ANTMINER S3+ Discussion and Support Thread

[contactlight]

Anyone using their S3 on P2Pool? I am mining on GHash right now and it makes me hate myself. If P2Pool worked for you guys, I'll switch them as soon as I get back.

[bobsav2121]

100 % correct !!!!

[Two4D]

Ok I have a few questions I would like to ask about S3s.

What is good ( in terms of safety and watts / GHs ) clock speed to overclock my S3 miners?

And what PSU would you suggest me to run 2 miners at that clock speed?

Thanks.

[CryptoGuy]

Found out why one of my units was not hashing and having X's on the chips. Paste was everywhere on the inside. Even the screws holding the heat sink on had thermal paste on them.
images removed

Messy paste wont effect anything but poor cooling, unless your units are overheating, that's not the problem

His look far better than mine did... lol.  I had paste on the chips, on the pcb, on the connectors... everywhere.

correct me if i am wrong, but if others suggest that paste is there to provide a thermal connection between a chip and a heat sink, then with heat sink sitting on the top of the chips in s3, I don't see how it could be done by anything other than having paste on the top of the chips (but not necessarily on connectors, I get that).

not sure what you are asking there...

are there other ways to have a thermal connection between chip and heat sink? sure, you can buy thermal pads. search ebay. youll see in the specs that they are massively electrically resistant. need 1000's of volts to make them conduct. Same goes for thermal paste. Its very unlikely that swimming in thermal paste (even on connectors) would cause any problem at all...

yep, but the OP said that cleaning paste improved his machine. If what you are saying is 100% correct about swimming in thermal paste not causing any problems, then why his S3 was improved by removing excess and reapplying some? I just want to understand and from what I heard here, it seems that paste should be on the top of the chip in S3.

After cleaning all the paste off the chips and surrounding PCB, the unit is working at 440 GH/s after 6 hours. All that extra paste can mess with the voltages on a chip and cause hardware issues. Thermal paste should always be on top of the chip with none running over the sides. On a full sized CPU an amount the size of a pea should be applied. On a small ASIC chip the paste should be just a tiny amount and let the heat sink spread it out. If mine is not that bad, all I can think is some dude with a Taco Bell sour cream gun filled with thermal paste is shooting this stuff on.  

what ?? your saying taco bell uses thermal paste ?? you are right the thermal past should not be gooped on the chip covering the entire chip connectors and other nearby electronic components. i always replace stock thermal paste on pretty much everything anyways: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835426035

Best practice to ensure you don't get too much is to put a small amount on the chip then spread it evenly with a business card, drivers license or the like. The layer of paste in most cases only needs to be a couple mils thick. It's only intended to take up any air gaps between the chip and heatsink, nothing more. Additionally, thermal paste such as Arctic Silver have silver particles in it so yes it will conduct electricity.

what is the point of thermal paste to conduct electricity? I think that you are incorrect. silver is there to conduct heat better. Because silver particles are surrounded by non-conductive filler, electricity is NOT conducted.
see:
http://www.arcticsilver.com/as5.htm

 

Not Electrically Conductive:
Arctic Silver 5 was formulated to conduct heat, not electricity.
(While much safer than electrically conductive silver and copper greases, Arctic Silver 5 should be kept away from electrical traces, pins, and leads. While it is not electrically conductive, the compound is very slightly capacitive and could potentially cause problems if it bridges two close-proximity electrical paths.)

Conductive/capacitive, whatever. My point is still valid, don't use too much paste.

[aztecminer]

Found out why one of my units was not hashing and having X's on the chips. Paste was everywhere on the inside. Even the screws holding the heat sink on had thermal paste on them.
images removed

Messy paste wont effect anything but poor cooling, unless your units are overheating, that's not the problem

His look far better than mine did... lol.  I had paste on the chips, on the pcb, on the connectors... everywhere.

correct me if i am wrong, but if others suggest that paste is there to provide a thermal connection between a chip and a heat sink, then with heat sink sitting on the top of the chips in s3, I don't see how it could be done by anything other than having paste on the top of the chips (but not necessarily on connectors, I get that).

not sure what you are asking there...

are there other ways to have a thermal connection between chip and heat sink? sure, you can buy thermal pads. search ebay. youll see in the specs that they are massively electrically resistant. need 1000's of volts to make them conduct. Same goes for thermal paste. Its very unlikely that swimming in thermal paste (even on connectors) would cause any problem at all...

yep, but the OP said that cleaning paste improved his machine. If what you are saying is 100% correct about swimming in thermal paste not causing any problems, then why his S3 was improved by removing excess and reapplying some? I just want to understand and from what I heard here, it seems that paste should be on the top of the chip in S3.

After cleaning all the paste off the chips and surrounding PCB, the unit is working at 440 GH/s after 6 hours. All that extra paste can mess with the voltages on a chip and cause hardware issues. Thermal paste should always be on top of the chip with none running over the sides. On a full sized CPU an amount the size of a pea should be applied. On a small ASIC chip the paste should be just a tiny amount and let the heat sink spread it out. If mine is not that bad, all I can think is some dude with a Taco Bell sour cream gun filled with thermal paste is shooting this stuff on.  

what ?? your saying taco bell uses thermal paste ?? you are right the thermal past should not be gooped on the chip covering the entire chip connectors and other nearby electronic components. i always replace stock thermal paste on pretty much everything anyways: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835426035

Best practice to ensure you don't get too much is to put a small amount on the chip then spread it evenly with a business card, drivers license or the like. The layer of paste in most cases only needs to be a couple mils thick. It's only intended to take up any air gaps between the chip and heatsink, nothing more. Additionally, thermal paste such as Arctic Silver have silver particles in it so yes it will conduct electricity.

what is the point of thermal paste to conduct electricity? I think that you are incorrect. silver is there to conduct heat better. Because silver particles are surrounded by non-conductive filler, electricity is NOT conducted.
see:
http://www.arcticsilver.com/as5.htm

there are some thermal pastes that are conductive hence why i only use non-conductive thermal paste. using a high quality thermal paste can reduce temps and increase efficiency of the chip too. so i think is good too replace stock thermal paste on everything. i have two asus R9 290x's i replaced thermal paste and they run GREEEEAAAT! (tony the tiger great). greeeeeaaat!

[Biodom]

moderately beeping ants-found at least one cause: when pool switches difficulty setting-they beep.
100% correlation (>3 occasions). At least mine only beep for this and also when mining commences at reboot.

[PlanetCrypto]

Got the email that my first 2 B2 orders shipped.
Order Date: 2014-07-02 06:32:18 (paid for within minutes).
Order on website listed as "shipped".
Opted for the refund, that is still listed as "Init".

Right on schedule.

Orders of magnitude better than Butt F*&^%$g Laboratory (BFL).

Right ON Bitmain!

I was Batch 1 and did not get my Tracking number until the 20th. Did not arrive until Today. Seems I was on the ass end of that deal lol.

Sorry to hear that.

My B2 order got stuck in Chinese customs over the weekend, UPS will deliver those tomorrow (24th).
Got the email my B3 order had a UPS label printed today (23rd).
Both refunds (B2 & B3) still listed as "Init".

BITMAIN Rocks!!

[jimrome]

Wow it really looks like Bitmain dropped the ball on these.
ALL the S1's were rock solid and everybody got the same hash rate. Plus everyone could overclock if you so desired.

<snip>

Bob

Let's not repaint history: there was a lot of variablility in the S1 as well - hash rate, error rate, function of thermal management (fans didn't always rev up properly as the unit got hot).

They did say they had an issue with the DC/DC converter. To what extent I don't know. With that said, it's better they ship what they have and deal with giving some sort of % refund (which they already have offered) than to sit on the miners and tell us "next week" like other hardware companies do. They haven't opened B4 so one can assume they intend to fix the issue before opening sales again.

