Came here to post that the machine the iMiner was plugged into spontaneously reboot, so after lord knows how long: a whopping BTC0.00236264 mined with it
But at least it was still running.
Topic: iMiner -- the really smallest and coolest BTC miner in the world (Read 11344 times)
Oops.. forgot to update this - new chip is supposedly still coming, but won't be in another iMiner type form-factor.
Came here to post that the machine the iMiner was plugged into spontaneously reboot, so after lord knows how long: a whopping BTC0.00236264 mined with it
But at least it was still running.
Came here to post that the machine the iMiner was plugged into spontaneously reboot, so after lord knows how long: a whopping BTC0.00236264 mined with it
But at least it was still running.
April 21, 2014, 12:43:50 PM
So we're 3 weeks into April - what's the news on the new chip (and potential new miners)?
For the curious, that iMiner's still busily hashing away:
Code:
cgminer version 3.1.1 - Started: [2014-03-13 21:58:41]
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(5s):110.1M (avg):298.3Mh/s | A:112812 R:172 HW:2453 U:2.0/m WU:4.1/m
ST: 2 SS: 1 NB: 6541 LW: 447426 GF: 4623 RF: 10
Connected to pool.50btc.com diff 2 with stratum as user [email protected]
Block: 000083bca2cfe921... Diff:6.98G Started: [18:36:53] Best share: 5.58M
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[P]ool management [S]ettings [D]isplay options [Q]uit
ICA 0: | 293.4M/298.3Mh/s | A:112812 R:172 HW:2453 U:2.02/m
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(5s):110.1M (avg):298.3Mh/s | A:112812 R:172 HW:2453 U:2.0/m WU:4.1/m
ST: 2 SS: 1 NB: 6541 LW: 447426 GF: 4623 RF: 10
Connected to pool.50btc.com diff 2 with stratum as user [email protected]
Block: 000083bca2cfe921... Diff:6.98G Started: [18:36:53] Best share: 5.58M
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[P]ool management [S]ettings [D]isplay options [Q]uit
ICA 0: | 293.4M/298.3Mh/s | A:112812 R:172 HW:2453 U:2.02/m
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
March 12, 2014, 10:45:00 AM
March 05, 2014, 10:00:16 AM
Interestingly enough, the price has come down.
About $11/unit (excludes shipping) direct, or $71.25 per 3 off of aliexpress (there's cheaper there, but I don't know if they're on the up-and-up).
About $11/unit (excludes shipping) direct, or $71.25 per 3 off of aliexpress (there's cheaper there, but I don't know if they're on the up-and-up).
March 03, 2014, 02:29:26 AM
I got .000001 BTC that says this ends up being a shamble.
Out of sheer curiosity.. willing to make good on that? 1MnrCEe1cn6w6SY26iFnFiWWDFFzAyQFNB (50BTC didn't accept several 1iMiner addresses) - you can add it to the satoshis that some day in the far far future will be paid out to it from the iMiner's progress Selling flash drives as miners 
It was only a matter of time i suppose. 
Well, it's a miner being sold in a flash drive package - slight distinction It was only a matter of time i suppose. Nice scam !!
Alas, it's not a scam. ( I have to admit that part of me was hoping that it was, just so I could chuckle at my friend. )How is this thread still even open? 
Why wouldn't it be? Heck, I'm actually looking forward to their next generation chip, especially if they make another release in a 'cute' package like this. Always nice to have additional players in the market 
Would have to be a fair bit cheaper to become give-away little things, though. March 02, 2014, 03:32:52 AM
hah, yeah I meant ASIC.. that's what I get for rushing. Who knows, it could still be one of the older chips relabeled.. would have to check if the apparent pinout resembles any of those (edit: doesn't look like it does); though even then it could just be 'modeled after'. It's definitely a tight little package though
the chip looks larger than an avalon or asicminer chip
Probably. The physical package size is very slightly larger than 7.5mm on each side, and it's a 64-pin package. BE100 is 40 pin, Avalon 3256 and BitFury's are 48.
