Author

Topic: Cairsnmore1s, Icarus, Lancelot, ZTEX etc.....What's happened to them? (Read 606 times)

newbie
Activity: 4
Merit: 0
The following is the thought process that led me to this site combined with discussions with my supervisor and a couple of other students. Realistically a cheap option for the department would be to buy 10-15 of the same type of device. Currently we share a single board SP601 between 4 of us for practical elements of the course:

http://www.xilinx.com/products/boards-and-kits/EK-S6-SP601-G-image.htm

The only thing that it offers extra is an ethernet connection over one of these bitcoin mining boards

Latest sale that I found on ebay values a Cairnsmore1 at around £50-£60:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/FPGA-Bitcoin-mining-rig-5x-Enterpoint-Cairnsmore1-miners-4-1GH-s-btc-miner-/281273958864

There's an ad valuing a ZTEX 1.15y at £100ea, but no bids on that:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/2-x-ZTEX-1-15y-FPGA-Quad-board-800Mh-SHA256-Coin-miner-/161237115709

This probably gives an open market value of about £30 ea for Icarus and Lancelot boards as they have 2 rather than 4 Spartan fpgas?

Clearly the components are worth more than this, however, recycling bga components is close to being a waste of time. In addition, because the software to develop on the Spartan 6 150 is so expensive the demand should be pretty small for these boards. As I'm at a university I have use of their software licences on their systems.

This all assumes that no-one comes up with an alternative commercial use for loads of fpga boards that have been retired from bitcoin mining.
legendary
Activity: 2128
Merit: 1005
ASIC Wannabe
sell it on ebay - you'll probably sell it for enough money to buy 10-40GH of ASICs
hero member
Activity: 728
Merit: 500
 I gave my CM1's and Ztex as a gift to a newbie.
I needed the space for Asics Cheesy
legendary
Activity: 1379
Merit: 1003
nec sine labore
What do people do with them? Are they genuinely obsolete? Or are there any other uses that people put them to? Where do they go?

In particular, I'm looking to buy one for a project from someone in the UK:

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/wtb-hoping-to-buy-a-cainsmore1-fpga-miner-or-similar-uk-cambridge-504695

Any help or guidance is appreciated.

I have a few cairnsmore left, I'm in Italy.

spiccioli
legendary
Activity: 1610
Merit: 1000
What do people do with them? Are they genuinely obsolete? Or are there any other uses that people put them to? Where do they go?

In particular, I'm looking to buy one for a project from someone in the UK:

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/wtb-hoping-to-buy-a-cainsmore1-fpga-miner-or-similar-uk-cambridge-504695

Any help or guidance is appreciated.
I have lancelots +USB brogrammer. I am not in uk. If you do not find your UK deal pm me. My location is EU
newbie
Activity: 4
Merit: 0
What do people do with them? Are they genuinely obsolete? Or are there any other uses that people put them to? Where do they go?

In particular, I'm looking to buy one for a project from someone in the UK:

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/wtb-hoping-to-buy-a-cainsmore1-fpga-miner-or-similar-uk-cambridge-504695

Any help or guidance is appreciated.
Jump to: