Themaltake Toughpower 1200W Gold burnup after 30 hours powering Avalon A6

[Yuna517]

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The Bitmain APW3 supply looks ok and seems to be a reasonable price. Anyone had any issues with them? By the time I factor in getting the HP DPS1200 supply, PCIe cables and either a breakout board or time to solder the pigtails straight to the connector, the price seems to be quite good.

My current two HP power supplies were out of a decommissioned server at work, so free.

Go for the Bitmain PSU's. I used to use the HP's and yes even have a few IBM 2Kw PSU's but for the same reasons you mentioned (hassle factor) I started using the Bitmain ones soon after they came out a few years ago. Have a couple dozen of them now and zero problems ever.

NFW - what about for those of us in 110/120v land? I'm ordering an Avalon 741 am trying to find the absolute best PSU for it. I saw the EVGA 1300w suggested in a post by canaan on their website, but is there something more miner-specific and better suited like the bitmain but for 110/120v w/ an A741? I know the HPs/Sidehack are a great option but there seem to be better options? having a couple dozen w/ zero problems ever must be preetty nice..

[NotFuzzyWarm]

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NFW - what about for those of us in 110/120v land? I'm ordering an Avalon 741 am trying to find the absolute best PSU for it. I saw the EVGA 1300w suggested in a post by canaan on their website, but is there something more miner-specific and better suited like the bitmain but for 110/120v w/ an A741? I know the HPs/Sidehack are a great option but there seem to be better options? having a couple dozen w/ zero problems ever must be preetty nice..

Well, without using an industrial rated 240-120v transformer (and losing about another 3% eff) the only real choice is Bitmains APW5. It works on 108-120v for de-rated max of 1,600w as I recall. Price is actually on-par with high-end ATX PSU's so in my book, worth it.

[fanatic26]

Theres tons of server grade psus for pennies all over ebay and other places. Find the pinouts, spend 30 minutes building a harness, and all of a sudden you have a really nice power supply for half the price of a single bitmain unit. You dont power industrial mining gear with low end ATX power supplies and expect it to just work like magic. If you arent a DIY kind of person then honestly the mining game isnt for you.

[philipma1957]

Theres tons of server grade psus for pennies all over ebay and other places. Find the pinouts, spend 30 minutes building a harness, and all of a sudden you have a really nice power supply for half the price of a single bitmain unit. You dont power industrial mining gear with low end ATX power supplies and expect it to just work like magic. If you arent a DIY kind of person then honestly the mining game isnt for you.

not many will do 1200 watts on 120 volts.

diy won't help if he has a 120 volt limit.

he has a few atx options that is about it.

[fanatic26]

not many will do 1200 watts on 120 volts.

diy won't help if he has a 120 volt limit.

he has a few atx options that is about it.

Then you buy two PSUs and run one board each with them while still costing less than a bitmain and being way more reliable and able to keep up with the duty cycle of a 24/7 miners way better than an ATX psu.

You can buy HP/Dell/SuperMicro server PSUs that clock in around the 700-800w range for under $10 each if you do a bit of looking around. Throw in $10 in cables and you have MORE than enough power for an Avalon for under $40 total. The Dells you dont even need to solder, you can just use female spade connectors and glue them into place.

Pretty sure that still falls under the DIY criteria and meets the 120v limit while costing about a third of what you would pay for a bitmain or ATX psu. When ROI is a big concern with miners, I would think you would want to save money while increasing reliability whenever possible and this does both.

[NotFuzzyWarm]

Well, you could always strap 2 of the fairly cheap HP's together. Just make sure they are switched on with a common switch. DO NOT JOIN THE DC OUTPUTS TOGETHER unless of course you know how to wire them for 1+n parallel operation. I did that long ago for some of my s5's -- all sent to Sidehack to be reincarnated as 2Pac's after hosting there became unprofitable.

On 108-120v they are good for 800-900w each. Since the Avalon has 2 boards in the miner that should work perfectly. Again I must stress DO make sure it is 1 PSU for just 1 board.

[Yuna517]

thanks for the advice all. i'm comfortable with DIY, but I don't really want to strap 2x PSU together for my first machine. I think I will just get the EVGA G2 as this is my very first miner and I have nothing but 110-120v to use at the moment.

Once the bug invariably bites, I'll get a 30amp 240v circuit and THEN, i'll get a server PSU or apw3+ for each miner, since i'll only need 1 @240 instead of 2 @110-120. sound sensible?

do you think the apw3+ is slightly overkill for an a741?

also do you recommend one specific 1200w HP over another? there are several with slightly different product numbers but all appear to be suitable.. DPS-1200*FB* seems to be the most common? suggestions? also.. do you use a breakout board for the conversion or some other way? i should have the a741 by next week

[HagssFIN]

Among the server power supplies, my recommandation for the Avalon 721 or 741 is HP DPS 1200 FB.
Sidehack here at the forum has them, packed with the breakout board and PCI-E cables.

In ATX PSU area EVGA is a good choice.

Bitmain APW3 is also pretty reliable choice.

[NotFuzzyWarm]

<snip>
do you think the apw3+ is slightly overkill for an a741?

also do you recommend one specific 1200w HP over another? there are several with slightly different product numbers but all appear to be suitable.. DPS-1200*FB* seems to be the most common? suggestions? also.. do you use a breakout board for the conversion or some other way? i should have the a741 by next week

No it is not overkill. In fact 1,1600w is a perfect size to keep near the 80% rating butter-zone. While server supplies are perfectly happy to run at full load 24x7x365 in warm/hot ambient temps their efficiency does drop off a bit as you go above the 80-85% load mark. Mostly from the fans kicking into hair-dryer mode and running at full speed.

As for HP DPS supplies:
a) they are available with from Plus-80 bronze (poor eff) up to Titanium (best) so check what the seller says they are. By and large the price will follow how good the efficiency rating is. There *is* a HP DPS Common Slot product guide out there that covers the entire rather sizeable number of types.

b) Initially I hard-wired the supplies using multiple 10ga leads ending in spliced on PCIe connectors,2 PCIe per-heavy lead.





Later used a couple brreakouts from GigAmpz. After futzing with around a dozen of the HP's and a few IBM 2kw's finally said 'screw it' and went with the Bitmain PSU's from then on. Once the s7's came out the HP's were maxed and replaced with the APW3's Most of the HP's were donated to Sidehack along with the s5's.

edit: found the product guide https://www.hpe.com/h20195/v2/GetPDF.aspx/c04111541.pdf

[Yuna517]

great! thanks for the info!