March 02, 2014, 02:51:03 AM
hah, yeah I meant ASIC.. that's what I get for rushing. Who knows, it could still be one of the older chips relabeled.. would have to check if the apparent pinout resembles any of those (edit: doesn't look like it does); though even then it could just be 'modeled after'. It's definitely a tight little package though
the chip looks larger than an avalon or asicminer chip
March 01, 2014, 11:43:09 PM
hah, yeah I meant ASIC.. that's what I get for rushing. Who knows, it could still be one of the older chips relabeled.. would have to check if the apparent pinout resembles any of those (edit: doesn't look like it does); though even then it could just be 'modeled after'. It's definitely a tight little package though
March 01, 2014, 09:37:07 PM
^really nice review
personally i had expected a gen-1 avalon or asicminer chip. This seems like a custom design ASIC.
I say ASIC because an FPGA would not be capable of 300mhash <2.5w. (most FPGAs were 200-250mhash using 10-20W)
personally i had expected a gen-1 avalon or asicminer chip. This seems like a custom design ASIC.
I say ASIC because an FPGA would not be capable of 300mhash <2.5w. (most FPGAs were 200-250mhash using 10-20W)
March 01, 2014, 03:58:23 PM
Right, details then.
Quick teardown of the iCointech iMiner
Product link: http://www.icointech.com/product1_en.php
A friend of mine ordered some (one of those BTC 'rich kids' who mined way back when) and threw one my way to dissect before he was going to plug them in, himself. I'm all set up for USB peripheral shenanigans, he is not.
I have to admit that I was skeptical as well well. Who wouldn't be? It's a super tiny miner, supposedly, in a package not unlike that of a USB stick. Like these:
http://www.dhgate.com/store/product/flash-drive-10pcs-lot-usb-2-0-cap-u-disk/139494557.html
http://www.legitreviews.com/images/reviews/923/ocz_diesel.jpg
http://www.usbbook.com/productinfo.asp?id=325
I did remark earlier in the thread that these are pretty standard husks that you could fill with whatever if you really wanted to:
http://www.wholesale-usb-flash-drive.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=6&products_id=133
Note that there are some slight variations, mostly in the cap and endcap, but also in whether there's any grooves and, if so, where (thin sides vs broad sides) I believe this is closer to what the iMiner's husk actually is:
http://www.promo-wholesale.com/china/Hard-Drives/8/Sprite-1-Gb-USB-Flash-Drive-47848.htm
I actually have a USB stick quite like it, and I took a comparison picture.
Precautions
Machine completely disconnected from the internet, running a sandboxed VM, all ready to go with a USB sniffer, network sniffer and procmon in case it turned out to be a USB stick with some executable on it.
Turns out, all of that was unnecessary. The cgminer version pointed to is stock version 3.1.1, the batch file simply adds the parameters:
--icarus-options 115200:1:1 --icarus-timing 3.3=120
So we can already tell a little bit about what we could expect to find later, that along with the CP2102 drivers (note: there's newer available that add a cert for Windows 8.1 - the version number has not been updated by SI, though) at the very least suggests something other than a regular USB stick, which tend to have a controller+usb interface chip fully integrated together.
Plugging it into the machine, nothing untoward appears to be happening. The usual banter back and forth getting USB details. It just registers as a virtual COM port - there's no custom Vendor ID or anything in here ( USB\VID_10C4&PID_EA60\0001 ). No flash drive, no HID trying to quickly take over the machine through simulating keypresses - nothing. All that happened externally was 4 blinks and then the LED remaining on.
Benign, let's give 'r
Considering the device itself appeared to be benign, and cgminer was benign, I figured what the heck and powered it up on an easy-going pool (50BTC - yeah, I read all the reports - I don't usually mine at all and they were less hassle than eligius, this is not an endorsement).
Lo and behold, the LED turned off, and shortly after, cgminer happily reported almost 300Mhash/s from the device. Along with, eventually, shares (short blink of the LED) and hardware errors (longer blink of the LED).
Edit: After 10,000 Satoshi at 50BTC, stats:
cgminer version 3.1.1 - Started: [2014-03-02 05:32:21]
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(5s):374.4M (avg):298.5Mh/s | A:6833 R:1 HW:147 U:2.0/m WU:4.1/m
ST: 2 SS: 0 NB: 331 LW: 26777 GF: 283 RF: 1
/Edit
So, it certainly appears to be legitimately a Bitcoin miner, albeit obviously one 'for fun' and not for ROI (like 95% of the devices available, right? right.)
But what is inside it?
What is inside?
