GekkoScience is now dabbling with 16nm ASICs for new designs

[sidehack]

The pod is designed to be 12cm square with mounting holes at each corner for an enclosure or tower stack standoffs. It will ship with rubber feet adhered to these corners. The heatsink will be screwed on through an aluminum base plate to help maintain planar contact of the chips underneath. The pods will take in USB from either a Mini or B plug, and will take power through a barrel jack or PCIe 6-pin. There is a second 6-pin for daisychaining power to multiple boards from one master cable. All these connections are lined up along one side. On the manual-adjust pods (short-term plan) there's also a small potentiometer which can be turned to adjust core voltage. BF16 pods will implement software-adjustable voltage control with internal calibration.

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[1714025467]

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[NotFuzzyWarm]

<snip>
I have, perhaps, a naive question. It might have been mentioned somewhere already, my apologies.
Say, 10-chip BM1385 pod needing 60W. What would be the proper/best way to power it?
I get the sticks, you connect powerhub's little brick to powerhub via round connector, then power the stick via USB port.
the hub would have the same type of connector (round), PCIe or something else altogether?
EDIT: OK so round powered USB connector=barrel jack, so i assume that as long as it provides 60W, it should be OK to just re-purpose the powered hub power supply.

Almost. AFAIK the USB does not supply power. It's just coms. Power input is only through the barrel (a 2-pin power connector) or PCIe jacks and power input is 12V nominal, not the 5v as a (edit: typical standard) USB hub supply usually provides.

Example of a PCIe to barrel adapter... https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=images&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwj_k4mH5_HQAhWLgFQKHbtpDUEQjRwIBw&url=https%3A%2F%2Fbitcoinware.net%2Fproducts%2Fgridseed-asic-accessories-highest-quality-pci-e-to-barrel-plug-power-adapter&psig=AFQjCNHL5XxyX0y60Xz6l2YdsEG_VnWtEw&ust=1481740337415027

[sidehack]

Yep, power is 12V. Technically you could go down to around 6V and it'd probably still work, but your fan would not be spinning. It's designed for a 12V-nominal power input, hence the PCIe 6-pins as well. There is no power drawn from the USB connection to the controller.

So if your USB hub takes in 12V power, sure it'd still work. 12V5A bricks are super common so that's what I'm designing the "stock" power draw around, but since voltage and frequency are adjustable that power draw is by no means mandated.

The BF16 pod may have a higher-power stock setting, I'll know more once I start playing with the hardware directly.

[Biodom]

<snip>
I have, perhaps, a naive question. It might have been mentioned somewhere already, my apologies.
Say, 10-chip BM1385 pod needing 60W. What would be the proper/best way to power it?
I get the sticks, you connect powerhub's little brick to powerhub via round connector, then power the stick via USB port.
the hub would have the same type of connector (round), PCIe or something else altogether?
EDIT: OK so round powered USB connector=barrel jack, so i assume that as long as it provides 60W, it should be OK to just re-purpose the powered hub power supply.

Almost. AFAIK the USB does not supply power. It's just coms. Power input is only through the barrel (a 2-pin power connector) or PCIe jacks and power input is 12V nominal, not the 5v as a USB hub supply usually provides.

Example of a PCIe to barrel adapter... https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=images&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwj_k4mH5_HQAhWLgFQKHbtpDUEQjRwIBw&url=https%3A%2F%2Fbitcoinware.net%2Fproducts%2Fgridseed-asic-accessories-highest-quality-pci-e-to-barrel-plug-power-adapter&psig=AFQjCNHL5XxyX0y60Xz6l2YdsEG_VnWtEw&ust=1481740337415027

my powered hubs have a brick, which output is 12V through round connector (OK, barrel jack). Then, you connect the barrel jack to powerhub itself, which then provides 5V to USB. therefore, one can just take the brick and shove the barrel jack into pod, I assume. i don't see why not.
Of course, if you want to buy larger PSU, go for it. It happens that I have a multitude of such powered hubs and thought of re-purposing them.

[ZACHM]

sidehack mentioned an estimate of 75w for the BF16 pods. If you plan on running multiple pods, I would think it would easier and more efficient to use a PSU with PCIe cables.

[sidehack]

Estimates posted at least once in this thread already give you a power range from about 45W to upward of 100W depending on voltage and frequency setting. So yeah, you could run a BF16 pod off a 70W brick.

The BF16 pod will have input power monitoring integrated. It'll be on vh to build it into code, but that's intended to be used for power limiting at the cgminer level. You could feed cgminer your maximum allowable power draw and it'd limit [something, depends on implementation] to try and maximize hashing without going over that threshold. If nothing else, there should still be a power-draw readout somewhere in cgminer that you can use to manually tune it.

This is an advanced feature requiring ADCs on an onboard microcontroller communicating directly with the cgminer driver, and as such will not be implemented on the short-term project pod. That's specifically for the advanced controls set being designed for BF16 projects.

[Biodom]

sidehack mentioned an estimate of 75w for the BF16 pods. If you plan on running multiple pods, I would think it would easier and more efficient to use a PSU with PCIe cables.

