Antminer L3 - 250mh - 400watt Scrypt miner coming soon

[Longsnowsm]

Well the crashes continue with this failing miner.  Bitmain replied back that they believe I have a bad hash board.  They have given me the steps to diagnose the boards which I will start doing in the morning.  I suspect it is board 3 as that board has  shown some hardware errors since day one.  So I will start by testing one board at a time and let them run for 24 hours or until I have the miner crash.  I will start with board 3 since it is the one I suspect is causing the issues.

Bitmain has given me instructions to open a repair ticket as soon as I figure out which board is causing the problem and to ship it back.  They also have provided the instructions on how to take the miner apart, and provided the instructions for packing and shipping it back.

So at least is sounds like Bitmain agrees there is a problem.  Now to just figure out which board or boards has an issue. 

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[Marvell1]

Well the crashes continue with this failing miner.  Bitmain replied back that they believe I have a bad hash board.  They have given me the steps to diagnose the boards which I will start doing in the morning.  I suspect it is board 3 as that board has  shown some hardware errors since day one.  So I will start by testing one board at a time and let them run for 24 hours or until I have the miner crash.  I will start with board 3 since it is the one I suspect is causing the issues.

Bitmain has given me instructions to open a repair ticket as soon as I figure out which board is causing the problem and to ship it back.  They also have provided the instructions on how to take the miner apart, and provided the instructions for packing and shipping it back.

So at least is sounds like Bitmain agrees there is a problem.  Now to just figure out which board or boards has an issue. 

bitmain R4 junk L3 junk i think ill only buy GPUs now

[Longsnowsm]

I reached out to BitmainWarranty to see if they could do the repair here instead of shipping to China, but the response is NO.  The L3 has only been sold in China so far so you can only get support by shipping back to China. 

So if you bought an L3 and shipped it anywhere outside of China you will have to mail back the parts to China for repair or replacement.

[Eyedol-X]

I reached out to BitmainWarranty to see if they could do the repair here instead of shipping to China, but the response is NO.  The L3 has only been sold in China so far so you can only get support by shipping back to China. 

So if you bought an L3 and shipped it anywhere outside of China you will have to mail back the parts to China for repair or replacement.

Wow, bummer -- it seems like current generation scrypt miners are being plagued with issues right now, regardless of manufacturer.

[Bulletdodger]

I reached out to BitmainWarranty to see if they could do the repair here instead of shipping to China, but the response is NO.  The L3 has only been sold in China so far so you can only get support by shipping back to China. 

So if you bought an L3 and shipped it anywhere outside of China you will have to mail back the parts to China for repair or replacement.

damn.
Mine is in the mail, I'll let you guys know how it works.

Too bad, I was planning on buying a boatload if they functioned without hiccups.

[lokomotive]

Inno at least doesn't die. Just restarts and after flashing ok. Bitmain's craps are going down like flies. Looks like only T9 has some potential.

[madmartyk]

My two will be here tomorrow.  I'll post how they run...

[edonkey]

Looks like only T9 has some potential.

How many T9 batches have there been? Isn't it just one or two? Probably not enough of a sampling to make a conclusion.

That said, my gut feeling is that given enough time and units shipped and the T9 will also be problematic. Bitmain seems to be unwilling or incapable of producing quality products now.

Of course there's Avalon which seems to be far more solid. But their A7's are less efficient and have a further out ROI than Bitmain.

Regardless of the coin mined, it seems like the choices for small miners is very poor right now.

[lokomotive]

Looks like only T9 has some potential.

How many T9 batches have there been? Isn't it just one or two? Probably not enough of a sampling to make a conclusion.

That said, my gut feeling is that given enough time and units shipped and the T9 will also be problematic. Bitmain seems to be unwilling or incapable of producing quality products now.

Of course there's Avalon which seems to be far more solid. But their A7's are less efficient and have a further out ROI than Bitmain.

Regardless of the coin mined, it seems like the choices for small miners is very poor right now.

I would agree to that. But keep in mind L3 is was also small quantity 1 batch run currently. And there are alredy several fourms users with problems with them. T9 is probably sold in high quantities than L3 and had no probs. Eitherway i would get Avalon if i bought SHA256 miner.

[Deep In The Mines LLC]

Looks like only T9 has some potential.

How many T9 batches have there been? Isn't it just one or two? Probably not enough of a sampling to make a conclusion.

That said, my gut feeling is that given enough time and units shipped and the T9 will also be problematic. Bitmain seems to be unwilling or incapable of producing quality products now.

Of course there's Avalon which seems to be far more solid. But their A7's are less efficient and have a further out ROI than Bitmain.

Regardless of the coin mined, it seems like the choices for small miners is very poor right now.

I would agree to that. But keep in mind L3 is was also small quantity 1 batch run currently. And there are alredy several fourms users with problems with them. T9 is probably sold in high quantities than L3 and had no probs. Eitherway i would get Avalon if i bought SHA256 miner.

