GekkoScience BM1384 Project Development Discussion

[Dexter770221]

My wife is fat... So definitely skinny

[sidehack]

Alright, looks like skinny it is. The PCB dimensions of the Compac are 1" by 2.5"; the Amita will probably be more like 1.3" by 4.1". The extra height is there to accommodate the doubled heatsinks, since there's one 25x40mm heatsink per chip. It'll look pretty much just like the Compac extended upward with a second sink above the first.

I'm probably gonna cut out of here in about two hours (making this an 8.5 hour day already) so let's see if I can't get the Amita PCB done in that amount of time.

Also, I'm going to give our tardy debtors until about Friday to get things ironed out with us (I expected it to be taken care of last Tuesday) before I think about short-term-borrowing some coin to cover the chip order I expected to have paid last week. So don't worry about it quite yet.

[notlist3d]

So yeah, opinions? Short and fat or tall and skinny?

Given the side by side nature of some usb hubs, I would think that taller and skinnier would be compatible for more folks and allow more airflow for multiple units.

I agree with this, I've seen way too many hubs where the space was at a premium...

I think tall and skinny will win out.  My biggest thing with the size is I really would like someone new to mining to be able to buy one and plug it into their computer to start off into mining.

Hubs as long as I can use the heat sinks allows a little bit of air from a pc fan or small desk fan I consider it a sucess.

[philipma1957]

So yeah, opinions? Short and fat or tall and skinny?

Given the side by side nature of some usb hubs, I would think that taller and skinnier would be compatible for more folks and allow more airflow for multiple units.

I agree with this, I've seen way too many hubs where the space was at a premium...

I think tall and skinny will win out.  My biggest thing with the size is I really would like someone new to mining to be able to buy one and plug it into their computer to start off into mining.

Hubs as long as I can use the heat sinks allows a little bit of air from a pc fan or small desk fan I consider it a sucess.

Yeah I made some software usb sticks with these.


http://www.amazon.com/SanDisk-SDCZ50-004G-10PK-Everything-Stromboli-Lanyard/dp/B00FVWQ6XC/ref=sr_1_15?

it allows for easy setup.  with zadig and cgminer folders

[valkir]

When The software part is done by Novak, and I can maybe get my hand on one of these sticks, I might try to get it running on a Raspberry Pi (cheap low power linux computer, costs 35$). If it works, I could make a ready to use operating system image, that would mean VERY easy setup, basically plug and play, even for users with very little experience.

Are you serious?? We are all aware of what a pi is and we actually already talk about that. Quick tip, before posting someting (since you seems to be new) read the thread.  Dont want to be a jerk but sometime you have to think before speak.

no offence

[sidehack]

Just throwing this out there, but the Compac already works (as a U3) with the latest Minera for the Pi.

But yeah, when Novak's got all sexy we'll need to do something, either a custom cgminer build or get it included in the main code.

Also, I'm feeling rather turdley so I'm gonna leave early and probably accomplish nothing at all the rest of the day.

[sidehack]

Nope, there are other changes required as described in previous posts.

[MCHouston]

I am curious in your testing, have you had time to test to what ambient air temp the miner will operate normally?

So mining areas are AC'd some are free air, mine is free air currently is the reason I am asking.  I know there is quite a range when it comes to equipment I have tested some gear to 120F with no problems some died at 95F.

Nice work on the project.

[philipma1957]

I am curious in your testing, have you had time to test to what ambient air temp the miner will operate normally?

So mining areas are AC'd some are free air, mine is free air currently is the reason I am asking.  I know there is quite a range when it comes to equipment I have tested some gear to 120F with no problems some died at 95F.

Nice work on the project.

yeah I am running my 1 stick at freq 218.75 with a fan to cool it in my garage yesterday it was 91f in the garage the stick was fine.

 I am interested in testing more with 2, 3, 4 ,5 stick setups.

This is the testing thread link.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1086011.0;all

[alh]

My wife is fat... So definitely skinny

You better hope she doesn't read this Forum, or can't connect your ID to you!  

[Dexter770221]

My wife is fat... So definitely skinny

You better hope she doesn't read this Forum, or can't connect your ID to you!  

I know that she doesn't Besides, her English is rather bad. She avoids anything that is not in polish (my & her native language)

[sidehack]

Currently the Compac enumerates under the Icarus driver, which is pretty generic and what cgminer appears to default to when it can't find ID-specified hardware. Basically the driver attempts to mine on whatever USB device it sees and if it gets back the expected result it just keeps going.

There are, that I can think of right now, four problems with enumerating the Copac as a U3. The first is simple - it's not correct. It's not a U3, so labeling it as such is fallacious. The second is, apparently there's something different in chained comms or chiplength detection between the BM1382 and BM1384, because every serial 1384 I've run on a USB driver passes only one work packet. The first chip hands it off to the second, and they both work on the same data, which means half the shares returned are duplicates that cgminer reports as HW errors (which does not affect the Compac, but cripples the Amita). The third is that, since the U3 is a four-chip device, cgminer is expecting four times the hashrate at the given frequency. This matters because cgminer has a reset timeout which it bases on maximum expected time between returned shares, and if the hashrate is one-fourth what it's expecting, the timeout will be triggered fairly often even when the hardware is working properly. The fourth issue is with startup current draw. When the chip inits with U3 code, it fires up hard and slams the crap out of the regulator, meaning it briefly draws really high power from the USB bus. The burst transient current can knock down the Vcore briefly, not enough to trip out the regulator but enough that the starting voltage for a particular frequency is higher (to compensate for the drop) than the running voltage, which means if you want to "set it and forget it" you'll be running hotter than you actually have to. S5 code ramps the chips up a lot more slowly, which helps to not transient-load the power rails (essential for USB miners). It also helps maintain the voltage/current balance between nodes on a string board (essential for Amita and TypeZero). All four of these things are significant reasons we'll need to redo the code.

