Hey guys.
Ok, time to address recent discussions that have been taking place here. I have been gobbled up by work deadlines lately but I've got a minute now to write some responses. I’m going to do all this in one post to save putting up a million posts.
Any plans for a "full kit" type miner that does not require a USB connection ?
No. These miners will still need a computer to run them. The computer can be anything, any platform. As others have mentioned, you could get a Raspberry Pi to run it if you want a compact mining set up.
What cooling is needed for the board?
The board will run fine on its own. That said, once you start overclocking the chips, you will be looking at a lot more heat and cooling will become an issue. Basically, the cooler the better. A fan running along the length of the board will do a lot. From there you could look at heatsinks and liquid cooling. We are looking into heatsinks potentially being prebuilt into the board, or more likely being an optional addon. More on this when we get to it.
Any plans for a "full kit" type miner that does not require a USB connection ?
Buy a Raspberry Pi like everyone else does.
I intend to use my old Dell Mini 9.
5~6W at idle with networking and the screen off, and
~7W with light browser usage and the screen always on but at minimum brightness. Not too shabby for x86 and a first gen Atom on 945GM.
We are also looking at a standalone GUI to give you direct control over various parts of the board, allowing you to easily adjust voltage and overclocking of the chips.
Barntech
Any word on what platform this software will run on? Windows and/or linux? x86 and/or ARM? Or will it simply rely on cgminer to make those adjustments? I'm just curious as I've never had any luck getting GPU vCore settings for my HD7950's to stick in cgminer. Always needed to use Afterburner/Trixx.
The GUI idea is something we will get to if we have time. In the meantime though, the board and firmware will be built to run using Cgminer, which is cross platform, so you will be good to run this miner on pretty much any system.
That would be unrelated, GPUs use the ATI library and if the ATI library doesn't support something, that is ATI's fault.
The extra programs that allow you to avoid the ATI limitations indeed are custom and not OS independent, the ATI library is.
In cgminer I talk directly to the USB devices and can use any USB control necessary as required by the firmware
e.g. in the BitBurner we use control transfers to set and get the voltage and that's available via the API also at any time while cgminer is running
However, regarding cgminer support, I've no idea ... I'm awaiting a reply from Barntech
I’ve just written a response to Kano and the ball is rolling regarding Cgminer support. Will keep you all updated with our progress.
Is my math off, or this this much more expensive than from megabigpower or bitfurystrikesback?
I’d say your maths is off. Please see this post for details.
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=266235.msg2924259#msg2924259
Why does the first post still say: "shipping prices to be updated shortly"?
If I order through PayPal will shipping prices be automatically added?
No, if you order from Paypal, the shipping prices won’t be automatically added. Shipping will be sorted out down the track.
The reason the first post still says shipping will be updated shortly is because I just haven’t had time to get the shipping details sorted out yet. Turns out to be quite time consuming running a project like this. That said, I WILL get the shipping details up in the next week. In the meantime I have been quoting people a rough guess of $50 - $100 for shipping, but this will depend on quantity and type of shipping.
if it is designed to be used with raspberry pi are we going to have instructions on how to run these boards?
I never used a raspberry pi before i am interested in learning how to use one
The boards are not specifically designed to run with a raspberry Pi, that would be rather odd. A raspberry PI is essentially a small computer. By all means, go out there and learn how to use one. They are cool. By as someone else mentioned, that’s another topic for another forum thread.
That's just comparing individual chips though. Comparing the more important ratio, hashes per dollar:
BitFury 400G: 400GH/s for $8000 = 50.0 MH/s per dollar (Rasp Pi included in price)
Drillbit Board: 16GH/s for $300 = 53.3 MH/s per dollar (plus the cost of the host computer)
So not that different really. Plus you don't have to fork out a whopping $8k straight away. The power efficiency of the 400GH/s rig is also a bit lower than the Drillbit boards, moreso when you compare using the more power efficient stock 2GH/s rating of the Bitfury chips, rather than 2.7GH/s.
It is great, the value in MH/s per $. The problem we will all be facing is the difficulty level. 3 of the best/deepest predictions are looking at a December difficulty of 200 million, some as high as 500 million.
If you consider the compounding of the difficulty, the ONLY way to break even is if the price goes higher.
http://www.coinish.com/calc/#I do think the price is going higher, very much so by the charts and buy sizes the last month or so. (Large players are moving in - big buys.)
I'm looking hard at the Drillbit system. Lot of bang for the buck.
In terms of GH / $ ratio, The Drillbit system is pretty solid compared to other offerings out there. On the difficulty front, yes its quite scary whats going on there. There’s nothing much we can do about that other that make sure we get these boards hashing as quick as possible, which is of course, the general plan
Nice jobs for the Drillbit board!! it is beauty, would you do a picture of hook up of the 4 board for better understanding?
it is interesting to have more clearing picture on it. Hope this request will not bring too much work load.
+1
I cannot see the connector for the other boards (top port?) on the model you just shown up. I can find the backplane port, the power plug, and the USB port. So I cannot figure out how the "stack" of 4 board looks like.
The ASIC board has 3 ports built in. The top port on the first board takes a data distribution board - like the FPGA board in the Avalon miner, only much, much simpler. It comes included with the initial purchase of a DrillBit board so you are ready to start mining as soon as you get it, nothing more required. But when you want to add more hashing power, this is where the DrillBit system really shows its advantages over other systems. If you want to double your hashrate to 43.2GH, just get another ASIC card and plug it into the bottom port of the first card. Its that simple. No big strings of USB hubs, no messy cables or setup changes. The data distribution card automatically registers the extra ASIC card and operates accordingly. Up to 4 cards can be stacked in this way.
This is not very clear to me. Could it be that one board is different from the others? Are there different models of "8 chips boards"? If so, I need 4 "first boards" for my 16 boards order.
OK, so there have been some recent developments to the board design. What we will probably going with now is making the 4 stack happen by way of a ‘mini backplane’ rather than connectors built into to each boards, basically this will be a more streamlined approach. So if you want to stack 4 boards you will get 4 boards (like the one you see in the picture) and a mini backplane to link them all together. The mini backplane will come free with any purchase of 2 or more boards. The other potential design variation will be connecting multiple mini backplanes to create larger stacks, either as well as, or in replacement for the large 16 board backplane. The functionality will be the same with these changes, just looking at a different implementation.
Is there a working prototype yet? If so, do you have a video of it hashing?
No, there isn’t a working prototype yet. Where we are at currently is that the proto boards have gone off for manufacture and will be back in about a week. From there we will be assembling and testing. Trust me, when there is something to show off I will be showing it off.
Ok, that covers most of it. Sorry that was a mega post. Congratulations for making it this far. I have not responded to certain things because good responses were already given.
A couple requests, In the future, if your question is specific to your order, please PM me instead of posting here. Let’s try to keep this forum for discussions that pertain to everyone.
Cheers.
Barntech
