Official FutureBit Apollo II/BTC Software/Image and Support thread

[MrMik]

My wifi has a complex password with spaces and special characters and it wouldn't connect for me either. I ended up changing to a password with no spaces or special characters and it worked. You could try that if it applies to your situation.

My WiFi PW is complex but no spaces

[btctotoro]

Anyone run into issues where the unit goes to sleep if you 'lock' the computer? If I leave it unlocked and just turn my monitor off, I don't run into connectivity issues.  But, after a few hours if I 'lock' the computer, unit loses connection to the internet in some capacity and the result is that my miner stops delivering hash to slushpool.  Anyone else run into this issue?  I don't see anything in the settings that would change this result when 'locking' the computer.

[MrMik]

You can test this with the -fan_pwm_hi 1 parameter. That will force the PMW controller to not output anything and make the fan either not spin or spin at its lowest speed possible.

How do I do this test? With the Standard or the Full Package?

I assume I will have to open a terminal while the Full Package Apollo is connected via HDMI to a monitor.

Then type

Code:

./apollo-miner -fan_pwm_low 1 -fan_pwm_hi 1

But what is the <rest of parameters> ? Or do I just enter the above line?

And what do I type in afterwards to get rid of 'Oh, the spirits I called...' ?
To set the same parameters as the Auto Fan Settings 'ON', do I have to type the following?

Code:

./apollo-miner -fan_pwm_low 40 -fan_pwm_hi 60

[PakoTor]

Hi guys,
my Apollo runs on Antpool for a while then randomly switch to this Futurebit pool.

URL: btc.viabtc.com:3333    Username:  portforwarded.futurebit

Once a day or 2 this will happen.
Anyone else experienced this?
Thanks

[MrMik]

Hi guys,
my Apollo runs on Antpool for a while then randomly switch to this Futurebit pool.

URL: btc.viabtc.com:3333    Username:  portforwarded.futurebit

Once a day or 2 this will happen.
Anyone else experienced this?
Thanks

Looks like you are not the only one:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5340015.msg61325163#msg61325163

[n0nce]

Is anyone here familiar with how to set up the apollo on wifi? I tried to connect the miner to the back of my router just so I could access the dashboard but when I put the password in for the wifi, it wouldn't work.

Assuming that you used a Ethernet cable for that: In that case you are not connecting to the WiFi and that password might be wrong.

To connect to Wifi you need to have a display going. You could use a computer monitor or a TV and connect the Apollo with a HDMI cable.

No, you could use the Ethernet connection and a different device on the network to set up WiFi, then disconnect the Ethernet cable and it should switch over to WiFi.
However, I don't think WiFi is generally very good on the Apollo. There have been reports of people having issues with it. One idea I had was to 'route' the Orange Pi 4's antenna outside of the metal casing, which may act like an RF shield and weaken reception.

Anyone run into issues where the unit goes to sleep if you 'lock' the computer? If I leave it unlocked and just turn my monitor off, I don't run into connectivity issues.  But, after a few hours if I 'lock' the computer, unit loses connection to the internet in some capacity and the result is that my miner stops delivering hash to slushpool.  Anyone else run into this issue?  I don't see anything in the settings that would change this result when 'locking' the computer.

If you have a standard unit and the host (PC) goes to sleep / lock, it will definitely stop the miner. No way around that; that's where SBCs or full unit come in handy. They keep the hashboard busy at minimal overhead in electricity / power draw.

But what is the <rest of parameters> ? Or do I just enter the above line?

I already said on the last page that the parameters are explained in start_apollo.sh.

The start_apollo.sh script actually includes a ton of comments for customization and tuning.
https://github.com/jstefanop/Apollo-Miner-Binaries/blob/main/linux-aarch64/start_apollo.sh

You should also be able to execute ./apollo-miner --help for explanation of all parameters.
I think it's trivial to understand that the binary needs to know basic stuff like pool config and device port on the computer. Everything else should be optional. Though it's possible that you have to also set power params (-brd_ocp 60  -osc 40).

