Archive for the ‘Mining Hardware’ Category

Braiins OS, An Opensource Operating System for ASIC Miners

3, Oct 2018

Braiins is the company behind one of the oldest and most trusted Bitcoin mining pools – Slush Pool, and they something new and interesting to show – an alternative opensource operating system for Bitcoin ASIC miners in the form of what they call Braiins OS. It is the very first fully open-source, Linux-based operating system for cryptocurrency embedded devices with the initial release targeted on mining devices and more specifically Bitcoin ASIC miners. Braiins OS has been developed for two primary reasons: to be open-source and have no “hidden features” and to work stable following standards without issues.

The first release includes images for Antminer S9 and DragonMint T1 (only the variant with Xilinx based control boards). Braiins OS is currently mostly on par with the official vendor firmware at this point. It monitors the hardware and its working conditions, handles errors and provides various performance data, but more features will be introduced making it a more interesting alternative. Most importantly possible performance improvements are being looked into as that would probably please the miners the most. The Braiins OS is intended to integrate flawlessly with the Slush Pool, but it should be just fine with any other alternative pool for SHA256 mining, so you are not going to be limited in where to mine with it.

Be aware that Braiins OS is still in alpha stage and has not been tested on a large scale yet, so you might want to start by deploying to single miner to give it a go before deciding to deploy on larger scale!

– For more details about the alternative Braiins OS for Bitcoin ASIC miners…

Firmware With Unlocked Overclock for Bitmain Antminer Z9 Equihash ASIC Miners

2, Oct 2018

It seems that just like with the newer Antminer Z9 Mini the new faster Antminer Z9 Equihash ASIC miners from Bitmain are arriving with locked overclock functionality in the firmware. We already know that these ASIC miners are overclocking pretty well and you can easily get a nice performance boost over the stock hashrate the devices come with, so why is Bitmain limiting you… it is pretty clear, they want you to buy more units. Fortunately there are alternatives that allow you to overclock your Antminer Z9 miners and get a nice extra performance boost. Initially there was only a modified firmware released by user efudd on Bitcointalk that was sold to interested people, but now there is also a free version of a modified firmware available with unlocked frequencies by smartass111. Of course you are more than welcome to make a donation to the author of the modified firmware in order to support and motivate him.

The new faster in terms of hashrate Bitmain Antminer Z9 ASIC miners do seem to be more limited in terms of operating voltage, so you will most likely will not be able to overclock them as much as a Z9 Mini, but still going from the default operating frequency of 500 MHz to 625 or 650 MHz should be possible on pretty much all miners. If you are lucky you might be able to even squeeze some more extra as well, just make sure you keep the chips cool enough when you start to overclock and also to have a powerful enough power supply that can handle the extra load that it will get after the overclock. Getting an extra performance boost of 20% or maybe even a bit more for free is something that you should definitely take advantage of if you have some Antminer Z9’s.

– For more information and to download the free modified Antminer Z9 OC unlocked firmware…

Bitmain Announced Their First 7nm ASIC Chip, Soon in Miners

24, Sep 2018

Bitmain has finally announced their next generation of ASIC chips that are based on 7nm Finfet technology called BM1391 for the SHA256 algorithm, these chips will power the next generation of Bitcoin ASIC miners coming from the company. The new BM1391 chips integrate more than a billion transistors and are optimized for maximum efficiency according to the company and can achieve a ratio of energy consumption to the mining capacity that is as low as 42 J/TH. Bitmain was dominating the Bitcoin mining market with their Antminer S9 in terms of hashrate and units shipped, but they started losing in terms of performance and efficiency lately due to the fact that the competition was adopting new production technologies and making further optimizations to get higher hashrates. We’ll see if Bitmain will be able to get back in the game with their next generation ASIC miners using the new chips…


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