Yeah, they have an issue with the DC/DC converter all right: they are pushing it too hard to begin with (which is causing it to heat up) and are supplying insufficient cooling. As it heats up it gets more inefficient, and the current begins to drop. Eventually the part hits a temp which causes it to shutdown, cooldown, and fire back up.

Then they put a box on: hot air rises from the components/heatsinks below and mixes with the already hot air around the DC/DC where it is trapped due to insufficient airflow.

From the datasheet:


Note the line for natural convection, and how current begins to drop off as ambient temperature rises.

[oskuro]

My S3´s are in germany right now tomorrow i will have them. yeah!

[-droid-]

Anyone using their S3 on P2Pool? I am mining on GHash right now and it makes me hate myself. If P2Pool worked for you guys, I'll switch them as soon as I get back.

use Eligius man

[windpath]

Anyone using their S3 on P2Pool? I am mining on GHash right now and it makes me hate myself. If P2Pool worked for you guys, I'll switch them as soon as I get back.

use Eligius man

S3s are working great with P2Pool, here are 4 stock S3s running on a single address:

http://minefast.coincadence.com/miner.php?id=19vXrwKGUhK4cCU8tA4kWZgbChcmh9a6qj

[kaltar]

Well i got my b2 order in, now i have to wait 3 hours until i get home to start playing with them
to people in canada wondering how much VAT ( custom + Tax ) fees.
with a declared value of 947USD
in Quebec for 2 miners i just paid 159$ CAD
heads up, get your credit card ready.

Have Fun Everyone and Happy Mining.

[kaltar]

Wow it really looks like Bitmain dropped the ball on these.
ALL the S1's were rock solid and everybody got the same hash rate. Plus everyone could overclock if you so desired.

<snip>

Bob

Let's not repaint history: there was a lot of variablility in the S1 as well - hash rate, error rate, function of thermal management (fans didn't always rev up properly as the unit got hot).

They did say they had an issue with the DC/DC converter. To what extent I don't know. With that said, it's better they ship what they have and deal with giving some sort of % refund (which they already have offered) than to sit on the miners and tell us "next week" like other hardware companies do. They haven't opened B4 so one can assume they intend to fix the issue before opening sales again.

Yeah, they have an issue with the DC/DC converter all right: they are pushing it too hard to begin with (which is causing it to heat up) and are supplying insufficient cooling. As it heats up it gets more inefficient, and the current begins to drop. Eventually the part hits a temp which causes it to shutdown, cooldown, and fire back up.

Then they put a box on: hot air rises from the components/heatsinks below and mixes with the already hot air around the DC/DC where it is trapped due to insufficient airflow.

From the datasheet:


Note the line for natural convection, and how current begins to drop off as ambient temperature rises.

So opening them, putting a box fan behind them in a AC room, should help them alot being stable, and better OC performance if possible. right .?

[contactlight]

Anyone using their S3 on P2Pool? I am mining on GHash right now and it makes me hate myself. If P2Pool worked for you guys, I'll switch them as soon as I get back.

use Eligius man

S3s are working great with P2Pool, here are 4 stock S3s running on a single address:

http://minefast.coincadence.com/miner.php?id=19vXrwKGUhK4cCU8tA4kWZgbChcmh9a6qj

I'll try moving them when I get back home from work today. Let's see how it performs for me.

[bobsav2121]

Wow it really looks like Bitmain dropped the ball on these.
ALL the S1's were rock solid and everybody got the same hash rate. Plus everyone could overclock if you so desired.

<snip>

Bob

Let's not repaint history: there was a lot of variablility in the S1 as well - hash rate, error rate, function of thermal management (fans didn't always rev up properly as the unit got hot).

They did say they had an issue with the DC/DC converter. To what extent I don't know. With that said, it's better they ship what they have and deal with giving some sort of % refund (which they already have offered) than to sit on the miners and tell us "next week" like other hardware companies do. They haven't opened B4 so one can assume they intend to fix the issue before opening sales again.

