The Chili – 30+GH/s BFL based Bitcoin Miner Assembly

[nexus99]

Is ok or better to buy twin 2 turbo Arctic

Well, at the same price I think the Twin Turbo 2 is a better deal, but the Mono Plus is nice for us in test because it's a little smaller. There's probably not a whole lot of difference though.

I have some Twin Turbo 2's on the way for my boards. I'll post up pics for everyone when everything is on hand.

[nexus99]

Anyone know the screw size to attach PCI brackets to the cards?

[MrTeal]

Anyone know the screw size to attach PCI brackets to the cards?

It depends on the PCI bracket. The Keystone 9203 is 4-40, but the hole on the board is large enough to accept 6-32s.

[oldbushie]

Would M3's be ok to use for mounting horizontally or are those too small? I need to bulk order some of those and I'm thinking of just just screwing some standoffs+spacers into the board and resting the spacers on top of a sheet of metal for protection.

[ChipGeek]

Edit: Also, are fan power connectors built into these boards? Or will I need to connect them directly to the ATX power supply somehow?

Yes, there are 3 fan connectors on the board:
2 are the type for CPU or motherboard case fans and
the other one is for a GPU cooling fan.

NOTE:  You should only use 2 of these at at time.  Besides, if you use the GPU cooler connector, you will probably NOT be able to use either of the other 2 CPU fan connectors because the GPU heatsink will get in the way.

So the practical answer is:
You can use the 1 GPU fan connector   -OR-
You can use 1 or 2 of the CPU fan connectors.   
(But not all 3.)

[dtown]

How's testing going?  Any final numbers on hash rate per 8-chip chili?  Any bad boards or chips?

[MrTeal]

How's testing going?  Any final numbers on hash rate per 8-chip chili?  Any bad boards or chips?

Testing is ramping up, and I'm happy to say the first units are out the door. I would expect that a lot more will be moving out tomorrow and Wednesday.
As for bad boards and chips, not as far as I am aware. We did have an issue with a couple shorts in the first 10 made before the assembly house made a change on the solder stencil, but those were reworked and are now good. Additionally I don't think there have been any chips that have failed outright, although we did lose two somewhere. One of us is now stuck with a 6 chip board until the assembly house finds the two that fell off the pick and place machine and reworks them back onto the board.

[Spieder]

Any plans on batch 2 boards?

[MrTeal]

Any plans on batch 2 boards?

Yeah, we're going to start taking orders for those right away. We just need to confirm with the assembly house when we can get our next spot in the line, and how much extra it will cost us given that batch two will be considerably smaller than batch one.

[Keefe]

Is there a way for us to guess how close we are to the front or back of the batch 1 shipping queue? Is that determined only by when we paid the $300 for the board? I don't know if you're expecting to ship all batch 1 boards over just a few days or a couple weeks.

[MrTeal]

Is there a way for us to guess how close we are to the front or back of the batch 1 shipping queue? Is that determined only by when we paid the $300 for the board? I don't know if you're expecting to ship all batch 1 boards over just a few days or a couple weeks.

We're estimating 2 weeks™.

Seriously though, we should be through shipping in the next couple days. We'll honestly probably be bottlenecked by getting all the units packaged and sent off (we both work 9-5 jobs after all), but we absolutely don't want this to take any longer than it needs to. ChipGeek and I aren't getting our units until everyone else has shipped (other than keeping SN# 0001 and 0002 for sentimental reasons), so we have a lot of motivation to get these out the door.

[Dagger75]

Is there a way for us to guess how close we are to the front or back of the batch 1 shipping queue? Is that determined only by when we paid the $300 for the board? I don't know if you're expecting to ship all batch 1 boards over just a few days or a couple weeks.

We're estimating 2 weeks™.

Seriously though, we should be through shipping in the next couple days. We'll honestly probably be bottlenecked by getting all the units packaged and sent off (we both work 9-5 jobs after all), but we absolutely don't want this to take any longer than it needs to. ChipGeek and I aren't getting our units until everyone else has shipped (other than keeping SN# 0001 and 0002 for sentimental reasons), so we have a lot of motivation to get these out the door.

Nice   

[Keefe]

Just for everyone's info: I ordered the Hyper 212 EVO coolers from bitcoinstore.com and they shipped them the same day from Bloomington CA so I received them the very next day. The price was an unbeatable $27.94 each including shipping. Compare to Amazon at $33.24.

It's actually (a little bit) cheaper at Amazon when you include taxes+shipping (which are already included at Amazon)

Ah, apparently BitcoinStore charges a flat $4.99 for shipping of orders under $100, otherwise free. And the prices have changed, now $29.32 at BitcoinStore and $32.68 at Amazon. So if price is all that matters, buy from Amazon if buying just one of these coolers. BitcoinStore is cheaper for 2 or more, and they probably ship faster than Amazon's free shipping method. Just trying to help my favorite bitcoin merchant. 

