today and had to go through the restart routine.  Seems like we are alternating board drops between the two versions at this point.  Average hash rate between the 2 miners for last 24 hours is 252-253mhs on Litecoinpool.  So very little difference between the two versions I am running for hash rate.  

I have to try and keep tabs on the miners to catch the board drops.  The miner may try to restart to clear the board issue, but it doesn't fix it and you can lose a lot of hash time until you catch it and have to restart it.

I am glad to hear someone on here saying they are not having any issues.  I wish that were the case with me.  Granted the v1.0.0 and v1.0.3 are far more stable than v1.0.2, but the miners still have to be watched for board drops and manual intervention is required.  I may try to move over to Prohashing on Friday to see how badly the miners behave on a multicoin pool where they tend to get their feathers ruffled pretty badly.

[Exoskeleton]

If they would just opensource the software I would seriously consider buying one knowing that better software was on the way. As it stands Im worried that by the time they have stable software the network diff will have tripled.

[excelerator]

If they would just opensource the software I would seriously consider buying one knowing that better software was on the way. As it stands Im worried that by the time they have stable software the network diff will have tripled.

Difficulty for LTC was at 48,913 on October 16 and looks to be at ~65,000 on the next change.  As it stands now, with more difficulty increases on the way, ROI is likely already gone mining LTC, based on current A4 pricing, if you start mining today (unless you have free power).
http://www.vnbitcoin.org/detailcalculationltc.php?name=LiteCoin_Mining_Rig&startdate=2016-11-24&costperunit=2000&wattperhour=1100&gigahazarate=260000&daytoincrease=3&testlopfirst=2&diffincrement=0.6312&bitcoinperdollar=3.88&electriccostinput=.1&begindifflevel=61422

I would expect the Thanksgiving promo to continue indefinitely...

[Longsnowsm]

Another board drop, this time on the v1.0.0.  It appeared that the miner attempted to restart, but was unable to bring the board back online.  Strangely enough I see the v1.0.3 miner also restarted at about the same time, but it did not appear to drop a board, and came back up with all the boards.  So I don't know what spurred the two miners to start bouncing at the same time unless there was a network issue or something.

So I will continue to monitor and report what I see and make a decision on Friday on the new firmware vs old firmware.  Then I will start doing some testing on a multicoin pool.

[FryguyUK]

Not getting any MH/s activity with a miner running the new 1.0.3 firmware, other miners on old firmware are still going for it with the drops.

ferk!  

[Eyedol-X]

Another board drop, this time on the v1.0.0.  It appeared that the miner attempted to restart, but was unable to bring the board back online.  Strangely enough I see the v1.0.3 miner also restarted at about the same time, but it did not appear to drop a board, and came back up with all the boards.  So I don't know what spurred the two miners to start bouncing at the same time unless there was a network issue or something.

So I will continue to monitor and report what I see and make a decision on Friday on the new firmware vs old firmware.  Then I will start doing some testing on a multicoin pool.

I think its completely random, my 1.0.0T A4 has dropped cards 4 times in the last 24 hours when previously it ran for >3 days without an issue.

[Longsnowsm]

I just saw over on the Avalon thread that the Avalon/Canaan manufacturer provided 2 sample A7's to two of the communities lead developers here on BCT so that they could develop the software for the community for the brand new A7.  That is what I call SMART. 

We have several well known A2 developers here on BCT, and at least 1 well known Titan software guru that would be ideal candidates to have Inno send a "demo" A4 to so that the community development can begin.

If the Avalon/Canaan company can do this I don't see why Inno doesn't follow suite and do the same.  It would be a very smart move and would help get some of these issues with the A4 under control that much faster.  Inno I hope you are paying attention.  If you would like input from people here we can tell you who the guru's are that supported the A2, and the guru who currently supports the KNC Titan's.  If you get sample miners in their hands ASAP things will start to happen for the A4 and the community will grow. 

Please give this some consideration.