Hacking BFL Monarchs and servicing them while times are weird. - page 5.

BadgerHobbs

jr. member

Activity: 77

Merit: 3

Join CKPool!

Has anyone tried using the BFL Monarch in the PCIE slots in their PC?

I've ordered 3 BFL Monarchs that are arriving on Thursday to try out for fun and was wondering if anyone had actually tried putting them into their motherboard. I'm getting the 500Gh/s versions so just one will be pulling about 290w from my computer's PSU (I've plugged an Antminer S1 (350w) into it in the past with no issues but it was sketchy af Cheesy

). I couldn't find anything online about someone trying it out so i thought that i would ask, if not ill be sure to try it out

Ed.Snowden

newbie

Activity: 13

Merit: 0

Thank you Lightfoot for the elusive BFG for Monarchs!👍
I'll leave a link for anyone else that needs it.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1sVJlHESfIDfzuFyWQRkQEqVt7XouqDBz/view?usp=drivesdk

Ed.Snowden

newbie

Activity: 13

Merit: 0

Does anyone have a copy of the original Bfgminer for Monarchs? I have the queue-ing error problem. Please provide a link, ANYONE.
Creating a download link to virtually any of your files is easy with a FREE Google Drive account, just upload the file and click on link sharing.

Ed.Snowden

newbie

Activity: 13

Merit: 0

@helipotte...

Quote from: helipotte on December 31, 2017, 05:10:11 PM

I have always had good luck using CGminer for early low serial number monarchs. And the latest Bfgminer with the later ones. What firmware does your unit have? If it is 1.4.2 CGminer might work well.

I've been downloading and installing tons of $h👁t ; curl, glib, gettextruntime, pkg-config, gtkruntime, libtool, mingw, etc., since you posted this reply and I'm still no closer to getting CGminer to work. Why doesn't someone make a miner with a Windows installer, I don't know linux, or command prompts, can't I BUY a simple quality mining program? Trying to get these mining programs to work really makes me appreciate the router like GUI interface in my Antminers.
P.S. I already tried Multiminer, it didn't detect any of my devices, it just started mining with my GPU (Nvidia) useless.

Ed.Snowden

newbie

Activity: 13

Merit: 0

I gave up. Too complicated. I ordered 5 S4's and a Wi-Fi hotspot and Ethernet to Wi-Fi bridge. Electricity is FREE at work. The Monarch is a beautiful paperweight. It's running over 500gig, even with half of the strings erroring out. It says "Failed to find work for queue" and "sanity check" very, very fast and then it mines the other half of the strings.

lightfoot

legendary

Activity: 3164

Merit: 2258

I fix broken miners. And make holes in teeth :-)

Quote from: Kuschelweich on January 01, 2018, 11:05:53 AM

Have been reading the official underclocking documentation on these, but it's fairly sparse about what you can actually expect to get from the huge range of frequency settings available. Basically I'd be interested in finding the absolute best W/GH these can produce.

One thing that I can't find any more information about is the 2x Mode mentioned in the manual other than that it's only available with voltage indexes of 4 or above. I even used an archive to search the old BFL forums, but nothing about it there either. Is it actually worth messing with? Does it double performance or some such?

Thanks!

F0D and F1D are the values above FFX. To be honest heat is your key indicator of efficiency, when the heat starts rising faster than linearly then you know you're entering the too much power zone.

Right now I get great efficiency using FEX and FCX on a pair of 2 plug BFL Monarchs being used to keep a room (quite) warm. They're running off a pair of 700 watt supplies, probably pulling under 300 watts each, so around .4w/gh and pulling around 62c at the chips. Which given the silence is not bad and probably profitable.

Kuschelweich

newbie

Activity: 32

Merit: 0

Have been reading the official underclocking documentation on these, but it's fairly sparse about what you can actually expect to get from the huge range of frequency settings available. Basically I'd be interested in finding the absolute best W/GH these can produce.

One thing that I can't find any more information about is the 2x Mode mentioned in the manual other than that it's only available with voltage indexes of 4 or above. I even used an archive to search the old BFL forums, but nothing about it there either. Is it actually worth messing with? Does it double performance or some such?

Thanks!

helipotte

hero member

Activity: 650

Merit: 500

Pick and place? I need more coffee.

I have always had good luck using CGminer for early low serial number monarchs. And the latest Bfgminer with the later ones. What firmware does your unit have? If it is 1.4.2 CGminer might work well.

lightfoot

legendary

Activity: 3164

Merit: 2258

I fix broken miners. And make holes in teeth :-)

Try this one:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/tpmpf7u03wxpl74/Bfgminer-For%20Monarchs.zip?dl=0

If that doesn't work PM me your email and I'll send a copy over

Ed.Snowden

newbie

Activity: 13

Merit: 0

OK 4.2.0 version (http://bfgminer.org/files/4.2.0/)
This version doesn't seem to have an EXE file, and a BAT file doesn't work either. How is this used?

Ed.Snowden

newbie

Activity: 13

Merit: 0

"Restricted Content
This file is no longer available. For additional information contact Dropbox Support."

lightfoot

legendary

Activity: 3164

Merit: 2258

I fix broken miners. And make holes in teeth :-)

Quote from: Ed.Snowden on December 30, 2017, 05:40:03 PM

It has 3 pcie power ports all 3 are connected to the new PSU. I can't try version 4.20 because the download link is dead.I DID order the cooling system from eBay (https://www.ebay.com/itm/COOLIT-Systems-Eco-III-120FB-Liquid-Cooling-System-BFL-Butterfly-Labs-Surplus/162791485695?ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT&_trksid=p2057872.m2749.l2649)($31.64)

Quote from: lightfoot on December 30, 2017, 01:26:04 PM

60-70c is about the right temps. Set your max temp to 80c or so in bfgminer.conf just to be on the safe side, and mine away!

If 70°c is normal then I probably don't need the cooling system. I searched my PC for "bfgminer.conf" it doesn't exist. I believe that the "runme.bat" file is how to configure bfgminer, I haven't even been able to add a second user, the examples in the "read me" make no sense to me, without a user friendly gui...I'm lost.

Hm. I have the code here somewhere, let me see if this works.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/9vcjl4djwvdtwfc/Bfgminer-For%20Monarchs.zip?dl=0

Ed.Snowden

newbie

Activity: 13

Merit: 0

It has 3 pcie power ports all 3 are connected to the new PSU. I can't try version 4.20 because the download link is dead.I DID order the cooling system from eBay (https://www.ebay.com/itm/COOLIT-Systems-Eco-III-120FB-Liquid-Cooling-System-BFL-Butterfly-Labs-Surplus/162791485695?ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT&_trksid=p2057872.m2749.l2649)($31.64)

Quote from: lightfoot on December 30, 2017, 01:26:04 PM

60-70c is about the right temps. Set your max temp to 80c or so in bfgminer.conf just to be on the safe side, and mine away!

If 70°c is normal then I probably don't need the cooling system. I searched my PC for "bfgminer.conf" it doesn't exist. I believe that the "runme.bat" file is how to configure bfgminer, I haven't even been able to add a second user, the examples in the "read me" make no sense to me, without a user friendly gui...I'm lost.

lightfoot

legendary

Activity: 3164

Merit: 2258

I fix broken miners. And make holes in teeth :-)

It probably has two power plugs; you need to get the 4.20 version that had a custom requeuing trick to fix that.

Get the $19.00 heat sinks on Ebay, I just got one and they are brand spanking new. Warning, remove all the old heat sink compound from the chips and screw them down carefully as the chip is *exceptionally* thin.

60-70c is about the right temps. Set your max temp to 80c or so in bfgminer.conf just to be on the safe side, and mine away! Two of these will keep a bedroom toasty warm at 10 degrees F.

Ed.Snowden

newbie

Activity: 13

Merit: 0

I ran it for 2hrs with a small household fan pointed at the pumps/copper plates. It ran 65c and my pool says 516.5ghz but half of the device threads still give the error! Huh

Ed.Snowden

newbie

Activity: 13

Merit: 0

OK, it was the USB printer plug, after plugging and unplugging the cord a couple of times the PC found it. How hot should it get? It's running 60-70c .It seems hot! I went on eBay and ordered a new cooling system. The new problem now is that half of the device threads consistently give an error "Failed to find work for queue" and my pool says that I'm running at 410...not 700
Advice will be welcomed. My other miners were all plug-n-play.

Ed.Snowden

newbie

Activity: 13

Merit: 0

It has 3 pcie power ports, it is the latest version, nothing at all happens to my PC when I plug it in (not even the sound when a device is connected) like nothing is connected at all. When I connect the BFL60, without the drivers it makes a sound and looks for drivers and when I connect the Monarch NOTHING happens at all. And BFG Miner can't find it.
I'll take it to a local computer shop and have them trouble shoot it tomorrow, but tonight I'm depressed and disgusted with it. Angry

lightfoot

legendary

Activity: 3164

Merit: 2258

I fix broken miners. And make holes in teeth :-)

Check in hardware settings/device manager to see if a COM port is appearing. Also if the thing has two plugs you need to use the special 4.20 version of BFGMiner. If three use the latest version.

C

Ed.Snowden

newbie

Activity: 13

Merit: 0

I can't get it to work! When I plug it into my laptop, it isn't recognized...like nothing was plugged in. I installed the newest Virtual COM Port Drivers (http://www.ftdichip.com/Drivers/VCP.htm) and everything works with my little Butterfly BFL60, but the Monarch just sits there with the fans and pumps running. What do I do now? My laptop is Windows 7 and I'm using BFG Miner 5.4.2, maybe I need a different OS for usb?

lightfoot

legendary

Activity: 3164

Merit: 2258

I fix broken miners. And make holes in teeth :-)

Don't open the loop unless you have a spare heat sink set (some guy is selling them on Ebay for $20 each, if your Monarch had a leak in the cooling system that's a nice fix). Those things run the chips quite warm (60c) and any disruption in cooling will blow the chips since it is *very* thin (which really helps with heat dissipation).

Use the V3X and FBX values to slow it down, remember the second digit is hexidecimal but voltages above 4 are locked out) and have fun with it.

Topic: Hacking BFL Monarchs and servicing them while times are weird. - page 5. (Read 21272 times)