BFL 5 GH/s Miner Demo

[Tamerz]

Unfortunately, I have no insight as to what Avalon may, or may not, be required to do to ship such wares to the US. But, BFL being Inc. in the US is a completely different issue, thus a host of regulations they must comply to, the FCC one being the main one.

But that doesn't make any sense. Why does my TV from China have to have that and UL? There has to be something more to it.

This link is actually rather interesting: https://www.sparkfun.com/tutorials/398

"What can I do to avoid expensive testing and still remain in compliance with the laws?"
"A digital device used exclusively as industrial, commercial, or medical test equipment."

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[Bogart]

Clearly then, any FPGA miner that they shipped was in violation of US law if it didn't at least have an FCC tag in place. Any unit sent to a municipality in the US that requires a UL lag clearly puts them and the customer who received it in violation of the law.

Ergo, Sonny Vleisides is clearly breaking the law, coupled with having some of his clients break it as well, depending on which municipality they live in. Circumnavigating CE regulations is a completely different matter altogether.

The FCC requirement is a concern of BFL, otherwise they wouldn't have posted that they were in the process of obtaining approval.

What about the other mining devices? Do they have any of those certifications?

BTW I'm not being a troll. I seriously don't know the answer.

My FPGA Singles have no labels or markings whatsoever on their exterior.  I guess they aren't certified.

[pikeadz]

While I find the video to be nice progress, I also received an email today regarding (finally) upgrading shipping order options.

The consistent thing I've been told was that when this would happen and be allowed to be changed was when shipping would be soon underway. 

Hopefully not too much longer now.  I'd imagine they just need to have the higher power spec boards mass-produced, then assembly and ship-out.

That e-mail is just part of the scam.  Just another income stream for them that they have no intention of ever delivering on.

[smoothie]

Seriously, I could care less exactly how many watts this thing uses - as long as it doesn't catch fire or melt itself as far as I'm concerned it is good to go! Get in production and ship me mine! Wasting a few more KW/H per month matters much less than the ramp up of difficulty that is going on now.

Typical noob. Don't care about power consumption just ship me my BFL magic box with lephrechauns gold and rainbows.

They missed their power mark by a huge factor and that doesn't phase you? Shit then they may as well have shipped gpu based mining equipment to satisfy your insatiable need to be fucked. Lol

[erk]

Seriously, I could care less exactly how many watts this thing uses - as long as it doesn't catch fire or melt itself as far as I'm concerned it is good to go! Get in production and ship me mine! Wasting a few more KW/H per month matters much less than the ramp up of difficulty that is going on now.

Typical noob. Don't care about power consumption just ship me my BFL magic box with lephrechauns gold and rainbows.

They missed their power mark by a huge factor and that doesn't phase you? Shit then they may as well have shipped gpu based mining equipment to satisfy your insatiable need to be fucked. Lol

What was the power mark for the demonstrated 5GHs unit that it missed by a "huge factor"?

[Tamerz]

My FPGA Singles have no labels or markings whatsoever on their exterior.  I guess they aren't certified.

Which is why I'm thinking these possibly won't need it either. They use an external power supply which should already have the UL certification and FCC might be excluded as "commercial test equipment" (that may be a stretch). It seems hardly worth bothering to go for the certifications unless the FCC comes after them. I doubt it will even hit their radar.

EDIT: Of course, Phinnaeus Gage pointed out that Josh said something about getting it. I don't know if that means they need it BEFORE they ship, or if after is OK.

[jspielberg]

I believe the irate anti-bfl crowd is noting that they originally cited that the 5Gh model was going to be USB powered... which this demo clearly demonstrates it requires externally supplied power.  Frankly it is pretty obvious that the "new jalapeño" is just the original design for the Single, but with 1 ASIC chip rather than the usual 5.

That being said... I think most miners don't give a rats behind how much power their asic miner uses (within reason) as long as it gets the hash rate what they want.

The interesting thing to me is... assuming they ship all the orders for all the models... they aren't brining in new money with those shipments... those pre orders were paid a long time ago.  Assuming they have a crappy CFO (given), it seems like they probably really need new orders to keep a revenue stream.  I wonder if they raised prices because they were really having issues with their revenue stream.   I wonder if that strategy is working.

[creativex]

Seriously, I could care less exactly how many watts this thing uses - as long as it doesn't catch fire or melt itself as far as I'm concerned it is good to go! Get in production and ship me mine! Wasting a few more KW/H per month matters much less than the ramp up of difficulty that is going on now.

Typical noob. Don't care about power consumption just ship me my BFL magic box with lephrechauns gold and rainbows.

They missed their power mark by a huge factor and that doesn't phase you? Shit then they may as well have shipped gpu based mining equipment to satisfy your insatiable need to be fucked. Lol

What was the power mark for the demonstrated 5GHs unit that the missed by a "huge factor"?

BFL was peddling their fairy tale(lie) 1w/Gh/s across their entire product line for months. Kind of a big deal when you originally sell a product you claim does 4.5Gh/s @ 4.5w and then say you'll ship a product that does 5Gh/s but uses 6-7x that amount of power. These things won't be profitable nearly as long as was originally projected due to much higher power consumption, which makes it even more painful that they're 6 months late and counting.

That being said... I think most miners don't give a rats behind how much power their asic miner uses (within reason) as long as it gets the hash rate what they want.

They may not care now, but if they don't receive their frankenminer for a few months they'll certainly care then as it's power consumption that determines how long mining equipment remains profitable. Josh and others attempting to pretty this turd up by saying it's still more efficient than Avalon are ignoring the fact that Avalons are real products that real miners are really using right now.

[Tamerz]

They may not care now, but if they don't receive their frankenminer for a few months they'll certainly care then as it's power consumption that determines how long mining equipment remains profitable. Josh and others attempting to pretty this turd up by saying it's still more efficient than Avalon are ignoring the fact that Avalons are real products that real miners are really using right now.

Not only that, but even if you have fixed electricity costs like I do, heat becomes a concern. More power = more heat.

[erk]

They may not care now, but if they don't receive their frankenminer for a few months they'll certainly care then as it's power consumption that determines how long mining equipment remains profitable. Josh and others attempting to pretty this turd up by saying it's still more efficient than Avalon are ignoring the fact that Avalons are real products that real miners are really using right now.

Not only that, but even if you have fixed electricity costs like I do, heat becomes a concern. More power = more heat.

So 32watts is going to break you? Or are you talking about some BFL model that has yet to have power consumption demonstrated?

[elvisrene]

i hop to see them soon looking to buy but i believe people have been waiting over a year

[Frizz23]

Jalapeno (5 GH/s): 36 Watt
Little Single (30 GH/s): 216 Watt

216 Watt is roughly what the cooler of a 7970 GPU has to dissipate.

Now look at the cooling solutions:

[erk]

Jalapeno (5 GH/s): 36 Watt
Little Single (30 GH/s): 216 Watt

216 Watt is roughly what the cooler of a 7970 GPU has to dissipate.

Now look at the cooling solutions:

The unit is called the "BitForce 25 GH/s SC" and it's 25Ghz not 30GHs. The 5GHs unit which consumes 32watts not 36watts most likely uses a few watts in driving the control electronics, USB port, fan if it has one etc. So it's real consumption for the ASIC is probably closer to 28watts. So the BitForce 25 GH/s SC will probably come closer to 145watts rather than your 216watt claim. That's of course assuming that the don't fix the power consumption issues in the next wafer/batch whatever before a BitForce 25 GH/s SC ships.

[witherworth]

You can't compare the wattage on a BFL with an Avalon. An Avalon is a self-contained mining device. Add in the wattage for the laptop and the BFL is less efficient than an Avalon! ROFLMAO.

Except it's not. When you add in even 100w for a laptop, then plug in 10 BFL singles, suddenly that laptop only uses an extra 10w per single. There's no point to have 10 different hard drives, 10 wifi modules, etc. all of that can be taken care of with 1 mini computer (~$150 for a new one, running at ~50w with either windows or Linux).

