ANTMINER S3+ Discussion and Support Thread

[faetos]

For some strange reason 2 out of my 5 Ant Miners require re-flashing every day to bring back up to stock speeds of 441 GH/s they appear to run stable for about 12 hours or so and then both just fall to circa 420 GH/s. I have tried everything, replacing the thermal paste, swapping around the PSU's, factory restart, reboot etc. The only thing that helps (For a short period of time) is if I flash the device again and again every 12 hours or so.
Has anyone else got any thoughts on what else I could do? Or do I just have 2 faulty units?

I've observed something similar with hashrates dropping to around 420 , however I also see hash rates of 460-470. Basically there's a 10% variance both + and -.
I now have 4 S3's and besides the faulty one now doing 229 the rest is up and running at 427 to 444.

I also have a dragon 1 Th/s miner and also this one shows a variance of up to 8% both up and down.
My observations after a week are that the hash rates somehow go up and down simultaniously. So if the Antminers are "slower' the Dragonminer seems to be slower as well.

Thanks, I guess I will just live with it, I suppose 40 GH/s is neither hear nor there anyway these days.

if you got multiple, it will average out: I also have one "underperformer" at ~415, but the other five perform above grade: 464 (one) to 478 (four) on 237.5, so average per miner is currently 465GH, which is good. However, it all would still go sour if BTC continues to tank.

Very True, What the hell is going on with the Bitcoin prices??? its in free fall!

It does this all the time. if panic = high; then buy coins

[1715539070]

1715539070

[Biodom]

I just noticed this on the bitmain site: https://bitmaintech.com/files/download/antMiner_S320140811.bin

The notes just say "added advanced frequency" which means there is an extra tab for overclocking in the miner configuration page...just flashed now thought I would give a heads up to you all  

Edit: in order for the frequency and firmware to work and not come up blank, I used the "save settings" box when flashing the firmware, then after the flash is complete and the miner has rebooted, go to the miner config/advanced tab and hit apply on the frequency you want (it defaults to 237.5 and no idea why 100 is in there), then hit apply on the main miner config page to be safe, then reboot the miner...works for me!

so, basically, on current miners (at least B4-7) 237.5 is a de facto default. I thought so....

[macgyver007]

I just noticed this on the bitmain site: https://bitmaintech.com/files/download/antMiner_S320140811.bin

The notes just say "added advanced frequency" which means there is an extra tab for overclocking in the miner configuration page...just flashed now thought I would give a heads up to you all  

Edit: in order for the frequency and firmware to work and not come up blank, I used the "save settings" box when flashing the firmware, then after the flash is complete and the miner has rebooted, go to the miner config/advanced tab and hit apply on the frequency you want (it defaults to 237.5 and no idea why 100 is in there), then hit apply on the main miner config page to be safe, then reboot the miner...works for me!

so, basically, on current miners (at least B4-7) 237.5 is a de facto default. I thought so....

I can't speak for batch 7 as its not even shipping yet and I only ordered batch 2,3,4,5, and 6, and batch 5/6 came with july 28 firmware which was nowhere to be found
The firmware defaults in the dropdown to 237.5 but I don't think its actually using that as when you check the miner status the frequency stays blank unless you do what I outlined above...and also it does not read the original asic-freq file for this dropdown list...haven't had time to see where its hiding now...yet.

[mjk79]

Seems like I got lucky with my two from Batch 6.

One is running stable 500+ gh/s at 250 freq. (46c, 45c)
The other stable at 490+ gh/s at 243.75 freq. Above that this one gets one chip X'd out. (44c, 45c)

Should I consider re-applying thermal paste on these to bring temps down or consider myself lucky and leave it alone?

[macgyver007]

Seems like I got lucky with my two from Batch 6.

One is running stable 500+ gh/s at 250 freq. (46c, 45c)
The other stable at 490+ gh/s at 243.75 freq. Above that this one gets one chip X'd out. (44c, 45c)

Should I consider re-applying thermal paste on these to bring temps down or consider myself lucky and leave it alone?

How long are you running at before you consider them stable? How are the errors? Have you tried using different power connectors or perhaps 2 on the malfunctioning blade? They seem to act up in the first 8 hours and still don't hash consistently between reboots..one boot is fine, the next errors and rejects  

[mjk79]

Seems like I got lucky with my two from Batch 6.

One is running stable 500+ gh/s at 250 freq. (46c, 45c)
The other stable at 490+ gh/s at 243.75 freq. Above that this one gets one chip X'd out. (44c, 45c)

Should I consider re-applying thermal paste on these to bring temps down or consider myself lucky and leave it alone?

How long are you running at before you consider them stable? How are the errors? Have you tried using different power connectors or perhaps 2 on the malfunctioning blade? They seem to act up in the first 8 hours and still don't hash consistently between reboots..one boot is fine, the next errors and rejects  

I tried other freq's yesterdy (225, 237.5, 250) for 2-3 hours each. With the current settings they've been running for about 7.5 hours.

HW errors are low, 19 and 11. I have all 4 power ports used currently on each so no I haven't tried moving any connectors yet.

I'll keep an eye on it for today, hopefully they will stay stable.

[Atomar]

I just did the firmware update. Everything seems OK so far. Except the Fan speed!
I set the freq. back to 218.75 and the fan shows allways 15300! And thats for shure not the case!

When it startet up right after the update, the fan was on 500 something. But that problem I had bevor the update also.
Has it something to do with the frequenzie ?

[Biodom]

Seems like I got lucky with my two from Batch 6.