Ive seen some of our customers with issues with the T9s mainly dropped hashboards. All Bitmains recent machines have been very poor quality it seems like every miner we sell that's from Bitmain always ends up having some issue. Yet that didn't stop them from raising the price on the 13th S9s recently go figure.

[lokomotive]

Probably because everyone still buy them as most efficient miners.

[vinylwasp]

Looks like only T9 has some potential.

How many T9 batches have there been? Isn't it just one or two? Probably not enough of a sampling to make a conclusion.

That said, my gut feeling is that given enough time and units shipped and the T9 will also be problematic. Bitmain seems to be unwilling or incapable of producing quality products now.

Of course there's Avalon which seems to be far more solid. But their A7's are less efficient and have a further out ROI than Bitmain.

Regardless of the coin mined, it seems like the choices for small miners is very poor right now.

I would agree to that. But keep in mind L3 is was also small quantity 1 batch run currently. And there are alredy several fourms users with problems with them. T9 is probably sold in high quantities than L3 and had no probs. Eitherway i would get Avalon if i bought SHA256 miner.

Ive seen some of our customers with issues with the T9s mainly dropped hashboards. All Bitmains recent machines have been very poor quality it seems like every miner we sell that's from Bitmain always ends up having some issue. Yet that didn't stop them from raising the price on the 13th S9s recently go figure.

I wonder if this is just a fundamental trade off between the efficiency of a series DC circuit and reliability of a parallel one? So if you buy any Bitmain equipment which all use a serial design you get efficiency but when there's a single issue with a chip the whole board is dead.

With a parallel DC circuit design such as that used on the A4, it's only 1/2 as efficient but much more reliable. If a chip ever dies, you're down to 19 on that board but the rest still work. The price to replace that single chip is $18 USD.

I suspect we'd find the same differences between the Baikal X11 miners and the Pinidea X11 miners.

So if you don't live in China and have direct access to your manufacturer, I think you'd be wise to factor in some element of failure rate, downtime, shipping and repair/replacement cost if you buy anything from Bitmain.

Deep in the Mines, do you have any statistics per series of machine, e.g MTBF, shipping cost, repair cost, average mining time lost, etc?

[Deep In The Mines LLC]

Looks like only T9 has some potential.

How many T9 batches have there been? Isn't it just one or two? Probably not enough of a sampling to make a conclusion.

That said, my gut feeling is that given enough time and units shipped and the T9 will also be problematic. Bitmain seems to be unwilling or incapable of producing quality products now.

Of course there's Avalon which seems to be far more solid. But their A7's are less efficient and have a further out ROI than Bitmain.

Regardless of the coin mined, it seems like the choices for small miners is very poor right now.

I would agree to that. But keep in mind L3 is was also small quantity 1 batch run currently. And there are alredy several fourms users with problems with them. T9 is probably sold in high quantities than L3 and had no probs. Eitherway i would get Avalon if i bought SHA256 miner.

Ive seen some of our customers with issues with the T9s mainly dropped hashboards. All Bitmains recent machines have been very poor quality it seems like every miner we sell that's from Bitmain always ends up having some issue. Yet that didn't stop them from raising the price on the 13th S9s recently go figure.

I wonder if this is just a fundamental trade off between the efficiency of a series DC circuit and reliability of a parallel one? So if you buy any Bitmain equipment which all use a serial design you get efficiency but when there's a single issue with a chip the whole board is dead.

With a parallel DC circuit design such as that used on the A4, it's only 1/2 as efficient but much more reliable. If a chip ever dies, you're down to 19 on that board but the rest still work. The price to replace that single chip is $18 USD.

I suspect we'd find the same differences between the Baikal X11 miners and the Pinidea X11 miners.

So if you don't live in China and have direct access to your manufacturer, I think you'd be wise to factor in some element of failure rate, downtime, shipping and repair/replacement cost if you buy anything from Bitmain.

Deep in the Mines, do you have any statistics per series of machine, e.g MTBF, shipping cost, repair cost, average mining time lost, etc?

I don't have statistics for each but I would say I believe the failure rate I've seen is about the same for the S9 and R4 and honestly I might even add L3 to that list now. I been starting to see some of our customers have issues with them recently. We own a location in Guangdong China that we ship back to then ship to Bitmain from there. Shipping for the whole units is about $80-$100 depending on if its a S9 or R4 via UPS expedited at our rates from USA to China then another like $10 USD or so in CNY to get it to Bitmain. We have not had to pay any repairs costs everything we sent back was always in warranty. Bitmain normally sends us it back in about a 3-5 days time to China. Its normally a 2-3 week process.

[Longsnowsm]

Looks like only T9 has some potential.

How many T9 batches have there been? Isn't it just one or two? Probably not enough of a sampling to make a conclusion.

That said, my gut feeling is that given enough time and units shipped and the T9 will also be problematic. Bitmain seems to be unwilling or incapable of producing quality products now.

Of course there's Avalon which seems to be far more solid. But their A7's are less efficient and have a further out ROI than Bitmain.

Regardless of the coin mined, it seems like the choices for small miners is very poor right now.