Also, of you've only got 1 unit, run it off a RPi, and that only consumes, what, 10w or something rediculus? You could probably find a way to mount the Pi inside the jalapeño, and cut a hole out the back for Ethernet & additional power cord. Would certainly be an interesting project.

[Frizz23]

So it's real consumption for the ASIC is probably closer to 28watts. So the BitForce 25 GH/s SC will probably come closer to 145watts rather than your 216watt claim.

And the Single SC, which was advertised with 60GH/s, has now what? 50GH/s? 40GH/s? 0GH/s?

It is still advertised with 50GH/s, so let's take 50.

According to your calculation the 25GH/s unit needs 145 Watt. So the 50GH/s needs 290 Watt.

Both units have the same casing.

So this tiny heatsink dissipates 290 Watt of heat? LOL.

[erk]

So it's real consumption for the ASIC is probably closer to 28watts. So the BitForce 25 GH/s SC will probably come closer to 145watts rather than your 216watt claim.

And the Single SC, which was advertised with 60GH/s, has now what? 50GH/s? 40GH/s? 0GH/s?

It is still advertised with 50GH/s, so let's take 50.

According to your calculation the 25GH/s unit needs 145 Watt. So the 50GH/s needs 290 Watt.

Both units have the same casing.

So this tiny heatsink dissipates 290 Watt of heat? LOL.

Just give up and stop your trolling, you and I have no idea what power consumption or case size the 25GHs and 50GHs units will come in, all we know so far is about the 5GHs unit, the rest is pointless speculation, silly pictures, and bad math.

[Frizz23]

Just give up and stop your trolling, you and I have no idea what power consumption or case size the 25GHs and 50GHs units will come in, ...

Yes we do have an idea. Look at products.butterflylabs.com

Or do you imply that BFL puts inaccurate pictures on their product page?

[Newscastix]

Just give up and stop your trolling, you and I have no idea what power consumption or case size the 25GHs and 50GHs units will come in, ...

Yes we do have an idea. Look at products.butterflylabs.com

Or do you imply that BFL puts inaccurate pictures on their product page?

They have been inaccurate before. A month ago the jalapeno looked different...

[k9quaint]

So it's real consumption for the ASIC is probably closer to 28watts. So the BitForce 25 GH/s SC will probably come closer to 145watts rather than your 216watt claim.

And the Single SC, which was advertised with 60GH/s, has now what? 50GH/s? 40GH/s? 0GH/s?

It is still advertised with 50GH/s, so let's take 50.

According to your calculation the 25GH/s unit needs 145 Watt. So the 50GH/s needs 290 Watt.

Both units have the same casing.

So this tiny heatsink dissipates 290 Watt of heat? LOL.

Just give up and stop your trolling, you and I have no idea what power consumption or case size the 25GHs and 50GHs units will come in, all we know so far is about the 5GHs unit, the rest is pointless speculation, silly pictures, and bad math.

How is it trolling to take the product page at butterflylabs and deriving the power needs of the product line from the latest claims put forth by BFL?
That just seems like math. Of course, this math is only of interest to nitwits who invested in BFL (since their debt notes are convertible into things called SCs or Singles or Jalapenos.)

[Marrs]

Except it's not. When you add in even 100w for a laptop, then plug in 10 BFL singles, suddenly that laptop only uses an extra 10w per single. There's no point to have 10 different hard drives, 10 wifi modules, etc. all of that can be taken care of with 1 mini computer (~$150 for a new one, running at ~50w with either windows or Linux).

Also, of you've only got 1 unit, run it off a RPi, and that only consumes, what, 10w or something rediculus? You could probably find a way to mount the Pi inside the jalapeño, and cut a hole out the back for Ethernet & additional power cord. Would certainly be an interesting project.

This is true, except I think the laptop and RPi power consumption numbers you're using are too high.

The currently unused netbook that I'm planning to use with my Single uses 12W at max draw, and under 8W when the screen is off, which will be most of the time, and a RPi uses about 2.1W under CPU load.