Yeah, they have an issue with the DC/DC converter all right: they are pushing it too hard to begin with (which is causing it to heat up) and are supplying insufficient cooling. As it heats up it gets more inefficient, and the current begins to drop. Eventually the part hits a temp which causes it to shutdown, cooldown, and fire back up.

Then they put a box on: hot air rises from the components/heatsinks below and mixes with the already hot air around the DC/DC where it is trapped due to insufficient airflow.

From the datasheet:


Note the line for natural convection, and how current begins to drop off as ambient temperature rises.

So opening them, putting a box fan behind them in a AC room, should help them alot being stable, and better OC performance if possible. right .?

Your chart is meaningless unless we know the devices current requirement.

[ibminer]

I have a bit of a problem. Hoping someone can help, I'm fine with computers but have no clue when it comes to network addresses etc.

To start with, I couldn't change the routers subnet so I went through a direct PC connection. Logged into the Ant fine & changed to DCHP. The Ant still had 192.168.1.99/24 as the IPv4 address at that time.

Here's where I went wrong perhaps, I had to connect to the internet again to get details for my pool (having to disconnect from the Ants), and since then I haven't been able to re-login to the Antminers. I've tried resetting them and trying to find them via the router, but they are not there. Anyone have any idea what went wrong/how I can login to them again pls?

Download Advanced IP Scanner and run that. It should find your Ant.

Good advice, but if you do find the IP address is still .1.99 and you can't log into it try a factory reset and plug directly in again.  I had a similar problem with my S1 when I first got it.  Played around with the settings and couldn't even connect directly to my lappy.  I could see it using IP scanner, but couldn't get to the login page because of the different subnet.  

I just changed the IP on my miner after to suit my routers subnet (.0.99)

Now doing a factory reset on an S3, I'm a B3'er so I have no idea if this is possible.  On the S1 there was a tiny button on the logic board.  I'd press it, then turn off at the power supply about 5 seconds after, power back up and it would be back to factory settings.

Hope that helps  

Thanks silverthorne, that was exactly the problem.

atledenin, Both Ants were still 192.168.1.99 but no matter how many times I reset the things I can't seem to log in as I did before.  This is getting frustrating, even GPU mining felt easier than this lol

Do you have both miners running on the same network, at the same time?   If so, try just doing one at a time to avoid any IP conflicts and change its IP before starting up the other.

[iikun]

I have a bit of a problem. Hoping someone can help, I'm fine with computers but have no clue when it comes to network addresses etc.

To start with, I couldn't change the routers subnet so I went through a direct PC connection. Logged into the Ant fine & changed to DCHP. The Ant still had 192.168.1.99/24 as the IPv4 address at that time.

Here's where I went wrong perhaps, I had to connect to the internet again to get details for my pool (having to disconnect from the Ants), and since then I haven't been able to re-login to the Antminers. I've tried resetting them and trying to find them via the router, but they are not there. Anyone have any idea what went wrong/how I can login to them again pls?

Download Advanced IP Scanner and run that. It should find your Ant.

thanks for your reply.  Funnily enough I had just run that software, but Ants are not found :/  Which is weird because the lights are happily flashing away & I'm sure they're mining to Bitmain's account no problem over my network somehow.

my ip scanner reports ants as Paragon technologies

There is nothing icky about that. Looking up the manufacturer from a MAC address is often inaccurate, and on top of that it reports the manufacturer of the network interface controller on the device, not the manufacturer of the device.

Thanks so much everyone, it's all sorted now & hashing away happily.

To be honest I can't really say what was going wrong, but after about 7 or 8 resets something seemed to work again. I've now assigned them their own separate addresses on my network & I can now go to sleep!

[iikun]

I have a bit of a problem. Hoping someone can help, I'm fine with computers but have no clue when it comes to network addresses etc.

To start with, I couldn't change the routers subnet so I went through a direct PC connection. Logged into the Ant fine & changed to DCHP. The Ant still had 192.168.1.99/24 as the IPv4 address at that time.

Here's where I went wrong perhaps, I had to connect to the internet again to get details for my pool (having to disconnect from the Ants), and since then I haven't been able to re-login to the Antminers. I've tried resetting them and trying to find them via the router, but they are not there. Anyone have any idea what went wrong/how I can login to them again pls?

Download Advanced IP Scanner and run that. It should find your Ant.

Good advice, but if you do find the IP address is still .1.99 and you can't log into it try a factory reset and plug directly in again.  I had a similar problem with my S1 when I first got it.  Played around with the settings and couldn't even connect directly to my lappy.  I could see it using IP scanner, but couldn't get to the login page because of the different subnet.  

I just changed the IP on my miner after to suit my routers subnet (.0.99)

Now doing a factory reset on an S3, I'm a B3'er so I have no idea if this is possible.  On the S1 there was a tiny button on the logic board.  I'd press it, then turn off at the power supply about 5 seconds after, power back up and it would be back to factory settings.

Hope that helps  

Thanks silverthorne, that was exactly the problem.

atledenin, Both Ants were still 192.168.1.99 but no matter how many times I reset the things I can't seem to log in as I did before.  This is getting frustrating, even GPU mining felt easier than this lol

Do you have both miners running on the same network, at the same time?   If so, try just doing one at a time to avoid any IP conflicts and change its IP before starting up the other.

Yes this may have been part of the initial problem, but I can't be sure. Certainly later when they were suddenly recognized again I found the software swapping between them so assigning separate IPs is essential.  thx for your help

[ibminer]

I have a bit of a problem. Hoping someone can help, I'm fine with computers but have no clue when it comes to network addresses etc.

To start with, I couldn't change the routers subnet so I went through a direct PC connection. Logged into the Ant fine & changed to DCHP. The Ant still had 192.168.1.99/24 as the IPv4 address at that time.

Here's where I went wrong perhaps, I had to connect to the internet again to get details for my pool (having to disconnect from the Ants), and since then I haven't been able to re-login to the Antminers. I've tried resetting them and trying to find them via the router, but they are not there. Anyone have any idea what went wrong/how I can login to them again pls?

Download Advanced IP Scanner and run that. It should find your Ant.

Good advice, but if you do find the IP address is still .1.99 and you can't log into it try a factory reset and plug directly in again.  I had a similar problem with my S1 when I first got it.  Played around with the settings and couldn't even connect directly to my lappy.  I could see it using IP scanner, but couldn't get to the login page because of the different subnet.  

I just changed the IP on my miner after to suit my routers subnet (.0.99)

Now doing a factory reset on an S3, I'm a B3'er so I have no idea if this is possible.  On the S1 there was a tiny button on the logic board.  I'd press it, then turn off at the power supply about 5 seconds after, power back up and it would be back to factory settings.

Hope that helps  

Thanks silverthorne, that was exactly the problem.

atledenin, Both Ants were still 192.168.1.99 but no matter how many times I reset the things I can't seem to log in as I did before.  This is getting frustrating, even GPU mining felt easier than this lol

Do you have both miners running on the same network, at the same time?   If so, try just doing one at a time to avoid any IP conflicts and change its IP before starting up the other.

Yes this may have been part of the initial problem, but I can't be sure. Certainly later when they were suddenly recognized again I found the software swapping between them so assigning separate IPs is essential.  thx for your help

And just to re-state my prior post, I had issues with making certain changes through the web interface using Safari and ended up having a smoother experience using firefox and/or chrome (I tried both). Not entirely sure why Safari was having issues but it wasn't changing the IP when I was using Safari.

Also - make sure you are modifying the right 'adapter' (not the bridge)

[iglasses]

Still nothing from Bitmain on refunds.
Looks like they have abandoned updating the site as well...B3 is expected to ship 7/20 message is still present.  S3 still reported as hashing at 478...etc.

C'mon Bitmain give us some info!!