Update:
Hosting:
The hosting setup is now complete, with all units stable and hashing. We have had to overcome several obstacles during the setup phase. Mainly, the lack of chaining ability, lack of serialization, much greater power usage, and increased thermal dissipation requirements have delayed the process and necessitated a redesign of the hosting configuration.
We had hoped to be able to daisy-chain the units as per the original design in order to reduce the amount of cables and hubs required. Unfortunately, the firmware is still missing this functionality. This does not affect the cluster performance, but did result in slight delays bringing the cluster online due to difficulty finding compatible hubs which were stable, with enough ports to connect the units.
Our original intent was to assign each unit to its corresponding customer in order to track payouts. As this is no longer a possibility due to the lack of individual serial numbers, we have chosen to configure the cluster and payouts as a pool, with each account receiving a percentage of the payouts based on the number of units owned. This setup does however cause a situation in the event one of the units becomes non-functional. To address this, we will be physically labeling each device with a unique customer number. In the event a unit breaks and cannot be fixed, the owner of that unit will be notified. In order to mitigate losses due to a unit failure, we will be replacing the first 5% of the total hosted units with our own, at no additional charge. Once 5% of the total hosted units have been replaced, any future failures will be the responsibility of the owner.
The estimated power requirements for each unit were 30-35 watts. The units are currently consuming more than 50 watts at 282mhz, or 4.5gh/s. This increase is largely due to the 1.2v regulators chosen in the design. The increased power usage also greatly increases the temperature for the regulators, which causes the units to shut down if they overheat. The regulators require low ambient temperatures and direct airflow in order to overclock the units. We are currently testing different cooling designs, and are increasing the amount of active cooling available in order to overclock the units, but are having difficulties due to the amount of units, and subsequently the amount of cooling required. In addition to the on-board fans, we have several fans blowing A/C directly across the units and funneling the heat away, and have greatly increased the spacing to reduce the amount of heat from adjacent units. This is keeping the temperatures low enough that the regulators do not shut down, which requires a power disconnect and cooldown period before power up, but is currently limiting the units to 4.5 gh/s. We hope to increase this to a minimum of 5gh/s shortly.
We will be processing payments for hosting for the first period shortly, and after each subsequent difficulty change thereafter. The first payment will be for the difficulty periods beginning November 5th and November 17th. While the cluster was not at 100% until recently due to setup and testing, payouts for these periods will be based on 100% uptime with a hashrate of 4.5gh/s. We will also be waiving the hosting and electrical fees for these periods. The power consumption per unit is 75 watts, which includes the units themselves and the infrastructure necessary to house and cool them. The electricity cost for each period will be calculated using the Coinbase USD/BTC exchange rate at the end of each period.
Assembly:
It is with a heavy heart we report the resources for full time development of the USB bootloader and I2C daisy-chain functionality have been exhausted. We have been working tirelessly with our partners and a third party engineering firm to complete the design where it was left off, which has proven unsuccessful. In light of this, we will be packaging and shipping all remaining units in the next couple of days. We will continue to work on it as time and resources allow, and our partners have announced they will be doing the same. Bkkcoins has mentioned he has completed the bootloader code, but has not released it to-date.
Assembly refunds:
With assembly, troubleshooting, coding, shipping and hosting setup drawing to a close, we can now begin processing refund requests. We apologize for the extended delay. Our initial role in this project was to design the accessory hardware, source components, assemble, and ship units based on the Klondike design. Due to circumstances outside our control, we were forced to rapidly assume much greater responsibility in the troubleshooting and testing phase of the project, which strained our resources to their limits and forced us to triage certain services. Thankfully, several members of the community and our partners stepped up to assist us in completing the project, without whom it is uncertain if we would have succeeded. I would like to personally thank Cray-1, Droid, Fasmax, Imagex, Jasinlee, Jimrome, Kano, Kostagr33k, Laserhorse, Pcb355, Ryepdx, Sensei, Stbgefltc, Unacceptable, Vigil, Zipiju, our team, and everyone else who assisted with this project. Their expertise, dedication, and countless hours of work were invaluable throughout this project.
During the course of providing this assembly service, we received payments through our website in BTC, which was converted to USD and subsequently used in fulfilling our obligations. An explanation of these expenditures may be found in the assembly refund section of post
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=192916.msg3128451#msg3128451. Since that time, we have continued work finalizing and troubleshooting the design, and assembling, testing, and shipping the units; in addition to setting up hosting for those customers who purchased the service. As a result of extended delays due to an incomplete design, troubleshooting, poor chip performance, and canceled orders, our original cost estimations have proven inaccurate. While the circumstances surrounding this project were largely outside our control, and could not have been realistically anticipated, we felt it our responsibility to do everything in our power to see the project through to the end.
Very little of the funds received remain to process refund requests. We understand our announcement of a 25% refund of assembly costs, and 100% of the shipping and hosting fees played a large part in our customer’s decision to request a refund. This announcement was not made lightly, and we knew there was a high probability the funds received would not be sufficient to cover refund requests should anything go wrong. Unfortunately, we have experienced the worst case scenario, as evidenced by the extreme difficulties surrounding the project. We had decided then that we would fund the balance for refunds should the need arise, and we will honor this decision. The refund will include 25% of the assembly costs, and 100% of the shipping and hosting fees, as well as 100% of the assembly fees for those customers that purchased the Fully Assembled unit finish option.
The unit cost and payment were priced in USD. This was necessary as while we would like the vendors we work with to accept BTC, that time has not yet come. As such, the refunds will be processed based on the USD price of the units, and remitted in BTC. While we are not responsible for fluctuations in the exchange rate, we have chosen to lock the rate to that of Sept. 11th, the day we announced we would be accepting assembly refund requests, in order to attempt to help ease the BTC losses of our customers. The exchange rate will be $126.61 per BTC, based on the price history of Coinbase.
We have been working with developers on designs for a new unit using more efficient chips. Of the designs commissioned, only one has met the initial requirements. We had originally chosen to build a unit which gave us the highest overclock potential using the Bitfury chips. Unfortunately, the component and manufacturing costs of the design are too great to be competitive. We are in the process of reworking the design to be more efficient without attempting to push the chips past their nominal operating specs, which should reduce the price of the units to a level more in line with current offerings. We do not know if this redesign will be successful, or it’s timeline for release.
We have been working with the assembly house and their consignment company to determine the best approach to sell the remaining component stock should we be unable to reuse them in a future design. The majority of the components were purchased through various parts brokers, and cannot be returned. Their optimistic return estimate is 40% of the price we paid via consignment, and only a fraction if we were to accept a lump sum payment. We are also preparing to sell those portions of the accessory components with resale value in order to recover as much as possible, but will likely only be able to recoup a small percentage of those costs as well.
In the event we are unsuccessful in developing a new product which utilizes the components on hand, we will sell the remaining stock, which will then be remitted in BTC based on the USD/BTC exchange rate at that time. The timeline for this process is still unknown.
All those that purchased chips and assembly and have had their chip purchase refunded are eligible for and will receive the assembly refund. We will be processing the refunds over the course of the next few weeks. Please continue to be patient with us during this process, as it will take time.
