Official FutureBit Apollo BTC Software/Image and Support thread

[jstefanop]

@jstefanop is there any reason (except maybe the sleekness of the device) to use the GPIOs? Maybe better hashrate?
For keeping the device's sleek design, but allowing users to run own OS, it might be cool to offer the GPIO connection software as a package to install!

I don't know for sure, but this must be for aesthetics only. Everything fits under miner skirt. No extra USB cable required.
Hashrate is the same in both cases, I've tried that, no differences in performance. Functionality also seems to same, hashrate readings, speed, fans, temps, power use.
So feel free to give your Full unit a USB cable so you can install system of your choice. You can always revert to Futurebit system if you don't like it, by reformatting SD card and removing USB cable.

No coms through GPIO or USB is the same. Unfortunately the GPIOs require kernel level changes to make coms work with the board, so its not an easy change. Main reason is for ease of use. Most people buying our device are new to mining so a plug and play all in one solution was the main design choice (we were debating having a separate controller (remember the KNC days , but this is way more cleaner and easier to use).

[1715229477]

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[1715229477]

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[n0nce]

@jstefanop is there any reason (except maybe the sleekness of the device) to use the GPIOs? Maybe better hashrate?
For keeping the device's sleek design, but allowing users to run own OS, it might be cool to offer the GPIO connection software as a package to install!

No coms through GPIO or USB is the same. Unfortunately the GPIOs require kernel level changes to make coms work with the board, so its not an easy change. Main reason is for ease of use. Most people buying our device are new to mining so a plug and play all in one solution was the main design choice (we were debating having a separate controller (remember the KNC days , but this is way more cleaner and easier to use).

Thanks a lot! Is the GPIO protocol anything 'special' or just internal USB? Because if it was, maybe someone can come up with a kernel patch to apply to an arbitrary Debian or other Linux installation

[NotFuzzyWarm]

Just do a simple search using 'GPIO protocol' and you will find

GPIO isn't really a 'protocol'. It is a rudimentary form of communication where you manually (in code) turn a pin on and off or read its state. Each port on the Tessel exposes three GPIO pins that can serve as a digital input or output and are marked as G1, G2, and G3.

Think of it as a modern version of the LPT parallel port that used to be used for printers which is also pin addressable.

Very good info about it is here: https://www.ics.com/blog/introduction-gpio-programming  A key bit from that is

By design it has no predefined purpose and can be used by the hardware or software developer to perform the functions they choose. Typical applications include controlling LEDs, reading switches and controlling various types of sensors.

[n0nce]

Just do a simple search using 'GPIO protocol' and you will find

GPIO isn't really a 'protocol'. It is a rudimentary form of communication where you manually (in code) turn a pin on and off or read its state. Each port on the Tessel exposes three GPIO pins that can serve as a digital input or output and are marked as G1, G2, and G3.

Think of it as a modern version of the LPT parallel port that used to be used for printers which is also pin addressable.

Very good info about it is here: https://www.ics.com/blog/introduction-gpio-programming  A key bit from that is

By design it has no predefined purpose and can be used by the hardware or software developer to perform the functions they choose. Typical applications include controlling LEDs, reading switches and controlling various types of sensors.

Oh yes, sorry for the bad wording! I know what GPIO is, used those pins on Raspberry Pi projects a lot myself already. What I meant to ask was with which protocol data is transmitted over those pins in the case of the Apollo unit.
As you said, in theory, it could be anything; from I2C to SPI to USB or anything else really.

[kano]

...
Thanks a lot! Is the GPIO protocol anything 'special' or just internal USB? Because if it was, maybe someone can come up with a kernel patch to apply to an arbitrary Debian or other Linux installation

I can only guess they used some special library, that's completely unnecessary.

If you look at the 2 SPI GPIO drivers I've done in cgminer (bab and minion) there's no necessary special drivers at all.

