Building Cheap Miners : My "Secret"

[greyday]

So you're pulling 600 h/s on your i7? What needs to be changed in the config or CPU file . . . I'm only pulling in 250, I didn't mess around with any of the low power settings, it's still on the stock "false" -

It's the low power setting. Instead of false, try out a multiplier. Changing mine to 5 pumped me from 140 to 359...

EDIT: Also, and this may be a linux or Iris specific thing, but (at least on the i5) doing the suggested change to sudo vi /etc/security/limits.conf dropped my start from 359 to 320, and eventually my hashrate dropped to 180. Commenting it out brought everything back to 359 and stable, so I suggest testing it if you want, but it doesn't seem necessary (if you are still getting locked RAM messages, I was able to get rid of them by sudo running the miner, but I don't think they had an effect on hashrate)

Also, just fyi, setting the low power setting to 5 upped my consumption a wopping 3W. So 140-200h/s was around 40W, and 359 is around 43W. While the ROI on the i5 model is much, much slower, for low power/low heat setups, the return is pretty great.

[Juggar]

Hmmm, according to Intel, the 5575r chip is CAPABLE of hyperthreading. I wonder if there's a driver that can enable it?

Dude no its not....

https://ark.intel.com/products/87714/Intel-Core-i5-5575R-Processor-4M-Cache-up-to-3_30-GHz

4 cores/4 threads.


Historically, desktop i5's have never had hyperthreading. Only the mobile variants that were dual core had hyper threading. Even today, the 6 core i5 8600k has 6 cores/6 threads.

I dont know what you are talking about with a "driver" enabling "hyperthreading". I wonder if any of you have ever really dealt with CPUs prior to this.

[greyday]

Hmmm, according to Intel, the 5575r chip is CAPABLE of hyperthreading. I wonder if there's a driver that can enable it?

Dude no its not....

https://ark.intel.com/products/87714/Intel-Core-i5-5575R-Processor-4M-Cache-up-to-3_30-GHz

4 cores/4 threads.


Historically, desktop i5's have never had hyperthreading. Only the mobile variants that were dual core had hyper threading. Even today, the 6 core i5 8600k has 6 cores/6 threads.

I dont know what you are talking about with a "driver" enabling "hyperthreading". I wonder if any of you have ever really dealt with CPUs prior to this.

Feel free to wonder! I hope it makes you feel all warm inside.

I was going off an intel document about this specific processor that said hyperthreading was enabled (though the same document said a max of 4 threads, which is just plain confusing). My i5 mac mini and my i5 macbook pro both have hyperthreading.

[nsummy]

I suppose its my turn to contribute something.  If you are into Cryptonight mining, which it sounds like a few of you are, check out this Gigabyte mini-pc for $250:  https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16856164036

You won't be adding any graphics cards (unless you are using eGPUS) but this thing will hash at 614 H/S.  You might be wondering how its possible to get that kind of performance out of a cpu with a 6 mb l3 cache.  The game changer is that this processor has an embedded Iris Pro GPU with a 128 MB L4 cache.  XMR-Stak recently included an optimization to take advantage of this cache space.  It should ROI itself in 2.5 months.  You have to provide your own ram and HD, but it does come with a wifi card so you could put this thing anywhere.

Ok, I picked up and set up one of the 5575rs (identical to the 5775, just i5 instead of i7). Out of the box and just using xmr-stak with the energy saver off, I'm getting around 200-202 h/s, which is not great but not bad. I haven't figured out how to enable support for the Iris Pro yet, still working on that, but I'm feeling pretty confident I can get it up significantly...

EDIT: ok, not exactly identical, it's 2.8-3.3ghz and 4mb l3 instead of 3.3-3.8 and 6mb l3, but I still think I can get it up much higher than 200h/s

If it has an Iris pro then the L3 size is irrelevent.  The issue you will run into though is that the I5 only have 4 cores and no hyperthreading.  To take full advantage you need 8 threads.  Make sure for the low power setting you are putting in 5.  you should probably be in the 300s

So you're pulling 600 h/s on your i7? What needs to be changed in the config or CPU file . . . I'm only pulling in 250, I didn't mess around with any of the low power settings, it's still on the stock "false" -

Correct.  When I ran it with the default settings out of the box I think I got around 250 also.   Here is my cpu.txt:


"cpu_threads_conf" :
[
    { "low_power_mode" : 5, "no_prefetch" : true, "affine_to_cpu" : 0 },
    { "low_power_mode" : 5, "no_prefetch" : true, "affine_to_cpu" : 1 },
    { "low_power_mode" : 5, "no_prefetch" : true, "affine_to_cpu" : 2 },
    { "low_power_mode" : 5, "no_prefetch" : true, "affine_to_cpu" : 3 },
    { "low_power_mode" : 5, "no_prefetch" : true, "affine_to_cpu" : 4 },
    { "low_power_mode" : 5, "no_prefetch" : true, "affine_to_cpu" : 5 },
    { "low_power_mode" : 5, "no_prefetch" : true, "affine_to_cpu" : 6 },
    { "low_power_mode" : 5, "no_prefetch" : true, "affine_to_cpu" : 7 },

],

In most situations you wouldn't mine using the hyperthreads let alone affine to them, but I think this low power mode must be less cpu intensive at the cost of more memory.

In /etc/security/limits.conf  I also added the following 2 lines:
* soft memlock 262144
* hard memlock 262144

and in /etc/sysctl.conf added:
vm.nr_hugepages=128


Proof:

[nsummy]

Hmmm, according to Intel, the 5575r chip is CAPABLE of hyperthreading. I wonder if there's a driver that can enable it?

Dude no its not....

https://ark.intel.com/products/87714/Intel-Core-i5-5575R-Processor-4M-Cache-up-to-3_30-GHz

4 cores/4 threads.


Historically, desktop i5's have never had hyperthreading. Only the mobile variants that were dual core had hyper threading. Even today, the 6 core i5 8600k has 6 cores/6 threads.

I dont know what you are talking about with a "driver" enabling "hyperthreading". I wonder if any of you have ever really dealt with CPUs prior to this.

Feel free to wonder! I hope it makes you feel all warm inside.

I was going off an intel document about this specific processor that said hyperthreading was enabled (though the same document said a max of 4 threads, which is just plain confusing). My i5 mac mini and my i5 macbook pro both have hyperthreading.

You can get desktop I3s  with hyperthreading, but the thing is they are only dual core.  As are the mobile I5s.  Basically if you want 4+ cores AND hyperthreading, it has to be an I7.  I could be wrong but I think there was a period when intel was cranking out I5s that were basically I7s with lower clocks and hyperthreading disabled.

[nsummy]

I suppose its my turn to contribute something.  If you are into Cryptonight mining, which it sounds like a few of you are, check out this Gigabyte mini-pc for $250:  https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16856164036

You won't be adding any graphics cards (unless you are using eGPUS) but this thing will hash at 614 H/S.  You might be wondering how its possible to get that kind of performance out of a cpu with a 6 mb l3 cache.  The game changer is that this processor has an embedded Iris Pro GPU with a 128 MB L4 cache.  XMR-Stak recently included an optimization to take advantage of this cache space.  It should ROI itself in 2.5 months.  You have to provide your own ram and HD, but it does come with a wifi card so you could put this thing anywhere.

Ok, I picked up and set up one of the 5575rs (identical to the 5775, just i5 instead of i7). Out of the box and just using xmr-stak with the energy saver off, I'm getting around 200-202 h/s, which is not great but not bad. I haven't figured out how to enable support for the Iris Pro yet, still working on that, but I'm feeling pretty confident I can get it up significantly...

EDIT: ok, not exactly identical, it's 2.8-3.3ghz and 4mb l3 instead of 3.3-3.8 and 6mb l3, but I still think I can get it up much higher than 200h/s

I've got the i7 version, and I'm only getting 250 H/s. You're right though, it is a zippy little thing.

You said you've got it working off USB? Are you using win2go or something like that? I tried it on a rig that was using a G4400 and it was just way too laggy and slow.

Hash aside, I actually like it. Made me look into the Intel NUC version, nice and slim. 3x the price but I might I like it so why not.

I'm using Lubuntu, did an install to a 32gb usb3 drive. Since it's mostly going to be mining, I kept it a pretty minimal install.

I think the key to better hashrates lies in the SDK for OpenCL from Intel. Problem is you have to sign up first, and it can take up to 2 days before they send you a link to the files. There is a Windows version as well.