Also, regarding temperature, my shop is usually 85-95F where I have sticks running. I don't expect them to have heat problems even at 100F ambient until you start pushing 175MHz or above without fans.

[vapourminer]

The third is that, since the U3 is a four-chip device, cgminer is expecting four times the hashrate at the given frequency. This matters because cgminer has a reset timeout which it bases on maximum expected time between returned shares, and if the hashrate is one-fourth what it's expecting, the timeout will be triggered fairly often even when the hardware is working properly.

the latest cgminer 4.9.2, doubled the U3 timeout from 1 to 2 seconds (going from memory here). I thought perhaps that was to help with your project.

[sidehack]

1 to 2 seconds at what frequency? It calculates a new timeout when the clock changes.

If that change was made to help us, it was done without my knowledge. I don't think we've talked to cgminer devs yet, but you'd have to ask Novak for specifics.

[vapourminer]

not sure. this is from the 4.9.2 readme:

- Default Antminer U3 voltage has been changed to 775 since 750 is rarely enough to get 2nd generation ones running at full speed.
- U3 will USB reset on no shares for 2 seconds instead of 1.

[TheRealSteve]

If that change was made to help us, it was done without my knowledge. I don't think we've talked to cgminer devs yet, but you'd have to ask Novak for specifics.

No, it was specifically to deal with some U3 issues.  For a long time, -ck didn't have a U3 to test against (not sure if he does again now), and the previous version of cgminer was giving people trouble (using a version older worked okay though).

Note that he's got some choice words on the U3 that make it clear he's no fan of the comm chip's behavior and non-ease of identification of the U3:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=827356.msg11598332#msg11598332
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=827356.msg11036830#msg11036830
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=28402.msg10538698#msg10538698
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=28402.msg10039320#msg10039320
Only this last one probably semi-applies to the Compac as well, but you've already touched on that in an earlier post (identifying as a U3).
I have no idea why the comm chip would misbehave on the U3 - bog standard CP2102 used on several miner designs and even larger numbers of other consumer devices.

Once novak has things fleshed out on his end, it certainly can't hurt to send -ck one for an extra set of eyeballs and testing (if he's interested); I'd be happy to frontcover the costs.

[sidehack]

Yep, the Icarus driver is pretty much a disaster at this point, with all the different little tricks required to detect from a couple dozen different machines using the same interface. We're going to try to write our own driver, and probably do something with the CP2102's manufacturer and device codes for ready identification.

[philipma1957]

Yep, the Icarus driver is pretty much a disaster at this point, with all the different little tricks required to detect from a couple dozen different machines using the same interface. We're going to try to write our own driver, and probably do something with the CP2102's manufacturer and device codes for ready identification.

that would be a nice touch. making these more fun to work with.  I agree with you on temps. my 1 stick can do freq 218 with a fan in 91f temps so if your hub is a bit weaker or you want to go fanless.  freq 150 - 175 should be okay.

[AJRGale]

Yep, the Icarus driver is pretty much a disaster at this point, with all the different little tricks required to detect from a couple dozen different machines using the same interface. We're going to try to write our own driver, and probably do something with the CP2102's manufacturer and device codes for ready identification.

changing the VID/PID on them things shouldn't be hard to do, to be USB compliant, you may want to register it?
as i have mentioned before, if you are using them cp2*** chips, please use ESD protection on it (if you haven't done it yet, also people asking about it here maybe good info in there?)

if not you could move onto the more bells and whistles, yet more expensive, "FT232R"? and call it a day?

Alright, looks like skinny it is. The PCB dimensions of the Compac are 1" by 2.5"; the Amita will probably be more like 1.3" by 4.1". The extra height is there to accommodate the doubled heatsinks, since there's one 25x40mm heatsink per chip. It'll look pretty much just like the Compac extended upward with a second sink above the first.

I'm probably gonna cut out of here in about two hours (making this an 8.5 hour day already) so let's see if I can't get the Amita PCB done in that amount of time.

Also, I'm going to give our tardy debtors until about Friday to get things ironed out with us (I expected it to be taken care of last Tuesday) before I think about short-term-borrowing some coin to cover the chip order I expected to have paid last week. So don't worry about it quite yet.

i gotta find dimensions of them 18 chip board (i believe thats the one getting made to fit the U1 yes?), im wondering if i could retrofit new-r-box sinks to them..

[TheRealSteve]

changing the VID/PID on them things shouldn't be hard to do, to be USB compliant, you may want to register it?

A proper VID registration is not chump change.  For something with such a small run, mainly used by techy people, and presuming they don't necessarily want to put a USB logo on the product.. it's just not worth it.  Thus my earlier suggestion of instead getting a PID from a PID vendor, or using the VID of a defunct company.  Plenty of articles on the internet about the pros/cons of doing so in terms of potential technical issues, whether or not entities have a right to sell the PIDs they do, and legal considerations.

if you are using them cp2*** chips, please use ESD protection on it  [...] if not you could move onto the more bells and whistles, yet more expensive, "FT232R"? and call it a day?

While ESD diodes on the CP2102 inputs is nice (AntMiner U1/U2, bi•fury use 'm), I've not had any on other products that didn't have them fail.  But that's anecdotal and there's plenty others who do swear there's issues.  If an alternative were to be chosen, though, FTDI wouldn't really be my first choice for the same reason that Prolific wouldn't be my first choice.  There's always MCP and wCH.  If anything, I'd use a CP2103 and make use of the 4xGPIO.. but that doesn't negate ESD concerns