[Keefe]

Is there a way for us to guess how close we are to the front or back of the batch 1 shipping queue? Is that determined only by when we paid the $300 for the board? I don't know if you're expecting to ship all batch 1 boards over just a few days or a couple weeks.

We're estimating 2 weeks™.

Seriously though, we should be through shipping in the next couple days. We'll honestly probably be bottlenecked by getting all the units packaged and sent off (we both work 9-5 jobs after all), but we absolutely don't want this to take any longer than it needs to. ChipGeek and I aren't getting our units until everyone else has shipped (other than keeping SN# 0001 and 0002 for sentimental reasons), so we have a lot of motivation to get these out the door.

Awesome!

Will we get tracking numbers before delivery? I'd hate to be away from the house when it arrives.

[MrTeal]

Is there a way for us to guess how close we are to the front or back of the batch 1 shipping queue? Is that determined only by when we paid the $300 for the board? I don't know if you're expecting to ship all batch 1 boards over just a few days or a couple weeks.

We're estimating 2 weeks™.

Seriously though, we should be through shipping in the next couple days. We'll honestly probably be bottlenecked by getting all the units packaged and sent off (we both work 9-5 jobs after all), but we absolutely don't want this to take any longer than it needs to. ChipGeek and I aren't getting our units until everyone else has shipped (other than keeping SN# 0001 and 0002 for sentimental reasons), so we have a lot of motivation to get these out the door.

Awesome!

Will we get tracking numbers before delivery? I'd hate to be away from the house when it arrives.

Yes, I'll email/pm tracking numbers once we ship them.

I know the timing sucks, but both jborkl and I have a few of these clearance coolers on order.
http://store.antec.com/Catalog/ProductDetails.aspx?ProductPath=kuhler-shelf/0-761345-77081-1
I am not sure they will work yet (I should know tomorrow), but if they do that's another option if you're looking for lowest cost.

[Keefe]

Who will need an adapter kit for the Hyper 212 EVO?

I expect to have all the pieces in hand tomorrow (Tuesday), for 25 kits, of which I'll keep 8 for myself. My kit will include screws, spacers, metal and nylon washers, all specifically chosen to properly mount the Hyper 212 EVO to the Chili board at the proper height without shorting anything, and repurposing the too-tall stock standoffs to support the unit horizontally such as on a shelf. The kit will not include the cooler itself, or the thermal pad which can be bought from FrozenCPU. The Hyper 212 EVO, and probably any other Socket 1155 cooler, is only designed to fit boards with an existing backplate and a chip die 7.8mm off the board. The Chili board will not have an existing backplate and the chip dies will be just 1.2mm off the board. I'll try to make some pictures tomorrow.

EDIT: Actually, I have more thermal pad than I need, so could include the 11W/mK pad in 10 of the kits.

[MrTeal]

BATCH 2 NEWS
OP Updated. We're going to start accepting orders for batch 2 in the next couple days. Unfortunately the price will be a little higher (~17%) than it was before due to a variety of factors (smaller batch size leading to less economy of scale, unexpected costs affecting our price (online suppliers apparently having a presence in TX and charging us tax, programming and test taking much more time than planned and driving up costs) and additional overhead as the average order size is lower), but we should be ready to go pretty shortly. I am working through my backlog of people interested in batch 2, and I should be done by tomorrow.
I'm trying to hit everyone, but if you've emailed (mrtealasic@gmail.com) or PMed me here and I don't get back to you by 6pm board time tomorrow, send me another message. I seem to get a couple new pages of PMs a day so some can get lost in the shuffle I'm afraid.

[shmadz]

<snip>

The Hyper 212 EVO, and probably any other Socket 1155 cooler, is only designed to fit boards with an existing backplate
<\snip>

Can you confirm that the EVO does not come with backplate?

 

In this image of the included hardware it does appear to include a backplate. (source = http://www.coolermaster.com/product/Detail/cooling/cpu-air-cooler/hyper-212-evo.html)

Thanks.

[Bargraphics]

<snip>

The Hyper 212 EVO, and probably any other Socket 1155 cooler, is only designed to fit boards with an existing backplate
<\snip>

Can you confirm that the EVO does not come with backplate?

 

In this image of the included hardware it does appear to include a backplate. (source = http://www.coolermaster.com/product/Detail/cooling/cpu-air-cooler/hyper-212-evo.html)

Thanks.

The Hyper 212 Evo is a good cooler to use this with Chili, although the included mounting hardware does make it a little difficult to use. I would recommend using these spacers instead of the supplied ones
http://www.mcmaster.com/#95947a310/=oridfb
and screw them in with some M3x10mm screws
http://www.mcmaster.com/#92005a120/=oribhm

[MrTeal]

<snip>

The Hyper 212 EVO, and probably any other Socket 1155 cooler, is only designed to fit boards with an existing backplate
<\snip>

Can you confirm that the EVO does not come with backplate?

It does come with a backplate, that's the funky looking thing in the top right of the picture labeled "All-in-one Mounting Solution"