They were done on ... RPi ... (and I moved the minion driver to another device with minor changes as can be seen in the code)

Edit: the first one (bab) was a BitFury board

[rosic1]

Can anyone recommend a good PSU to use to run 2 LTC and 2 BTC miners? Right now I'm using the Futurebit power supplies and one blew up on me so I'm looking to replace and consolidate.

[NotFuzzyWarm]

Can anyone recommend a good PSU to use to run 2 LTC and 2 BTC miners? Right now I'm using the Futurebit power supplies and one blew up on me so I'm looking to replace and consolidate.

sigh....
What are the model numbers or better yet, how much power does each one need? We're not psychic and there are many different miners that all use different amounts of power...

[n0nce]

...
Thanks a lot! Is the GPIO protocol anything 'special' or just internal USB? Because if it was, maybe someone can come up with a kernel patch to apply to an arbitrary Debian or other Linux installation

I can only guess they used some special library, that's completely unnecessary.

If you look at the 2 SPI GPIO drivers I've done in cgminer (bab and minion) there's no necessary special drivers at all.

They were done on ... RPi ... (and I moved the minion driver to another device with minor changes as can be seen in the code)

Edit: the first one (bab) was a BitFury board

Thanks you very much kano! So the assumption here is that this unit uses SPI as well? Once I get my unit, I'll try to get it running with GPIO and cgminer directly. We actually established these use BitFury chips right? So bab might even work out of the box? We'll see!

(bitfury info from here)

[jeyzeus]

Can anyone recommend a good PSU to use to run 2 LTC and 2 BTC miners? Right now I'm using the Futurebit power supplies and one blew up on me so I'm looking to replace and consolidate.

I've been using Dell 03MJJP + a power supply adapter a guy makes on eBay. I'm running a full package + 2 standard units at around 370W on Eco with absolutely no issues. It does get a bit loud if you overclock to turbo+ it but still relatively quiet.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/234213412917
https://www.ebay.com/itm/294446940004

How long did you use the futurebit power supply for and how was the damage? I was planning on using my extra ones with some GekkoScience stuff.

[kano]

...
Thanks a lot! Is the GPIO protocol anything 'special' or just internal USB? Because if it was, maybe someone can come up with a kernel patch to apply to an arbitrary Debian or other Linux installation

I can only guess they used some special library, that's completely unnecessary.

If you look at the 2 SPI GPIO drivers I've done in cgminer (bab and minion) there's no necessary special drivers at all.

They were done on ... RPi ... (and I moved the minion driver to another device with minor changes as can be seen in the code)

Edit: the first one (bab) was a BitFury board

Thanks you very much kano! So the assumption here is that this unit uses SPI as well? Once I get my unit, I'll try to get it running with GPIO and cgminer directly. We actually established these use BitFury chips right? So bab might even work out of the box? We'll see!

(bitfury info from here)

No, the bab driver is for early BitFury boards (circa 2013-14)
My point was that there's no special libraries for either of the SPI cgminer drivers I wrote, that run on the RPi,
so I'm wondering what is locking down doing linux security upgrades in the apollo ... which is especially concerning since it's an internet device.

[n0nce]

No, the bab driver is for early BitFury boards (circa 2013-14)
My point was that there's no special libraries for either of the SPI cgminer drivers I wrote, that run on the RPi,
so I'm wondering what is locking down doing linux security upgrades in the apollo ... which is especially concerning since it's an internet device.

Oh right, makes sense. I don't know - they (or someone from the community? not sure) made it sound like it was something quite involved, which relies on some dependencies that break when updating the OS. Since your software proves it's possible to implement in a way that isn't affected by security updates, it's quite weird that the Apollo OS behaves like this.

I'm myself not comfortable running a non-updateable machine connected to the internet and sitting in my home network. So I will either install a stock Linux OS and connect the miner via a short USB cable (maybe make a custom one so it's not too in the way), or put in the time to figure out if it's possible to modify one of your drivers to communicate with the thing via GPIO

I'm not sure we will get an official answer though; the NDA they have seems quite restrictive, since any low-level-ish questions in this thread in general, were never answered.

