Topic: BFL ASIC mining board project - page 11. (Read 36510 times)
FWIW, outside of these particular intended purposes, the Noctura products rock, I've always used them, and they are super quiet. You probably know this though, but in case you didn't and ambient noise matters to you...
i would laugh so loud if BFL will deliver chips on time and go over avalon 
This looks very interesting.
A lot of hard work has gone into it so far, can't wait for the final product.
Seems to be a better board compared to the BFL Jalapeno as dwdoc mentioned.
A lot of hard work has gone into it so far, can't wait for the final product.
Seems to be a better board compared to the BFL Jalapeno as dwdoc mentioned.
MrTeal - anything new happen in the last week with the boards??
I think BFL are going to have to halve their chip price to remain competitive after Oct when KNCminer and possibly Hashfast are shipping.
*tingling sensation detected 
$300 for board + $400 for chips (using chip credits) + cooling ($30?) + psu ($50?) = $780ish?
Chriss99 at BFL forum is also designing a board for BFL chips but I think MrTeal is a little farther along.
Chriss99 at BFL forum is also designing a board for BFL chips but I think MrTeal is a little farther along.
I presume $300(plus chips) might be a typo. since 8 chips already costs $500.
OK, I claim dibs on part of the first production run - let me know when I can buy 10 or so of them. 
Jelin, the final board will take 8 although you can mount however many you'd like on it.
iikun, we're still estimating $300 (plus chips) for a fully populated 8 chip board.
iikun, we're still estimating $300 (plus chips) for a fully populated 8 chip board.
I'm branching this off from the old group buy thread, as that has a lot of posts that just aren't that applicable to the actual board design.
Project Description
This project is being developed by Mr Teal and Chip Geek, with the purpose to provide a high performance mining platform for the Butterfly Labs ASICs. By leveraging existing infrastructure in the PC space, the plan is to provide the chips with high levels of thermal and power headroom without spiraling cost out of control.
Once the design is proven, orders for the boards will begin. Chips can either be ordered through myself, or you can order chips and have them resent to us to have them populated onto miners.
Project Description
This project is being developed by Mr Teal and Chip Geek, with the purpose to provide a high performance mining platform for the Butterfly Labs ASICs. By leveraging existing infrastructure in the PC space, the plan is to provide the chips with high levels of thermal and power headroom without spiraling cost out of control.
Once the design is proven, orders for the boards will begin. Chips can either be ordered through myself, or you can order chips and have them resent to us to have them populated onto miners.
Hi, could you give an est price for the populated board with chips thru you? I'm not a part of a group buy.
Thx
Great
But the board take final 4 or 8 chips?
But the board take final 4 or 8 chips?
Very cool. Looks a lot simpler than the jalapeno board (below). Do I understand correctly that this is a test board that will run with 1 or 4 chips (not seen) but the final board will accomodate 1-8 chips?
ps-will be interesting to see what hashrate you get with each sample chip given the range advertised by bfl...
ps-will be interesting to see what hashrate you get with each sample chip given the range advertised by bfl...
I just realized that I never posted this here. Must have something to do with getting home after working on it at 4am yesterday.
PCBs are delivered and two are populated, other than the precious ASIC samples. I plan to build two more tomorrow (one with an ASIC mounted, one without) and ship two to Chip Geek for firmware testing while I characterize and test the power supply and tweak the power supply compensation loop. This project might take a little longer to get running once hardware arrives as it's a different MCU and there are several other features to add (external clocking, onboard temperature diode reading, dynamic frequency and voltage control, custom chaining interface, etc), but so far the chance of sticking to the timeline seems pretty good.
PCBs are delivered and two are populated, other than the precious ASIC samples. I plan to build two more tomorrow (one with an ASIC mounted, one without) and ship two to Chip Geek for firmware testing while I characterize and test the power supply and tweak the power supply compensation loop. This project might take a little longer to get running once hardware arrives as it's a different MCU and there are several other features to add (external clocking, onboard temperature diode reading, dynamic frequency and voltage control, custom chaining interface, etc), but so far the chance of sticking to the timeline seems pretty good.
mrteal, can you look at my PM to you?
I'm a little concerned about some direct contact heatpipe designs since there often is a gap between the heatpipes and the aluminum plate between then. That doesn't seem to be the case with the Evo as there isn't a gap between the heatpipes. The copper heatpipe area width is ~28mm, so it's likely that there might be a millimeter or two of the outside dies contacting the aluminum on the base plate instead of the copper, but the difference between the two is going to be inconsequential compared to the thermal resistance you'll get from your interface between the silicon and the heatsink anyway.
Ya, I realized the Hypte 212 isn't a bad one, but some of those direct heatpipe ones that work for a CPU would be devastating on an 8 chip design! I wouldn't expect very good performance, that's for sure. Again, the plan is that it will be something that's compliant with the mounting hole locations for an LGA1156 heatsink, but things like clearance and having a large enough base plate will be hit or miss. I'll do my best to provide a reasonable selection of coolers that will work with minimal or no tweaking, but it won't be something where you can grab any CPU cooler and toss it on there. There has to be a balance between providing options to people who want to try high end cooling or water blocks, and making the board larger and more expensive.
I'm a little concerned about some direct contact heatpipe designs since there often is a gap between the heatpipes and the aluminum plate between then. That doesn't seem to be the case with the Evo as there isn't a gap between the heatpipes. The copper heatpipe area width is ~28mm, so it's likely that there might be a millimeter or two of the outside dies contacting the aluminum on the base plate instead of the copper, but the difference between the two is going to be inconsequential compared to the thermal resistance you'll get from your interface between the silicon and the heatsink anyway.
