Topic: Asteroid -- a new Mac mining client (0.9.7) - page 2. (Read 46464 times)

If you're very concerned, purchase one of these bad boys: http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=sr_nr_n_0?rh=n%3A172282%2Cn%3A2243862011%2Ck%3Alaptop+fan+pads&keywords=laptop+fan+pads&ie=UTF8&qid=1389497508&rnid=493964

I've been using one on laptops for years, from back in the days when I ran BOINC on all my machines.

Depends what pool you're working in.  Be careful and note if the delimiter should be "." or "_"

An example:

 chopsticks.workername    <-- works in GHASH.io
 chopsticks.workername    <-- does NOT work in BTC Guild!
 chopsticks_workername   <-- works in BTC Guild

Anyone concerned with heat issues using asteroid (or any other miner) on a rMBP? I have a 15" rMBP and the CPU Heatsink temps during normal usage are around 36-45C, when I run asteroid they are pretty much pegged around 61-64C. This seems a bit hot. I know Macs don't have the best cooling but I'm worried I'll return to a dead macbook one of these days (I run asteroid at night).

Anyone else have this concern or run into issue / can speak to the legitimacy (or not) of this concern? I do have the macbook propped up for increased airflow and I even try and open a nearby window to allows outside cool air to be drawn into the cooling system.

Thanks

I get an incorrect worker username/password error.

Am I supposed to put in my account.workername in the Worker username field? or just the workername?

Excellent.  Thank you.  Once I get some hardware (assuming they ship some hardware), I'll try it out and let you know how it goes.

Correct!

Correct at the moment, but my internal builds of Asteroid support a variety of different miners, including old and new versions of cgminer.  Once it is released, it will be on the same update schedule as my cgminer for Mac OS X builds.  But at the moment, yes, you are correct

Apologies if this is the wrong place - I didn't see a separate CGMiner for Mac thread.

Is anyone else considering using CGMiner for Mac with (finally shipping?) Hashfast hardware?  

CGMiner for Mac seems to be immediately updated with other CGMiner releases (thanks!) and, I assume, includes CGMiner mods for HF.  Correct?

I assume that Asteroid, as it relies on an older CGMiner build, will not work with HF hardware.

Congratulations! 

Got some good coverage on ZDnet this morning!
    Bitcoin and Litecoin mining with Asteroid for Mac

And an article I consulted on for cryptocoins was posted by the same author this weekend:
    A crypto-currency primer: Bitcoin vs. Litecoin

0.9.6 is planned for sometime before Christmas, and should include a lot of bug fixes and tweaks for bitcoin and litecoin users (MobileMiner, improved settings sharing, etc).  Thanks for all the feedback reports being submitted!

Curious, I had another Danish user mention this just tonight too on the official forums.  I think that narrows down the problem (international formats).  Thanks sboc!

I have verified this and it does in fact show incorrectly. I did select a Litecoin pool. I think it might be caused by the fact that my region is set to Denmark - Danish which causes the miner output to display for example 2.345 kH/s instead of 2,345 kH/s. The first option will by English systems be parsed as 2345 which is in fact 2(point)345 MH/s.

And I am using 0.9.5 which I assume being the latest so I guess something does still screw up the preferences after entering the Bitcoin address

I haven't heard of this bug, since it's strictly a numerical algorithm that gets applied to all hashrates regardless of coin type.  It *might* be that you had selected a Bitcoin pool perhaps by mistake?  I could be wrong though, please let me know if you've confirmed it and/or can repeat it.


Are you using the latest version of Asteroid?  I added a fix for that bug but it may not have caught it.  I'm guessing the API reply from blockchain.info is giving it a hard time.  I'll add some error-checking at the same time as I implement this same functionality for Litecoin addresses (in the upcoming version of Asteroid).


Thanks, I'll investigate.  If/when you can send in a feedback report (go under the "Asteroid" menu and go to "Send Feedback") with a line or two about what is happening, I'll have the relevant log files as well that Asteroid generates that may help me more quickly troubleshoot your specific setup (and implement a fix for everyone if possible).


Yes, this bug has been reported, and thanks for doing so as well.  It's actually trying to say "missing value", which is an error that is coming from the litecoin hashrates not being parsed properly.  It's on my list for fixing in the next version.