[rosic1]

Can anyone recommend a good PSU to use to run 2 LTC and 2 BTC miners? Right now I'm using the Futurebit power supplies and one blew up on me so I'm looking to replace and consolidate.

I've been using Dell 03MJJP + a power supply adapter a guy makes on eBay. I'm running a full package + 2 standard units at around 370W on Eco with absolutely no issues. It does get a bit loud if you overclock to turbo+ it but still relatively quiet.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/234213412917
https://www.ebay.com/itm/294446940004

How long did you use the futurebit power supply for and how was the damage? I was planning on using my extra ones with some GekkoScience stuff.

It's from a batch 2 ltc unit, I think it's 2 years old or so. It looks like it had some kind of surge. The wires are toasted and the connectors on the power supply and miner are both destroyed.
Thanks for the recommend on the Dell power supply.  I tried a server one from HP, but it was just too loud for my environment.

[rosic1]

Can anyone recommend a good PSU to use to run 2 LTC and 2 BTC miners? Right now I'm using the Futurebit power supplies and one blew up on me so I'm looking to replace and consolidate.

sigh....
What are the model numbers or better yet, how much power does each one need? We're not psychic and there are many different miners that all use different amounts of power...

Given that this is a FutureBit thread, and I said the models LTC and BTC, I thought it was self explanatory what miners I'm using.  Given that the FutureBit power supplies are 200watts, I'm looking at an 800-1000 watt replacement.

[mutatrum]

Can anyone recommend a good PSU to use to run 2 LTC and 2 BTC miners? Right now I'm using the Futurebit power supplies and one blew up on me so I'm looking to replace and consolidate.

I'm running 3 BTC hash boards on balanced mode on a be quiet! Dark Power 12 750W, in single rail mode. I mainly selected on modularity and number of cables. It had enough cables to power the 3 boards, so with one extra cable I could add one more hash board, it's not close to max power.

[CIVIoney]

FAQ

Q: I updated the system and now my Apollo won't boot
A: DO NOT UPDATE THE OS THROUGH THE SYSTEM UPDATE PROMPTS Even though the Apollo is a full linux desktop, its still an embedded system with multiple system level changes to make it work with our proprietary hardware attached to it. If you do a system level OS update these will be whipped and you will end up with a bricked system, requiring a full SD card reflash using the stock image. Any system/kernel level updates will issue here with updated SD card images.

Hi Everyone,

I recently bought a FutureBit Apollo BTC. Upon setting up, I was prompted to do updates and I didn't think anything of it and proceeded. It seems I immediately bricked my new system
This is my first venture into mining so I'm quite a bit bummed at the moment. Although I'm more tech savvy than the average person, I don't have the knowledge on how to fix this. Could anyone help me understand how to do a full SD card reflash using the stock image in order to get back to working order?

Appreciate anyone's guidance.

[Muppet007]

FAQ

Q: I updated the system and now my Apollo won't boot
A: DO NOT UPDATE THE OS THROUGH THE SYSTEM UPDATE PROMPTS Even though the Apollo is a full linux desktop, its still an embedded system with multiple system level changes to make it work with our proprietary hardware attached to it. If you do a system level OS update these will be whipped and you will end up with a bricked system, requiring a full SD card reflash using the stock image. Any system/kernel level updates will issue here with updated SD card images.

Hi Everyone,

I recently bought a FutureBit Apollo BTC. Upon setting up, I was prompted to do updates and I didn't think anything of it and proceeded. It seems I immediately bricked my new system
This is my first venture into mining so I'm quite a bit bummed at the moment. Although I'm more tech savvy than the average person, I don't have the knowledge on how to fix this. Could anyone help me understand how to do a full SD card reflash using the stock image in order to get back to working order?

Appreciate anyone's guidance.