Also I deleted and reinstalled xmr-stak and now am getting 140h/s. Gonna have to figure out why THAT is...

 

This doesn't use opencl or the gpu.  It only uses the extra L4 cache that happens to come with the Iris gpu.

[Juggar]

Hmmm, according to Intel, the 5575r chip is CAPABLE of hyperthreading. I wonder if there's a driver that can enable it?

Dude no its not....

https://ark.intel.com/products/87714/Intel-Core-i5-5575R-Processor-4M-Cache-up-to-3_30-GHz

4 cores/4 threads.


Historically, desktop i5's have never had hyperthreading. Only the mobile variants that were dual core had hyper threading. Even today, the 6 core i5 8600k has 6 cores/6 threads.

I dont know what you are talking about with a "driver" enabling "hyperthreading". I wonder if any of you have ever really dealt with CPUs prior to this.

 My i5 mac mini and my i5 macbook pro both have hyperthreading.

And they both use mobile CPUs which have always followed the doctrine of "Dual core + hyper threading".

[greyday]

 My i5 mac mini and my i5 macbook pro both have hyperthreading.

And they both use mobile CPUs which have always followed the doctrine of "Dual core + hyper threading".

Fair enough! Just what I was basing the possibility on...

And to be fair, if you saw how tiny these things are you'd be forgiven if you thought they might have mobile versions of the cpus in them.

[greyday]

You can get desktop I3s  with hyperthreading, but the thing is they are only dual core.  As are the mobile I5s.  Basically if you want 4+ cores AND hyperthreading, it has to be an I7.  I could be wrong but I think there was a period when intel was cranking out I5s that were basically I7s with lower clocks and hyperthreading disabled.

I wouldn't doubt that for a second. But both my macbook and my imac are dual i5s with 4 threads total. My i7 server and i7 rig are both 4 with 8 threads. These little boxes are actually my first experience with this gen of computing that DOESN'T have hyperthreading (other than my rigs built with super cheap celerons)...

[greyday]

nsummy I am WAY jealous of those numbers. But for around $310 total and drawing 43W for 360h/s, I'm content enough (though if I buy any more, I would hold out for the i7s for SURE).

[ephraim_90]

thanks for this Tip mate, i am now thinking of buying materials like this. mining is great this days i am sure it will be profitable. keep sharing and more power.

[VyprBTC]

nsummy I am WAY jealous of those numbers. But for around $310 total and drawing 43W for 360h/s, I'm content enough (though if I buy any more, I would hold out for the i7s for SURE).

Yeah those numbers are nice. I can't get those on windows, it will bounce to 550, then rapidly just drop down to 250. Very weird.


I also tried installing linux but it was an epic fail. I have no clue how to deploy xmr-stak on linux. I'm sure someone would have gotten a laugh seeing me trying to navigate through it all knowing zero about linux lol.

Ah well.

[greyday]

nsummy I am WAY jealous of those numbers. But for around $310 total and drawing 43W for 360h/s, I'm content enough (though if I buy any more, I would hold out for the i7s for SURE).

Yeah those numbers are nice. I can't get those on windows, it will bounce to 550, then rapidly just drop down to 250. Very weird.


I also tried installing linux but it was an epic fail. I have no clue how to deploy xmr-stak on linux. I'm sure someone would have gotten a laugh seeing me trying to navigate through it all knowing zero about linux lol.

Ah well.

Try commenting out the memory thing (I posted about it previously, can't remember it this second but it's one of the steps suggested in the guide). That solved that same problem for mine.

EDIT TO ADD: here it is: this may be a linux or Iris specific thing, but (at least on the i5) doing the suggested change to sudo vi /etc/security/limits.conf dropped my start from 359 to 320, and eventually my hashrate dropped to 180. Commenting it out brought everything back to 359 and stable, so I suggest testing it if you want, but it doesn't seem necessary (if you are still getting locked RAM messages, I was able to get rid of them by sudo running the miner, but I don't think they had an effect on hashrate)

[Amstellodamois]

http://www.ebay.fr/itm/PC-Gigabyte-Brix-GB-BSi7HA-6500-Intel-Core-i7-6500U-2x-2-50GHz-GB-BSi7HA-6500/152714522870?hash=item238e7eb0f6:g:SW0AAOSw8-xZ2AHF

Minimal since it has no GPU assist w/ only Intel HD video and not Iris Pro w/ 128mb of RAM.