Thanks! 

1) When mining LTC I think the speed on the mining speed incorrectly shows MH/S instead of kH/s.
2) The preferences screen is still blank after entering the Bitcoin address.
3) Once the miner is stopped I cannot start it again. I have to qui the program and launch it again.
4) When mining Litecoins there's an issue with the notification message in the dock. Think it says mis....lue or something like that.

Keep it going. It really has potential.

Edit: I am not too sure about 1)

The API key is arguably an authentication token that I could easily store in the Keychain too, thus making it independent from any preference file format changes.  I'll add it to the list for the next version

Pool settings aren't as annoying as having to re-enter my MobileMiner API key. Pool settings are generally easy to remember, but an API key requires me to find it and enter it in manually.

If you mine Litecoin / scrypt (regardless of what miner frontend you use), the Asteroid website now has a list of all the best settings that Asteroid users have come up with for thread-concurrency and worksize, the two most significant variables when mining scrypt:

    Asteroid's litecoin / scrypt settings database page

The page shows the hashrates and popularity of each GPU, along with the settings used to get those speeds.  It's geared towards Mac users, but the hardware is similar regardless of platform.

This list is updated live, and is also the same database from which Asteroid makes recommendations to users.  Meaning, if you use settings in Asteroid that are faster than everyone else's for the same hardware, Asteroid will upload your settings (with your permission), updating this webpage, and show alerts in Asteroid the next time any other user with that same card launches and faster settings are available on the server.  All within a couple minutes.  Even if you don't choose to upload your settings, you will still get recommendations on the best settings to use, even the first time you launch the app.

So get out there and get hashing!

Ah yes, this bug has been a fickle one.  0.9.5 was mainly a bugfix and compatibility release.  Fortunately it seems as though very few people have any operational/functional problems with it now, so I can refocus now on UI quirks such as this one.  It only affects multiple identical devices (and is tough for me to test as I have some devices but none identical).  Even though I've coded Asteroid to recognize them with a unique ID, there's something in the code that isn't referring to the unique IDs that are internally assigned when it goes to draw the UI.  As you note, they do mine fine regardless, as the console shows.  I hope to squish this one soon, as it's been there a while and will only keep being an issue



Yes, my apologies for that.  However, it should be easy to re-enter pool information if you use one of the default pools as your login information will be pre-populated from previous keychain entries regardless of Asteroid version.  Actually you just gave me an idea, perhaps I can allow custom pools to be saved in a similar manner...  Anyway, Asteroid does include code to migrate preferences from version to version, but the format changed slightly between the two most recent versions and I think there's likely a bug or two in there too.  I'll have a look for 0.9.6, and thanks for the feedback

Asteroid still only displays the hashrate of 1 of my 3 erupters in the UI, but the "Miner Console" lists the proper hashrate. They show up as "AMU-1, AMU-2, AMU-3" instead of "ASICMINER USB Block Erupter" as the image on the website indicates it should be... What's going on?

Also, none of my settings were saved when I upgraded from 0.9.4. Very frustrating.

Asteroid 0.9.5 is now out
Download here or run "Check for updates..." from the in-app Asteroid menu

This is also a bug fix release that should take care of a lot of the rare cases people had where Asteroid wasn't updating.  There are still some known UI issues (particularly for multiple identical devices) but rest assured they are indeed mining (click the "i" to see).  Change log is as follows:

• Preference window should no longer blank out when entering a bitcoin address
• Recommended settings for litecoin/scrypt have been tweaked with sanity checks
• Fixed scenario where Asteroid would never appear to do anything upon launch
• Added ability to disable FTDI VCP drivers
• Option to disable conflicting USB drivers is now only presented when applicable, and in a unified box
• Added ability to remember choice when disabling drivers
• Adding custom pools should now work as expected
• Fixed some scenarios where the miner would be running but Asteroid wouldn't update
• Added "SHA-256" and "scrypt" wordings where applicable, to highlight how to mine altcoins
• Editing a pool will always load entries from the Mac keychain automatically
• Progress bar is set to previous maximum values on launch
• Reset UI elements to reflect changes when switching between coin types

Please remember that Asteroid does not need any extra drivers or installs of any kind, unlike other miners!  True plug-and-play.