There are two types of these husks. One where a thin sheet metal is clamped around plastic, and one where the main body is a thick metal. Unfortunately, the iMiner uses the latter. I say unfortunately, but that's really a good thing as the metal acts as not just the main body, but also the heat sink. Still, it meant that getting into it was a lot more difficult. Removing the end cap just showed that the board was practically epoxied down with thermal goop (and possibly some thermal tape), so it certainly wasn't going to be sliding out the way it had slid in during assembly.
Thankfully, it's just aluminum or some other soft metal like it, and a small hacksaw made short work of not being able to get at the innards.
Once the innards were exposed, what became visible as the main components were:
Silicon Labs CP2102 USB-UART Bridge used for communication between the USB host and whatever is inside the stick.
A crystal at 8.380MHz.Could be 8MHz round, but some goop that won't budge (didn't want to touch it with rubbing alcohol just yet) is covering up the last digits.
Alpha & Omega AO Z1038PI buck voltage regulator. Probably because the other chips don't want none of that USB 5V goodness.
Silicon Labs C8051F330 microcontroller.. Probably to offload all the communication tasks.
A big fat chip that gets really hot with the markings: QT20 / CA3755. That 'QT20' sounded familiar, but a friend of mine asked an FPGA guy and he wasn't sure (because it's probably an ASIC, duh). The other code on there - X1349 - is just a batch and date code (49th week of 2013), similar codes are present on the SI components while the AOZ1038 may have been produced in 2014. Nonetheless, given the parameters, this is probably an ASIC. Somebody will probably pop up and remind me why the 'QT20' sounds familiar.
Mining away
After I took it apart, did it still work? Absolutely. With a little extra cooling from an otherwise completely useless 'laptop helper fan' (no, seriously, don't buy them for that - the physics say it doesn't work well, and reality agrees), it's mining away even as I write this.
Full images
Full images? Of course, full images! This post is long enough without a bunch of full size (even if proxied) inline images, so please enjoy them, along with descriptions, over at imgur:
http://imgur.com/a/5wmv2#0
Edit March 6th: And since I figured I'd better put it back together again, the tearup:
Album: http://imgur.com/a/9Jc0X
Scam or no scam?
So now the question.. is it a scam or is it not a scam?
If the definition of the scam were "it's just a USB flash drive", then no - it is not a scam. It certainly behaves like a miner, and the pool is accepting shares so as far as I can tell, it's not faking it either.
If the definition of scam is "getting people to part with money they'll never see positive return on", then I'd say that's still a no. Mining hasn't been particularly profitable for most devices, let alone low power ones like these.
While communication could be handled better (all these 'scam!' posts could have been prevented pretty easily by sending one to a trusted member, or at least posting more details), I think the 'scam!' battle cry should be reserved for those products/sales/companies that have been verified as scams, rather than just 'gut feeling'.
Quick teardown of the iCointech iMiner
Product link: http://www.icointech.com/product1_en.php
A friend of mine ordered some (one of those BTC 'rich kids' who mined way back when) and threw one my way to dissect before he was going to plug them in, himself. I'm all set up for USB peripheral shenanigans, he is not.
I have to admit that I was skeptical as well well. Who wouldn't be? It's a super tiny miner, supposedly, in a package not unlike that of a USB stick. Like these:
http://www.dhgate.com/store/product/flash-drive-10pcs-lot-usb-2-0-cap-u-disk/139494557.html
http://www.legitreviews.com/images/reviews/923/ocz_diesel.jpg
http://www.usbbook.com/productinfo.asp?id=325
I did remark earlier in the thread that these are pretty standard husks that you could fill with whatever if you really wanted to:
http://www.wholesale-usb-flash-drive.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=6&products_id=133
Note that there are some slight variations, mostly in the cap and endcap, but also in whether there's any grooves and, if so, where (thin sides vs broad sides) I believe this is closer to what the iMiner's husk actually is:
http://www.promo-wholesale.com/china/Hard-Drives/8/Sprite-1-Gb-USB-Flash-Drive-47848.htm
I actually have a USB stick quite like it, and I took a comparison picture.
Precautions
Machine completely disconnected from the internet, running a sandboxed VM, all ready to go with a USB sniffer, network sniffer and procmon in case it turned out to be a USB stick with some executable on it.