I don't want any more PSUs in the house, seriously  , and the idea is to make them less visible.

[sidehack]

I added the daisychain PCIe by request, for folks who want to use a larger single PSU to run stacks at a time without octopus cabling. It's not a bad idea, so long as people keep track of the power limits a single cable can do.

I plan on using the same footprint and, ideally, the same connector layout on BF16 pods.

Also, editing posts after replies makes conversation confusing.

[ZACHM]

This is off-topic and sidehack, if you want it removed let me know, but I thought posting it here might help.

I started a blockchain lottery, 3% of collected funds will be sent to 1BURGERAXHH6Yi6LRybRJK7ybEm5m5HwTr

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1712963

I don't know if anyone else will join this, but I thought it might be fun.

[sidehack]

While I officially do not endorse nor participate in gambling... sure, thanks.

[Biodom]

I added the daisychain PCIe by request, for folks who want to use a larger single PSU to run stacks at a time without octopus cabling. It's not a bad idea, so long as people keep track of the power limits a single cable can do.

I plan on using the same footprint and, ideally, the same connector layout on BF16 pods.

Also, editing posts after replies makes conversation confusing.

I think that it is still pretty coherent; deleted one post because it was redundant.

[sidehack]

Yeah, just threw me for a loop for a minute there when something I had responded to disappeared. Still works but I couldn't find what I was expecting to.

Anyways, your questions brought up some good information. I'll get around to updating the first post with fresh data sometime today.

[goku1997]

ASICs suck. Do you guys remember CPU miners when things were equal?

Bitcoin Ocho is bringing back CPU miners. Google it, it's all over the internet.

[NotFuzzyWarm]

<snip>
my powered hubs have a brick, which output is 12V through round connector (OK, barrel jack). Then, you connect the barrel jack to powerhub itself, which then provides 5V to USB. therefore, one can just take the brick and shove the barrel jack into pod, I assume. i don't see why not.
Of course, if you want to buy larger PSU, go for it. It happens that I have a multitude of such powered hubs and thought of re-purposing them.

Then yer golden.
Edited my post to reflect not using a standard USB hub supply vs a custom or BC1.2 high power hub & supply.

[ZACHM]

Google it, it's all over the internet.

So is child porn, but that don't make it legit or legal, ethical, moral, etc.

[philipma1957]

Here is a great brick I have one of them.


https://www.trcelectronics.com/ecomm/pdf/hlg240h.pdf


will do 192 watts 24/7

[gt_addict]

Here is a great brick I have one of them.


https://www.trcelectronics.com/ecomm/pdf/hlg240h.pdf


will do 192 watts 24/7

They look really good. Especially the Voltage adjustable ones with the terminals (C type I think). One of those could easily power a couple of pods.

[NotFuzzyWarm]

Here is a great brick I have one of them.
https://www.trcelectronics.com/ecomm/pdf/hlg240h.pdf
will do 192 watts 24/7

Folks, that supply is for LED lighting and is specifically made for power LED strings in lighting panels! It is not a general purpose power supply. Those supplies are made to deliver stable fixed or adjustable (when using dimming funct) current - not stable voltage!

Typically that means that there is a set max voltage to light the LED's (typical conduction threshold drop is 1.1 to 1.6v per-LED depending on the type) and then voltage drops as needed to maintain desired current through the string. (LED brightness is set by the amount current flow through them and that is only indirectly controlled by voltage).

Now yes, if the current is dialed to max then the voltage adjust might do fine and keep ya at 12v but - point is these supplies are not designed to hold voltage steady. If you exceed the dialed in current the voltage out will drop as low as needed to produce the set current and odds are that voltage will be far below what a miner needs leading to possible Vcore regulator damage.

Just putting this warning out there....

[ZedZedNova]

Here is a great brick I have one of them.
https://www.trcelectronics.com/ecomm/pdf/hlg240h.pdf
will do 192 watts 24/7

Folks, that supply is for LED lighting and is specifically made for power LED strings in lighting panels! It is not a general purpose power supply. Those supplies are made to deliver stable fixed or adjustable (when using dimming funct) current - not stable voltage!

Typically that means that there is a set max voltage to light the LED's (typical conduction threshold drop is 1.1 to 1.6v per-LED depending on the type) and then voltage drops as needed to maintain desired current through the string. (LED brightness is set by the amount current flow through them and that is only indirectly controlled by voltage).

Now yes, if the current is dialed to max then the voltage adjust might do fine and keep ya at 12v but - point is these supplies are not designed to hold voltage steady. If you exceed the dialed in current the voltage out will drop as low as needed to produce the set current and odds are that voltage will be far below what a miner needs leading to possible Vcore regulator damage.

Just putting this warning out there....

Hmmm, this page says constant voltage and constant current:
https://www.trcelectronics.com/View/Mean-Well/HLG-240H-12.shtml

Here is one that will go up to 264 Watts:
http://www.trcelectronics.com/View/Mean-Well/HLG-320H-12.shtml

[sidehack]

Reckon those have a switch to select CC or CV? Looks like CV mode would be fine.