Apollo BTC SD Card Image/OS Download and Install

Folder for all Apollo BTC Image Releases: https://mega.nz/folder/ZlxnwYZb#ZN77cDAcXa6dN_2QKSdT_Q

Release 7/31/21

d6f820869268383883db4741dcfcade8f57ad1a1c20c359fd7a3015c78ffe3dd  apollo-btc_310721.img.xz

-Updated Apollo UI to latest 0.3.1
-Image no longer wipes SSD if it detects it has already been formatted
-Added additional swap memory to prepare for Lightning network/block explorer apps
-System level fixes/tweaks for stability


Initial Release 5/14/21

c5dfeb7812e43df64fac2fd4dbc929ec7c78f6df513bed0d8aba81a6573bec7e  apollo-btc-14-05-21.img.xz



SD Card Flash Instructions:

Download image linked above, verify SHASUM is correct
Decompress the image (should have just a .img extension when its done full size ~7GB when decompressed)
Use an easy cloner tool like etcher (etcher.io) or dd etc if your know what your doing
Insert SD card in your computer, select the the decompressed apollo.img file, and select the SD card you inserted
Flash away...this will return your SD card back to stock state

[Optimalsunshine]

Have two issues.

1) Can only set one pool.

2) All but 1 of my units have stopped working after trying to change the the miner settings. I have tried setting eco, balanced and even advanced with power from min to 45%. Only  One unit will work when I make these changes but the rest will not function at all. Even the main controller will not function with no unit connected and shows the default config with default pool.
 
Update: I was able to now get some units working again by connecting each one to the USB 1 port and booting the units individually. All but 1 of the units are now working. I will try connect the still bad unit to a PI and run it on its own.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Start them up and leave them be for 10-15 minutes. They will start up eventually. As long as you see the front LED start flashing slowly it will show up in the dashboard.

Solid RED led after startup and one flashing green led on the board, on the last unit that will not run, seems to be bricked.

If I connect this unit to the full unit/controller nothing loads on the miner page and the page defaults back to original default page, shows slushpool, no stats load.

Ok if it does not start flashing at all when you do stop or restart on the miner dashboard then that means the system does not see it at all. Shoot an email to us by replying to your order email and well go over some other troubleshooting steps.

I just received the full unit with power and a standard unit with power -- i'm having this exact issue and could really use help.  The full unit with power started up with Red LED flashing, and showed up quickly on the dashboard, no issues.  When i started up the standard unit with its own power source, the red LED light never flashed, it only came on solid, and the fan never started up.  On the back side, there's a solid red light and one green small flashing light, but there's no fan going and it never appeared on the dashboard.  I am not at all (at ALL) technically savvy, and i'm afraid to do anything with this standard unit over concerns of interrupting or killing the main unit that is working .  If ya'll have any advice or could provide specific action steps I would greatly appreciate it!  Thank you!

[cd1177]

My full unit and 2 standards have ran great for a couple months.  couple restarts here and there.  today they quit hashing and it won't let me log into the dashboard.  i powered them down and back on, still nothing and it's not hashing.  the red lights are all blinking like normal though?  ideas?

[jeyzeus]

My full unit and 2 standards have ran great for a couple months.  couple restarts here and there.  today they quit hashing and it won't let me log into the dashboard.  i powered them down and back on, still nothing and it's not hashing.  the red lights are all blinking like normal though?  ideas?

when you power everything down, are you also closing firefox / the web browser? i noticed that sometimes if i leave it open and reboot, it will try to open the previous tab I had open upon turning the computer back on. if you had it on /stop then it might be getting stuck there.

try closing all the windows prior to turning it off so it starts a "fresh" session upon reboot. idk if that would fix the issue but i had something similar and hilariously that actually fixed it.

[rosic1]

Can anyone recommend a good PSU to use to run 2 LTC and 2 BTC miners? Right now I'm using the Futurebit power supplies and one blew up on me so I'm looking to replace and consolidate.

I'm running 3 BTC hash boards on balanced mode on a be quiet! Dark Power 12 750W, in single rail mode. I mainly selected on modularity and number of cables. It had enough cables to power the 3 boards, so with one extra cable I could add one more hash board, it's not close to max power.

Perfect, exactly what I'm looking for. Thank you!