[MrMik]

One idea I had was to 'route' the Orange Pi 4's antenna outside of the metal casing, which may act like an RF shield and weaken reception.

The hole in the housing with 5V DC Out written below it works well for that purpose. I use a rubber cable gland to reduce risk of chafing the cable on the edges. I might design a 3D printable adapter for it if I get bored.

Would this antenna work better in a horizontal or a vertical position, or does it not matter?

[n0nce]

I might design a 3D printable adapter for it if I get bored.

Optimal would be to route the antenna connector to the outside - maybe to a more sturdy SMB connector, so that even better WiFi antennas such as used on routers and PCs could be screwed on.

Would this antenna work better in a horizontal or a vertical position, or does it not matter?

Vertical should be much better. The RF waves are like a donut. The center line is your antenna.



If the antenna was horizontal, the strongest reception would be above and below the antenna and not sideways - the direction in which they best propagate across a room / flat towards the access point.

[MrMik]

Vertical should be much better. The RF waves are like a donut. The center line is your antenna.



If the antenna was horizontal, the strongest reception would be above and below the antenna and not sideways - the direction in which they best propagate across a room / flat towards the access point.

Cheers!
That means that the stock antenna in the FP Apollo is located in the worst possible orientation and inside a Faraday cage. No wonder it did not work well before I put it outside of the housing!

It 'should' be (famous last words?  ) easy enough to make a part to hold it vertical just outside of the housing, and protect against yanking and chafing at the same time.

[MrMik]

But what is the <rest of parameters> ? Or do I just enter the above line?

I already said on the last page that the parameters are explained in start_apollo.sh.

Cheers, the penny finally dropped! I'll explain in case other beginners benefit from a 'For Dummies' explanation:

I falsely assumed that I could change the operating parameters while the Apollo (Full Node or Standard) is already running, like when changing the setting in the GUI of the Full Node Apollo.

But now it dawned on me that the full node Apollo does not respond to GUI settings changes while it is running either. The ASICs needs to be stopped and restarted before a change to the settings will occur.

For the change between ECO, Balanced and Turbo mode this fact is reflected in the "Save and Restart" button that needs to be clicked in the GUI, no option to misunderstand and not actually change the settings.

But for a change to the Fan temp settings, the Save button does not automatically do a restart. Next to the Save button is an explanation:"You need to save your settings to apply changes (miner won't be restarted)."
I think this could be worded better, what it means is "You need to save your setting to apply changes but you also need to restart the miner before the changes will take effect. The miner will not automatically restart."
Or, make it a 'Save and restart' button like for the Miner mode settings.

What the GUI in the Full Node Apollo does when settings changes are applied is this:
It writes a new line of parameters in the start_apollo.sh file. Everything the miner needs to know about how to operate needs to be in that one line of code (or it uses the default settings in the apollo-miner file).

Code:

./apollo-miner -host us-east.stratum.slushpool.com -port 3333 -user jstefanop.x -pswd x -comport /dev/ttyACM0 -brd_ocp 48  -osc 30 -ao_mode 1

When the 'Save and restart' button for the Miner mode (Eco, Standard, Turbo) is clicked, then the GUI will also stop the miner (I don't know how yet) and then it 'types'

Code:

sudo ./miner_start.sh

which starts the miner again, with the parameters specified in that one line of code (and all the defaults in the apollo-miner file).
Thereafter, the miner will stubbornly continue to run with these parameters. No changes are possible unless it is stopped and restarted with a new line of code saved in the ./start_miner.sh file.

So, if you want to change what a Standard Apollo does, you have to edit the line in the ./miner_start file and then start the miner by typing sudo ./start_miner.sh in a terminal (after changing directory to wherever that file is on your computer by using the cd command in that terminal).
You specify your mining pool and user name and password in that line so that it no longer points at jstefanop's pool, but at yours.

Then, if you want to change from Eco to Turbo mode, you change

Code:

-brd_ocp 48  -osc 30

to

Code:

-brd_ocp 75  -osc 50

And if you want to test the minimum speed of your miner fan (and risk frying it if you forget to turn it off again!), you add:

Code:

 -fan_pwm_hi 1

and restart it with that added part in that one line of code.