Thanks! Is there something in the product number that says "Iris Pro thingy"?

i7's that have Iris are
5950HQ
5850HQ
5750HQ
5755C
5775R

i5's that have Iris are
5675C
5675R
5575R

There is more to the list than this
There are a bunch of Skylake processors with them:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skylake_(microarchitecture)#Mainstream_and_high-end_desktop_processors
Along with Haswell:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haswell_(microarchitecture)#Desktop_processors

Additionally some of the Xeon E3 V4 processors have it: https://www.anandtech.com/show/9532/the-intel-broadwell-xeon-e3-v4-review-95w-65w-35w-1285-1285l-1265

I couldn't find any CPU that would work on an ATX mother board, am I mistaken?

And the cheapest mini PC I could find on eBay was over 400€ used.

That $250 newegg thing was a steal!



EDIT : If you're in the UK, you might want to follow this auction.

[sundownz]

Since I have all this heat being generated... we "sealed" off this portion of the warehouse to keep it in the area for the winter.

Surrounding areas can be ~10-20 degrees and it'll stay 60-70 degrees in here simply with the plastic we hung. May consider a permanent wall & adding additional heat extraction (for the summer).

We moved some of our employees into the corner opposite the computers so they aren't so cold this winter =)

[Amstellodamois]

They're not gonna like you in the summer...

[Juggar]

http://www.ebay.fr/itm/PC-Gigabyte-Brix-GB-BSi7HA-6500-Intel-Core-i7-6500U-2x-2-50GHz-GB-BSi7HA-6500/152714522870?hash=item238e7eb0f6:g:SW0AAOSw8-xZ2AHF

Minimal since it has no GPU assist w/ only Intel HD video and not Iris Pro w/ 128mb of RAM.

Thanks! Is there something in the product number that says "Iris Pro thingy"?

i7's that have Iris are
5950HQ
5850HQ
5750HQ
5755C
5775R

i5's that have Iris are
5675C
5675R
5575R

There is more to the list than this
There are a bunch of Skylake processors with them:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skylake_(microarchitecture)#Mainstream_and_high-end_desktop_processors
Along with Haswell:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haswell_(microarchitecture)#Desktop_processors

Additionally some of the Xeon E3 V4 processors have it: https://www.anandtech.com/show/9532/the-intel-broadwell-xeon-e3-v4-review-95w-65w-35w-1285-1285l-1265

I couldn't find any CPU that would work on an ATX mother board, am I mistaken?

Yeah you are mistaken. There are plenty aval that will work on any Z97 or H97 mobo provided the BIOS is up to date and supports those CPU's per manufacturer.

If one had like 50 Z97/H97 mobos, they could make a killing. Unfortunately you need mobo, ram, HDD/flash drive and PSU. But I can still stomp that $250 Brix deal into the dust with what ive found.

[sundownz]

They're not gonna like you in the summer...

We'll move them back out to the other areas in the summer ;-)

But yes it was HOT in there in the summer.

[Calatravo]

So, the conclusion of all the benchmarks I've read is: find an architecture that uses an AMD CPU

Yes and no.  If you are talking about modern desktop processors, Ryzen wins out, the main reason being because it includes the SHA instruction set.  Probably the Epycs on the server side too, but they have barely released those to the market.  If you are interested in making a run at mining cryptonight the best bet is to find an old server on ebay with multiple xeon chips in it (The HP DL580 G7 was mentioned earlier in the thread).   The rub with the Ryzen chips are that the motherboards are expensive.

My HP DL580 G7 with 4 x E7-8837 does about 1600H/s on cryptonight.

how much power from the wall? thx

[PharmEcis]

Spinx,

I tried to send you a PM but you don't accept them from noobs like me.    I'm hoping you might be able to give me some advice.  I'm having some problems getting my DL580 to boot w/ the 8837 chips installed.  I fired her up and let her sit for 20 minutes but while on, it never booted.  I also didn't get any error codes on the LCD indicator on the board, just 00.  Did you have to do anything special to get the CPUs to work?  I've read about some incompatibility problems based on board revisions etc.  I've also read something about updating the CPLD.

Any advice you have would be great.

Thanks!