Turns out, all of that was unnecessary. The cgminer version pointed to is stock version 3.1.1, the batch file simply adds the parameters:
--icarus-options 115200:1:1 --icarus-timing 3.3=120
So we can already tell a little bit about what we could expect to find later, that along with the CP2102 drivers (note: there's newer available that add a cert for Windows 8.1 - the version number has not been updated by SI, though) at the very least suggests something other than a regular USB stick, which tend to have a controller+usb interface chip fully integrated together.
Plugging it into the machine, nothing untoward appears to be happening. The usual banter back and forth getting USB details. It just registers as a virtual COM port - there's no custom Vendor ID or anything in here ( USB\VID_10C4&PID_EA60\0001 ). No flash drive, no HID trying to quickly take over the machine through simulating keypresses - nothing. All that happened externally was 4 blinks and then the LED remaining on.
Benign, let's give 'r
Considering the device itself appeared to be benign, and cgminer was benign, I figured what the heck and powered it up on an easy-going pool (50BTC - yeah, I read all the reports - I don't usually mine at all and they were less hassle than eligius, this is not an endorsement).
Lo and behold, the LED turned off, and shortly after, cgminer happily reported almost 300Mhash/s from the device. Along with, eventually, shares (short blink of the LED) and hardware errors (longer blink of the LED).
Edit: After 10,000 Satoshi at 50BTC, stats:
cgminer version 3.1.1 - Started: [2014-03-02 05:32:21]
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(5s):374.4M (avg):298.5Mh/s | A:6833 R:1 HW:147 U:2.0/m WU:4.1/m
ST: 2 SS: 0 NB: 331 LW: 26777 GF: 283 RF: 1
/Edit
So, it certainly appears to be legitimately a Bitcoin miner, albeit obviously one 'for fun' and not for ROI (like 95% of the devices available, right? right.)
But what is inside it?
What is inside?
There are two types of these husks. One where a thin sheet metal is clamped around plastic, and one where the main body is a thick metal. Unfortunately, the iMiner uses the latter. I say unfortunately, but that's really a good thing as the metal acts as not just the main body, but also the heat sink. Still, it meant that getting into it was a lot more difficult. Removing the end cap just showed that the board was practically epoxied down with thermal goop (and possibly some thermal tape), so it certainly wasn't going to be sliding out the way it had slid in during assembly.
Thankfully, it's just aluminum or some other soft metal like it, and a small hacksaw made short work of not being able to get at the innards.
Once the innards were exposed, what became visible as the main components were:
Silicon Labs CP2102 USB-UART Bridge used for communication between the USB host and whatever is inside the stick.
A crystal at 8.380MHz.
Alpha & Omega AO Z1038PI buck voltage regulator. Probably because the other chips don't want none of that USB 5V goodness.
Silicon Labs C8051F330 microcontroller.. Probably to offload all the communication tasks.
A big fat chip that gets really hot with the markings: QT20 / CA3755. That 'QT20' sounded familiar, but a friend of mine asked an FPGA guy and he wasn't sure (because it's probably an ASIC, duh). The other code on there - X1349 - is just a batch and date code (49th week of 2013), similar codes are present on the SI components while the AOZ1038 may have been produced in 2014. Nonetheless, given the parameters, this is probably an ASIC. Somebody will probably pop up and remind me why the 'QT20' sounds familiar.
Mining away
After I took it apart, did it still work? Absolutely. With a little extra cooling from an otherwise completely useless 'laptop helper fan' (no, seriously, don't buy them for that - the physics say it doesn't work well, and reality agrees), it's mining away even as I write this.
Full images
Full images? Of course, full images! This post is long enough without a bunch of full size (even if proxied) inline images, so please enjoy them, along with descriptions, over at imgur:
http://imgur.com/a/5wmv2#0
Edit March 6th: And since I figured I'd better put it back together again, the tearup:
Album: http://imgur.com/a/9Jc0X
Scam or no scam?
So now the question.. is it a scam or is it not a scam?
If the definition of the scam were "it's just a USB flash drive", then no - it is not a scam. It certainly behaves like a miner, and the pool is accepting shares so as far as I can tell, it's not faking it either.
If the definition of scam is "getting people to part with money they'll never see positive return on", then I'd say that's still a no. Mining hasn't been particularly profitable for most devices, let alone low power ones like these.
While communication could be handled better (all these 'scam!' posts could have been prevented pretty easily by sending one to a trusted member, or at least posting more details), I think the 'scam!' battle cry should be reserved for those products/sales/companies that have been verified as scams, rather than just 'gut feeling'.