I would agree to that. But keep in mind L3 is was also small quantity 1 batch run currently. And there are alredy several fourms users with problems with them. T9 is probably sold in high quantities than L3 and had no probs. Eitherway i would get Avalon if i bought SHA256 miner.

Ive seen some of our customers with issues with the T9s mainly dropped hashboards. All Bitmains recent machines have been very poor quality it seems like every miner we sell that's from Bitmain always ends up having some issue. Yet that didn't stop them from raising the price on the 13th S9s recently go figure.

I wonder if this is just a fundamental trade off between the efficiency of a series DC circuit and reliability of a parallel one? So if you buy any Bitmain equipment which all use a serial design you get efficiency but when there's a single issue with a chip the whole board is dead.

With a parallel DC circuit design such as that used on the A4, it's only 1/2 as efficient but much more reliable. If a chip ever dies, you're down to 19 on that board but the rest still work. The price to replace that single chip is $18 USD.

I suspect we'd find the same differences between the Baikal X11 miners and the Pinidea X11 miners.

So if you don't live in China and have direct access to your manufacturer, I think you'd be wise to factor in some element of failure rate, downtime, shipping and repair/replacement cost if you buy anything from Bitmain.

Deep in the Mines, do you have any statistics per series of machine, e.g MTBF, shipping cost, repair cost, average mining time lost, etc?

I don't have statistics for each but I would say I believe the failure rate I've seen is about the same for the S9 and R4 and honestly I might even add L3 to that list now. I been starting to see some of our customers have issues with them recently. We own a location in Guangdong China that we ship back to then ship to Bitmain from there. Shipping for the whole units is about $80-$100 depending on if its a S9 or R4 via UPS expedited at our rates from USA to China then another like $10 USD or so in CNY to get it to Bitmain. We have not had to pay any repairs costs everything we sent back was always in warranty. Bitmain normally sends us it back in about a 3-5 days time to China. Its normally a 2-3 week process.

So far my communication with Bitmain they indicated for me to just send back the board that is faulty and not the entire L3.  Of course since they told me to do that the miner started to behave normally.  So I reconnected the boards and started mining again, then boom it now has locked up and dropped boards again a couple of times. 

So I am about at my wits end here and I think I am going to assume that the one board that is throwing hardware errors is the culprit and just send that one back.  I will try testing some more with just that board connected over the weekend and from there just make a judgement call on which board to send back.  The 3 other boards report no hardware errors, but they are the first ones to drop while the one with the HW errors does not drop until the end.  Which I find quite odd. 

This isn't reassuring that others are also having issues with L3's.  My tolerance level for Bitmain issues is quickly reaching a point where I don't think I will be in a hurry to spend any more money with them until they get their act together.  This is just not acceptable. 

[lokomotive]

Eitherway happy about A4. Only thing you need it stable internet connection.

[naron]

Overall I'm happy for now about my L3, in particular that it's batch 1. After more than one month of mining on NiceHash by my L3 it dropped one time one board, so I restarted it once a week with the hope it will help prevent dropping board. Now after 10 days I'm going to wait for how long my L3 would works without dropping board. I watch and I will let you know about my result.
Screen shot after 10 days.
https://images82.fotosik.pl/405/92d697ca97a3dfd1.jpg

[vinylwasp]

Overall I'm happy for now about my L3, in particular that it's batch 1. After more than one month of mining on NiceHash by my L3 it dropped one time one board, so I restarted it once a week with the hope it will help prevent dropping board. Now after 10 days I'm going to wait for how long my L3 would works without dropping board. I watch and I will let you know about my result.
Screen shot after 10 days.

Looks like the board with all the HW errors is getting sick.

[naron]

Yes, one of the board is weaker and generates an average of 30 HW per day but until it does not cause of dropping board, this situation is acceptable, because it does not make much impact on hashing speed.

[Longsnowsm]

Yes, one of the board is weaker and generates an average of 30 HW per day but until it does not cause of dropping board, this situation is acceptable, because it does not make much impact on hashing speed.

My problem miner started out this way, but it has progressively gotten worse. Right now I have disconnected the board that throws the errors and letting it run to see how long the miner goes before issues appear again.  If the board with the HW errors is the cause of my boards dropping then this should prove that out.  I tried the one board at a time testing and sadly I couldn't reproduce it.  So now I am more or less going at this "backwards" and removing the suspects as they poke their heads out of the holes.  I can tell you this isn't a lot of fun. 

[crackfoo]

Yes, one of the board is weaker and generates an average of 30 HW per day but until it does not cause of dropping board, this situation is acceptable, because it does not make much impact on hashing speed.

My problem miner started out this way, but it has progressively gotten worse. Right now I have disconnected the board that throws the errors and letting it run to see how long the miner goes before issues appear again.  If the board with the HW errors is the cause of my boards dropping then this should prove that out.  I tried the one board at a time testing and sadly I couldn't reproduce it.  So now I am more or less going at this "backwards" and removing the suspects as they poke their heads out of the holes.  I can tell you this isn't a lot of fun. 

doesn't eastshore test the miners and send a screen shot before shipping?