Here is the practical upshot for anyone who has continue to read all this: You don't have to edit that one line in the .sh file every time!

You can save the start_apollo.sh file (including any edits you have made) with a descriptive file name and then use

Code:

sudo ./start_DESCRIPTIVE-FILENAME.sh

to start your Standard Apollo with that set of parameters.

For example:

Code:

start_Apollo_Turbo_Auto-Fan_Slushpool_20221125.sh

or

Code:

start_Apollo_Turbo_NOFAN-DONOTUSE_20221125.sh

for the above example without fan , which would fry your miner if you let it run for too long!

So once you have figured out how to edit the .sh file, and you have tested the proper functioning of the Apollo when it runs with that file, you can save different versions and use them quickly without risking that you make a mistake in the gobbledigook code part. You could have different start_Apollo.sh files for Winter/Summer operation, or loud/quiet, or to quickly change mining pools.

[MrMik]

How should I turn off a Standard Apollo?

My assumption was to

Code:

sudo ./miner_stop.sh

but that does not actually turn it off,

although it seems to claim it has stopped:

Code:

 sudo ./miner_stop.sh
[sudo] password for yourstruly: 
./miner_stop.sh: line 14: screen: command not found
./miner_stop.sh: line 17: gpio: command not found
./miner_stop.sh: line 19: gpio: command not found
./miner_stop.sh: line 7: python: command not found
Stopped

What is going wrong here?

Assuming the lines referenced in the above output are these:
 

Code:

1#!/bin/bash
2
3 reset_hashboards()
4 {
5    while [ $1 ];
6            do
7            python -c 'import termios; termios.tcsendbreak(3, 0)' 3>$1
8            sleep .5
9           shift
10   done
11 }
12
13 #quit all mining proccesses
14 for scr in $(screen -ls | awk '{print $1}'); do screen -S $scr -X quit; done
15
16 #reset internal hashboard
17 gpio write 0 0
18 sleep .5
19 gpio write 0 1
20
21 #find and reset external hashboards
22
23 ports=$(ls /dev/ttyACM*)
24 reset_hashboards $ports
25
26 echo "Stopped"

[MrMik]

Some fans have a minimum RPM they won't go below, it depends on the fan revision/vendor. We had to source like 3-4 fan vendors during the pandemic all with slightly different fan controllers.

You can test this with the -fan_pwm_hi 1 parameter. That will force the PMW controller to not output anything and make the fan either not spin or spin at its lowest speed possible.

Tested it, thanks!

The fan is the type that will not run slower than about 1800rpm. I have double-tested this by connecting a different fan. An 80mm Noctua PWM fan will run intermittently, while the stock fan never goes below 1800rpm.

Could you please let me know which fan would be ideal for the Apollo ASICs ? I'm happy to buy some and replace them if they are now available.

I would like a high quality fan that can reach high speed and air flow when required, but turns off completely (or at least so slow that it is very silent) when the miner temperature is below the -fan_temp_low setting.

[PakoTor]

Hello,
i am using the braiins pool stratum+tcp://eu.stratum.braiins.com:3333 with my futurebit btc miner.
after some times, all my hashrate is forwarded to this pool : stratum+tcp://btc.viabtc.com:3333 username : portforwarded.futurebit
My miner is not corrupted and i see any changes in my configuration files. it's probably a men in the middle redirecting my url.
Any help please.

Still no fix for this?
Really annoying to pay that much to hash for Futurebit !!!
My pool never dropped using the standard unit in Linux terminal.
Only switch pool with the full node unit LAN or WAN no difference.
Please update with a Pool lock command or something FutureBit.
Thanks

[yojaf]

Hello,
i am using the braiins pool stratum+tcp://eu.stratum.braiins.com:3333 with my futurebit btc miner.
after some times, all my hashrate is forwarded to this pool : stratum+tcp://btc.viabtc.com:3333 username : portforwarded.futurebit
My miner is not corrupted and i see any changes in my configuration files. it's probably a men in the middle redirecting my url.
Any help please.