Ya, I realized the Hypte 212 isn't a bad one, but some of those direct heatpipe ones that work for a CPU would be devastating on an 8 chip design! 
I'm a little concerned about some direct contact heatpipe designs since there often is a gap between the heatpipes and the aluminum plate between then. That doesn't seem to be the case with the Evo as there isn't a gap between the heatpipes. The copper heatpipe area width is ~28mm, so it's likely that there might be a millimeter or two of the outside dies contacting the aluminum on the base plate instead of the copper, but the difference between the two is going to be inconsequential compared to the thermal resistance you'll get from your interface between the silicon and the heatsink anyway.
So would I, but it's just not possible I'm afraid, at least not without a shim or a custom bracket. That being said, there's a lot of great coolers that should just work. I grabbed these from Tom's since they had a 10 cooler LGA1156 roundout that shows great pics of the mounting mechanism.
Arctic Freezer 7 - Would need a custom bracket.
[img ]http://media.bestofmicro.com/A/Q/236258/original/arctic-cooling_freezer-7-pro-rev2_installed.jpg[/img]
CM Hyper 212+ - Should work, I actually bought one to use
[img ]http://media.bestofmicro.com/A/V/236263/original/cooler-master_hyper-212-plus_installed.jpg[/img]
Noctua NH-D14 - Should work, I have one and will test
[img ]http://media.bestofmicro.com/B/0/236268/original/noctua_nh-d14_installed.jpg[/img]
Scythe Mugen-2 - Looks like it would
[img ]http://media.bestofmicro.com/B/5/236273/original/scythe_mugen-2-rev-b_installed.jpg[/img]
I won't show all the pictures, but of the others the Thermaltake Frio, Tuniq Tower 120 Extreme, Xigmatek Thor's Hammer look like they'll work while the Thermalright, Sunbeamtech and Zalman coolers wouldn't. There won't be a custom heatsink; there's no need since many CPU coolers will still work and there's no way I could offer the performance of something like the Hyper 212 Evo for the $30 that Newegg wants for it.
Arctic Freezer 7 - Would need a custom bracket.
[img ]http://media.bestofmicro.com/A/Q/236258/original/arctic-cooling_freezer-7-pro-rev2_installed.jpg[/img]
CM Hyper 212+ - Should work, I actually bought one to use
[img ]http://media.bestofmicro.com/A/V/236263/original/cooler-master_hyper-212-plus_installed.jpg[/img]
Noctua NH-D14 - Should work, I have one and will test
[img ]http://media.bestofmicro.com/B/0/236268/original/noctua_nh-d14_installed.jpg[/img]
Scythe Mugen-2 - Looks like it would
[img ]http://media.bestofmicro.com/B/5/236273/original/scythe_mugen-2-rev-b_installed.jpg[/img]
I won't show all the pictures, but of the others the Thermaltake Frio, Tuniq Tower 120 Extreme, Xigmatek Thor's Hammer look like they'll work while the Thermalright, Sunbeamtech and Zalman coolers wouldn't. There won't be a custom heatsink; there's no need since many CPU coolers will still work and there's no way I could offer the performance of something like the Hyper 212 Evo for the $30 that Newegg wants for it.
Would a Hyper 212 eve work? It's a direct heatpipe design, which doesn't really work for a multiple chip design unless you've got some sort of heat spreader between the chips and the heatsink. Otherwise, some chips could be cooled better than others.
The Noctua looks like it isn't a direct heatpipe design, so it might work better by way of not having to use a heat spreader first.
Any chance you will offer cooling installation as an option?
ps-I doubt it but wonder if anyone will offer to provide a hosting service for boards like these...
ps-I doubt it but wonder if anyone will offer to provide a hosting service for boards like these...
Probably. Just because of how mounting the heatsink works, some LGA1156/1155 heatsinks won't work. The ASICs only sit ~1mm off the board while a CPU sits considerably higher, so some heatsinks would sit too high depending on their retention mechanism. As well, some might have small interface areas or weird irregularities that could negatively impact cooling. To take some of that away, we'll probably offer a standard and tested cooler as an option along with the bare populated boards so people can just plug in and go.
I also plan to test the idea of a copper shim/heatspreader to get the height correct so that pretty much any cooler would work. Having another interface will degrade performance a little vs one, but it might be acceptable tradeoff to some people.
I'm sorry to hear that about the height of the chips. I would prefer a design that would allow any standard CPU heatsink to be used. Very interested to see the results of the shim/heatspreader idea... I expect it will be less than optimal but I'd recommend that you make this option available as it would make mounting a water block much easier for those who would like to go that route...
Have you considered a custom designed attachment kit? Perhaps something like a back-plate with a few simple bar springs to apply pressure? I'm thinking that a thermal pad interface is going to be necissary but it would be awesome if you could figure out a way to have a more direct connection using thermal paste...
If you do indeed find that a custom heatsink is necissary, please go with a copper base plate with heatpipes transferring the heat to a large aluminum radiator with fan. pretty much the standard premium heatsink design and in my experience it is extremely effective.
Thanks again for all your hard work, this is a very exciting project and I will be watching with great anticipation.
Arctic Freezer 7 - Would need a custom bracket.
CM Hyper 212+ - Should work, I actually bought one to use
Noctua NH-D14 - Should work, I have one and will test
Scythe Mugen-2 - Looks like it would
I won't show all the pictures, but of the others the Thermaltake Frio, Tuniq Tower 120 Extreme, Xigmatek Thor's Hammer look like they'll work while the Thermalright, Sunbeamtech and Zalman coolers wouldn't. There won't be a custom heatsink; there's no need since many CPU coolers will still work and there's no way I could offer the performance of something like the Hyper 212 Evo for the $30 that Newegg wants for it.
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