March 01, 2014, 01:50:53 PM
Hate to say i told you all so, but...................... I TOLD YOU SO. I tried to warn you it was a USB flash drive.
Nope. Details to follow - heading out at the moment. Just thought I'd go ahead and say 'Nope' for now. March 01, 2014, 01:38:37 PM
Hate to say i told you all so, but...................... I TOLD YOU SO. I tried to warn you it was a USB flash drive.
February 21, 2014, 05:53:23 PM
You guys should update your name to "iConTech"
February 21, 2014, 11:09:12 AM
I think its cute
Now you can buy it on aliexpress or ebay, 27$ for one with free shipping.
http://www.aliexpress.com/item/BTC-miner-BTC-38Gh-s-miner-BTC-mining-machine-BTC-USB-bitcoin-miner/1277786413.html
http://www.aliexpress.com/wholesale?SearchText=iMiner&catId=&initiative_id=SB_20140221070613
February 21, 2014, 01:00:44 AM
How is this thread still even open?
February 21, 2014, 12:07:05 AM
Looks nice, what will be the price to buy one?
Now you can buy it for 27$ with free shipping on aliexpress or ebay.
http://www.aliexpress.com/item/BTC-miner-BTC-38Gh-s-miner-BTC-mining-machine-BTC-USB-bitcoin-miner/1277786413.html
http://www.aliexpress.com/wholesale?SearchText=iMiner&catId=&initiative_id=SB_20140220193257[/b]
February 20, 2014, 11:58:09 PM
Nice scam !!
I can also order them at any put youre logo on a usb stick website, same colors , same constant on colored light.
but they just cost 1 usd for 8gb 8P
Go scam youre grandmas, maybee they believe it
I can also order them at any put youre logo on a usb stick website, same colors , same constant on colored light.
but they just cost 1 usd for 8gb 8P
Go scam youre grandmas, maybee they believe it
Be polite, gentlemen.
Many people don't think the BTC miner can be made so small. Haha, but we did it.
This is a evaluating report on CYBTC.COM, which is one of the most famous BTC website in China.
http://www.cybtc.com/article-594-1.html
Now, there are more and more people buying it and selling it on ebay and aliexpress.
http://www.aliexpress.com/wholesale?SearchText=iMiner&catId=&initiative_id=SB_20140220193257
http://www.aliexpress.com/item/BTC-miner-BTC-38Gh-s-miner-BTC-mining-machine-BTC-USB-bitcoin-miner/1277786413.html
We are a techinical team in China, and we like make electronic products nice and smart.
BTC is the most amazing invension in the world in this century. We think BTC miners should not be cumbersome and ugly.
This Apail, we will present our new miners with our second generation chips, which would be very nice and cute and with powerful hashrates.
February 17, 2014, 03:32:11 PM
Nice scam !!
I can also order them at any put youre logo on a usb stick website, same colors , same constant on colored light.
but they just cost 1 usd for 8gb 8P
Go scam youre grandmas, maybee they believe it
I can also order them at any put youre logo on a usb stick website, same colors , same constant on colored light.
but they just cost 1 usd for 8gb 8P
Go scam youre grandmas, maybee they believe it
February 17, 2014, 03:27:09 PM
Why spend money on design? put all money in performance, ROI is more important then design
IF u sell these devices for 3 dollar then its a great deal
IF u sell these devices for 3 dollar then its a great deal
February 17, 2014, 12:57:31 PM
I asked for pricing, and with the suggested DHL shipping the costs were rediculous.
0.03BTC per unit before shipping is too much. I would pay 0.05BTC for 2 if that included shipping simply due to thier novelty value and to see whats inside, but anything more than that is just throwing away money on something worthless
0.03BTC per unit before shipping is too much. I would pay 0.05BTC for 2 if that included shipping simply due to thier novelty value and to see whats inside, but anything more than that is just throwing away money on something worthless
We are glad you like iMiner. And we are sorry for the price, because the exchange rate between BTC and CNY changes a lot those days.
There are more and more vendors on aliexpress and ebay now. They would provide better and cheeper shipping ways.
For example:
http://www.aliexpress.com/wholesale?SearchText=iMiner&catId=0&initiative_id=SB_20140217085000
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