Posts Tagged ‘bitcoin asic’

New 16 THS DragonMint 16T Bitcoin ASIC Miner Coming in 2018

23, Nov 2017

If you think that BitMain has too much control over the Bitcion ASICs out there being one of the main manufacturers on that particular market, then you might be happy to learn that there is a new alternative coming next year. There are of course the Canaan Avalon miners and the Ebit E9 miners already available, though they are also hard to get, just like the Antminers from Bitmain lately. The just announced DragonMint 16T Bitcoin ASIC miner from a new company called Halong Mining is looking very promising. What makes this announcement even more interesting is the fact that one of the Bitcoin Core developers – BtcDrak seems to be directly involved in the development of the miner and with Halong Mining who developed it. According to the initial information the project has been started quite a while ago with a lot of people contributing and with a serious investment in order to be able to bring the much needed competition and innovation to the Bitcoin mining arena. The only possible problem here is that it might still be hard to acquire for some small miners and users willing to get just a single ASIC miner to play around with once it becomes available, especially if demand from large scale mining operations is as high as it is with Bitmain’s products.

The DragonMint 16T is supposedly the world’s most efficient Bitcoin miner, running faster and cooler than any competing miners currently available. It is based on the DM8575 ASIC chips that run at 85 GHS per chip with power efficiency of around 0.075 J/GHS according to the developers. If you are wondering what is the catch here, well the new miner is not yet available for sale, it is expected to start shipping in March 2018 or in about 4 months from now. You can however already pre-order the device with a minimum order quantity and a regular price tag of $1595 USD (with first day promo at $1350 USD per device). That price does not include a power supply, just the miner, but you can also add a 1600W PSU for $125 USD ($115 USD on promo), though again this is a pre-order. As with all other pre-orders and promises for a new product that is to start shipping in the future it is advice to proceed with caution, especially in cases such as this one where it is from a newcomer in the crypto space (new company)!

DragonMint 16T Specifications:
– ASIC Type: SHA256
– Hash power: 16 THS
– Network: Ethernet port
– Miner power consumption: 1205 W ±6%
– Chip efficiency: 0.075 J/GHS ±6%
– Fans: dual fan variable 6000rpm (100W)
– Power Supply: Not included (1600W recommended)

– For more details about the new ASIC miner check the official website of Halong Mining…

Bitmain Just Announced the 14 THS AntMiner S9 ASIC Bitcoin Miner

31, May 2016

bitmain-antminer-s9-asic

One more announcement fro Bitmain, the AntMiner S9 ASIC Bitcoin miner is no official and will start shipping on June 12th for $2100 USD without the shipping cost (power supply is not included). The device uses the company’s new 16nm ASIC chips BM1387 and essentially triples the hashrate of the previous generation S7 miners while offering the same level of power usage. The Bitmain AntMiner S9 should be capable of 14 THS SHA-256 mining hashrate with a power usage of 1375 Watts at the wall, so definitely a good improvement over the S7.

Bitmain AntMiner S9 Specifications:
– Hash Rate: 14.0 THS ±5%
– Power Consumption: 1375W + 7% (at the wall, with APW3 ,93% efficiency, 25C ambient temp)
– Power Efficiency: 0.098 J/GH + 7% (at the wall, with APW3 93% efficiency, 25°C ambient temp)
– Rated Voltage: 11.60~13.00V
– Chip quantity per unit: 189x BM1387
– Dimensions: 350mm(L)*135mm(W)*158mm(H)
– Cooling: 2x 12038 fan
– Operating Temperature: 0 °C to 40 °C
– Network Connection: Ethernet
– Default Frequency: 650 MHz

The big question however is if now was the right time to announce the new mining hardware, as of you order now from the first batch you might be getting your units delivered right before the Bitcoin block reward halving. So it might be wise to wait for a later batch of S9 miners after the halving to see how the situation will change and if you might get a better deal in terms of price for the hardware. Then again if you are using S7 miners you might already get to the planning for switching to S9 now that the previous generation S5 is no longer profitable barely covering the electricity costs.

TechnoBit DICE Bitcoin ASIC Cooling Performance

27, Feb 2015

technobit-dice-noise-level-check

We are still playing with our hardware latest toy, the small TechnoBit DICE Bitcoin ASIC miner and today we were checking the cooling performance of the device. When we first saw the announcement the DICE was supposed to be a very silent miner as per the official specifications that stated (and still state) “Noise: ~20 DB at 25 °C ambient temperature”, however the moment we have turned on the unit a few days ago we knew this promise was not kept. If the noise level was just about 20 decibels than the DICE should’ve been so quiet that you would hardly know it is present and working in a quiet room. The reality is quite different though, our sound level meter has detected a noise level of almost 50 dBA and this is really quite noisy and a far cry from the promised noise. So we just had to take apart the device to see what fan it is using and also test to see if the case of the miner could be the culprit that is responsible for the very noisy operation of the DICE Bitcoin ASIC…

technobit-dice-top-bottom

When we have opened the case of the ASIC miner we’ve discovered that the cooling fan used inside is a 92mm Evercool EC9225M12CA, a mid range fan that does 2200 rpm with about 1.8W of power usage. Apparently the fan itself was sufficient to cool the miner with its 39.35 CFM of air flow and interestingly enough the specifications of the fan do say less than 25 dBA in terms of noise generated. The fan itself was directly soldered to the pins of the 6-pin PCI-E power connector on the unit, there is no thermal control or variable rpm, it is working at maximum all of the time. Running the miner without its metal casing has show us that it can be quite silent indeed, so the cause of the noise apparently was the metal case of the miner. More specifically the holes at the fan air intake that apparently are responsible for the significant increase of the noise level, so when TechnoBit has promised us a silent Bitcoin ASIC miner they should have modified the case of the device, so that it can really be silent and not the opposite – make a case that will increase the noise level way over what was promised in terms of specifications.

technobit-dice-side

The cooling of the single RockerBox ASIC chip that is at the heart of the DICE miner is sufficiently provided by two large aluminum heatsinks, one on top interfacing with a solid copper block to the ASIC chip and one at the bottom with direct contact to the whole surface of the PCB. There is enough thermal paste in between the heatsinks to provide good heat transfer and the not so powerful cooling fan has no trouble keeping the temperatures low, so that the about 100W of power used at the stock settings are not a problem. The device can also handle a nice boost in performance with some overclocking that is possible via parameters for the ASIC chip voltage and operating frequency, though you should be careful should you decide to clock the unit higher.

technobit-dice-thermal-image

In the end we take a look at the operating temperatures of the DICE with the help of a thermal imaging camera, the thermal image you see above shows how hot the top and bottom heatsinks get while the device is working normally. We are getting close to 60 degrees at the top heatsink and a bit over 40 at the bottom at the hottest sports, do note however that the operating temperature of the Bitcoin ASIC chip under the heatsink should be higher with something like 10-20 degrees Celsius over the temperature we have measured on the heatsink. So if you decide to overclock the miner you should proceed with caution and monitor the operating temperatures as the power usage increases along with the hashrate when you increase the operating voltage and frequency of the Bitcoin ASIC chip.


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