One is running stable 500+ gh/s at 250 freq. (46c, 45c)
The other stable at 490+ gh/s at 243.75 freq. Above that this one gets one chip X'd out. (44c, 45c)

Should I consider re-applying thermal paste on these to bring temps down or consider myself lucky and leave it alone?

leave the good thing alone...if it works, it does so more or less stably.
I don't even want to try 250 that much, pretty content at 237.5, perhaps will try 243.75 later

[bluecityste]

So, S3+ at 0.58 Btc, seriously overpriced and probably make a loss unless they shipped 3 weeks earlier to give a possible ROI.

S1 upgrade kits, just LOL! 0.46 Btc, thats almost no difference despite the shipping being considerably cheaper and the amount of DIY that would have to be done to make one. Surely 0.4 Btc, i.e. a 30% discount on S3+ price would have been a more appropriate price point?

It's actually cheaper to sell the S1 and buy an S3+ rather than go the upgrade route.....crazy!!

[Biodom]

It's actually cheaper to sell the S1 and buy an S3+ rather than go the upgrade route.....crazy!!

I always suspected this to be the case, so I sold all my S1 just as I ordered/was getting S3.
0.58 BTC price wise is at the level with others, but Sept 20 shipping date is unfortunate (too far away).
S3 is pretty energy efficient and reduces risk (in case your machine is a rare bad one).

[danny3614]

someone offer antminer s3 for .53btc
is that good price?

[MrGreenHat]

Obviously I haven't been able to read all 260 pages of this thread, but I read some of the initial posts concerning people being unsatisfied with their over clocking speed. I just wanted to say that I have 6 units that I ordered from Batch 4 and I was surprised at how much extra hashing power I ended up getting from setting my frequency to 250 MHz (I guess because I saw so many complaints initially).
Each over clocked unit hashes ~490 GH/s, sometimes over 500 GH/s. Not to mention,  I am only using a single PCI on each hashing board.
Images:
http://awesomescreenshot.com/0373bdof49
http://awesomescreenshot.com/0de3bdpf03
http://awesomescreenshot.com/01c3bdq50e

[MoreBloodWine]

Well, as I start this reply it's 1:23pm.

I just OC'd all four of my S3's to 237.5, I have a dentist appointment at three. So after I hit the post button. I'm gonna do a single refresh on all four to see web stats. After that I'll let everything be til probably around 4pm when I get back. If everything looks good, I'll leave them all on 237.5 for 24hrs.

If after that, everything still looks good. Then about this time tomorrow or so I will take the proverbial plunge and try 250 on one of them for 24hrs. If that holds good, then I'll set the second at 250 and let run 24hrs, so on and so forth til I t all four on 250 if I'm lucky.

Between 237.5 & 250, is there any other freqs, I think I saw someone say 240 or something a few pages back.

[Biodom]

someone offer antminer s3 for .53btc
is that good price?

too low. lemon?

[philipma1957]

I have 8 Antminer S3 coupons.

Value:= 0.075

Looking  0.06 for each coupon.
 

Valid up to 16August
You can use also for S3+ and S1 Upgrade Kit.

This is why you still have them on August 14th...dream on .06 nobody is that stupid

well one can hope.  although at .03 they would sell

at morebloodwine

freq
 212.5
218.75
225
231.25
237.5
243.75
250
256.25 -----  I do not have the code for this.

[suchmoon]

someone offer antminer s3 for .53btc
is that good price?

Most likely not, but maybe you could post a link or something.

[Biodom]

I have 8 Antminer S3 coupons.

Value:= 0.075

Looking  0.06 for each coupon.
 

Valid up to 16August
You can use also for S3+ and S1 Upgrade Kit.

This is why you still have them on August 14th...dream on .06 nobody is that stupid

getting free money is stupid? Some people have truly unrealistic expectations....
fair value of these coupons is 0.005775 BTC.
They were provided in lieu of miners underperformance (441 vs 478GH).

[MoreBloodWine]

at morebloodwine

freq
 212.5
218.75
225
231.25
237.5
243.75
250
256.25 -----  I do not have the code for this.

Thx, anything above 250 IMO is asking for trouble, 250 itself is thinking of talking to trouble.

Don't know if I want to really mess with 250 though, but if 237.5 holds well for the next 24hrs with no X's, I may just do 243.75 and call it a day as the saying goes.

I did notice on my refresh after the initial post (before this) that all looked good on the miners except for a single x on the third miner. I rebooted it, did one fresh and wont touch / check on it til I get back from my 3pm appointment.

I chalked that x up to a hiccup on the new freq since sometimes another reboot is all you need for them to settle after OC'ing.

[Biodom]

at morebloodwine

freq
 212.5
218.75
225
231.25
237.5
243.75
250
256.25 -----  I do not have the code for this.

Thx, anything above 250 IMO is asking for trouble, 250 itself is thinking of talking to trouble.

Don't know if I want to really mess with 250 though, but if 237.5 holds well for the next 24hrs with no X's, I may just do 243.75 and call it a day as the saying goes.

I did notice on my refresh after the initial post (before this) that all looked good on the miners except for a single x on the third miner. I rebooted it, did one fresh and wont touch / check on it til I get back from my 3pm appointment.

I chalked that x up to a hiccup on the new freq since sometimes another reboot is all you need for them to settle after OC'ing.

I have one S3 that has a single x on 237.5, however, it is still better (464-465) than on 218.75, so I leave it with one X in perpetuity.
It (miner) did not "complain" so far (>10d).

[boyohi]

I got mine to freq 250. Took out the intake fan and used a fan I had laying around.. I replaced the thermal paste for all the chips and only had enough left over for one of the heat sink in the back. You can see the temp difference of replacing the thermal paste. I used Antec F7 since I didn't want to wait for the MX-4 to arrive in the mail. The room is about 23.3C and the fan rarely goes above 1700.