Still no fix for this?
Really annoying to pay that much to hash for Futurebit !!!
My pool never dropped using the standard unit in Linux terminal.
Only switch pool with the full node unit LAN or WAN no difference.
Please update with a Pool lock command or something FutureBit.
Thanks

i am still having the problem, the pool switch at least once a day, so i update manually the pool (remove and add the same url). we can't update the apollo to fix this problem for the moment!!

[n0nce]

That means that the stock antenna in the FP Apollo is located in the worst possible orientation and inside a Faraday cage.

That's correct!

Cheers, the penny finally dropped! I'll explain in case other beginners benefit from a 'For Dummies' explanation:
~snip~

That's all correct, too, thanks for writing such a detailed guide / explanation. Will bookmark it for future reference.

Could you please let me know which fan would be ideal for the Apollo ASICs ? I'm happy to buy some and replace them if they are now available.

I'm not an expert on fans, but I'd go Noctua (Industrial) or Delta (though those aren't known for being quiet, but certainly high-performance.. so may perform well at low-RPM, too).

I would like a high quality fan that can reach high speed and air flow when required, but turns off completely (or at least so slow that it is very silent) when the miner temperature is below the -fan_temp_low setting.

Does the stock fan continue running at 1800RPM even when it's set to 1% for any temperature (-fan_pwm_low 1 -fan_pwm_hi 1)?

Still no fix for this?

i am still having the problem, the pool switch at least once a day

Maybe try custom install... :/ This should be a software bug.
If you have a spare microSD, give my guide a try.

[MrMik]

Does the stock fan continue running at 1800RPM even when it's set to 1% for any temperature (-fan_pwm_low 1 -fan_pwm_hi 1)?

Some of them do, and all of mine do.

jstefanop mentioned that Futurebit had supply problems during Covid and had to source a number of different fans, so different Apollo's might have a different fan.

It is not necessary to use the Standard Apollo and command line interface in a terminal with

Code:

 -fan_pwm_hi 1

to verify which type of fan is in a specific Apollo. But it is very educational and I'm glad I started to stumnble down that path.

To easily test the capabilities if the miner fan in a Full Package Apollo the owner can simply set the Miner fan speed in the GUI of the Full  Package Apollo to something like 60c/65c and then restart the miner. The fan should then run at it's lowest possible speed, that could be 0 rpm or higher, until the miner temp reaches 60c.

[yojaf]

Maybe try custom install... :/ This should be a software bug.
If you have a spare microSD, give my guide a try.

i will, thanks

[MrMik]

Sounds like a cool project! Maybe consider making your own 'Modded-out Futurebit Apollo' thread once it's finished (or at least work-in-progress status) somewhere on here.

I started a new thread without direct mentioning of the Apollo hardware.

So if anyone is interested, follow me here: Worst case ASIC heat scenario

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5424883.new#new

[MikeDownUnder]

Hello,
i am using the braiins pool stratum+tcp://eu.stratum.braiins.com:3333 with my futurebit btc miner.
after some times, all my hashrate is forwarded to this pool : stratum+tcp://btc.viabtc.com:3333 username : portforwarded.futurebit
My miner is not corrupted and i see any changes in my configuration files. it's probably a men in the middle redirecting my url.
Any help please.

Still no fix for this?
Really annoying to pay that much to hash for Futurebit !!!
My pool never dropped using the standard unit in Linux terminal.
Only switch pool with the full node unit LAN or WAN no difference.
Please update with a Pool lock command or something FutureBit.
Thanks

Most likely you have you BTC directly connected to the Internet, maybe in a DMZ. In this case it is directly exposed and most likely compromised, like in about 5 seconds. It should sit behind a firewall/router with port forwarding only.

[williamsroller]

NEW Router and Apollo isn't showing up as "connected".  Everything looks like it's working...red light blinking, ethernet port on router green, etc. However, in the router dashboard the Apollo isn't showing up. Spectrum says that I need to call you guys, because the router is recognizing every other device that I have.  My Apollo was working fine until this router upgrade. Any suggestions?  I'd be grateful.

Thanks in advance to all.