It has been amazing the amount of engineering talent that has surfaced over the last
several months to produce Bitcoin mining hardware. Personally, it's been a little
frustrating to see things move so fast that most part-time/hobbyist engineers like myself
are forced to the sidelines. Still very anxious to contribute something that doesn't
become meaningless before it is finished. I'm convinced that an "open source Hardware
enclosure standard" could be a first great step in creating synergy between the efforts
of the many engineers that frequent this forum and be useful for the many years to
come.
Background:At this point there appears to be emerging two main mining hardware approaches:
1) A few large expensive packages that milks the silicon die for every last hash
it's worth. (e.g. KNC, BFL, Cointerra, etc.)
2) Many small and cheap packages that run the silicon die near peak energy
efficiency. (e.g Bitfury, Coincraft, Avalon, etc.)
The first approach requires alot more consideration for heat dissipation which may add
additional cost. A GPU form factor makes much since on many levels IMO because of all
the supporting hardware and enclosures readily available. See Mr Teal's example:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=304250.0The large array of efficient ASICs has the potential of becoming the long term winning
solution IMO especially for those that live in hotter climates with expensive electricity.
https://bitmine.ch summed it up perfectly:
"
Do you think that fitting the highest possible number of hashing units into a single,
500+ GH/s silicon die is the best solution? We don’t. Real life experience have shown
that the highest performance, lowest total system cost and greatest scalability are
achieved by large arrays of small and cool ASICs..."
https://bitmine.ch/?page_id=863This case enclosure standard will cater more to the "large arrays of small and cool ASICs".
Proposal/Thoughts:4U 19" Wide x 19" to 24" Depth. What is a good depth?
ATX12V PSU over a server PSU. Thoughts?
Port holes for a RPi and/or a Black Beagle Bone
3 fans in the front.
Please help make this a success. I'll be glad to work with anyone interested. For This
project, I plan to just help coordinate the efforts of those willing to get involved.
Thanks.
Some Case Examples:
