Topic: Klondike - 16 chip ASIC Open Source Board - Preliminary - page 129. (Read 435369 times)

party!

I love that they put two sets of holes on those fans. Great idea. Why no prices on their info?

** News Flash **
Just got an email that my K1 test boards have shipped out.
I'd expect them here in 6-7 days then. Job #1 - get everything ready for that.
And get the K16 finalized and out.

SCYTHE 100mm




SILENX 100mm

This is true I'm fairly confident this design will work, even with an ultraquiet low cfm fan.

SilenX do 100mm  http://www.silenx.com/quiet.fans.asp?sku=efx-10-12

There are a lot of 92mm fans out there, 100mm not so common.

So there are 2 options:
Both We are doing great
Both made a mistake

We'll see when some chips are here working and distributing the heat

Nice! Those look to be 100mm fans. I've only found 80mm and 120mm locally.
Well, I'm sure they exist out there.

It's eerie how similar our designs are.

How a single K16 with heatsink and fan will look

Ok. Back again, for my 2nd try at this (first one was wiped by the board software after 15 minutes typing it out!).

I picked up a number of things but the highly desired PIC chips had not yet arrived. Disappointed. I know they're overdue and should be there any day now. So I'll be calling in and going again as soon as they are there. I had to go this time due to other demands and was hoping they arrived before me. No luck.

But the good news is from forum member chaoztc who, just before I left, bread boarded up a couple of the same PICs and tested out the data signalling. He had good results with prelim code that transfers bursts of 104 bytes from one PIC to the other using my planned methods (software output, NOR gate, delay and UART input). Here's a few photos from him:

Breadboard showing NOR gates and PICs.


Burst of data between PICs.


Clock (yellow) and data (green) after NOR gate and RC delay going into UART.


This is great advance work and he sent me the sample code to work from going forward. I believe he's also using some info I sent his way to optimize for faster speeds.

The IR Thermometer arrived and works great. Thank You, Bicknellski.

No heat sinks qrrived but I did check a few shops in Bkk and got some useful stuff there. I have some small heat sinks for the K1 now, and a larger double size 115mm x 254mm x 30mm heat sink for the K16. I'll try mounting 2x K16 on this but it could be cut down for 2 units. This would work using the method where PCB mounts against heat sink as support member. They're going to get me a price on 400mm long for a 4x bar. The way these places work - I know they are buying from another local source for about half the price. I paid $6 for this double heat sink, so that's $3 each. I bet some wholesaler in Bkk has them for $3 each, $1.50 per K16. Hard to find out where. Will try to post some photos later but the ones I got look much the same as other posted here.

I picked up several tools and fans, and various bits which I'll be testing out soon. I expect to order the scope today thanks to KS who arranged a bitcoin sale for me and made a large donation in US$ to get this going. For as much as I love Bitcoin it's still a hassle to transfer in/out of $$.

A 300uS loss on 0.9 S work cycle (assuming 16 chips) would be 0.03%, so even if I can't get it fastest possible choaztc has already shown a speed that will make other friction much greater than not being able to push data at full speed. I'm confident we'll get quite close and if the ASIC is super picky about input timing I have a back up plan that may get us bang on 125nS timing, but is a bit tricky software wise.

Spot on Ente. I think from your calcs and the Avalon photos we can be pretty sure that a heat sink is needed, and air flow is needed, but after that it's not going to be critical just how much or how big the fins are. Good board -> heat sink contact is our main concern but I think we'll be fine there.

I think you might have one heat sink and a RAY GUN in hand... I hope at least.

Just back from Bkk. I have some news and will post a couple replies to posts above shortly. I have to have a shower and rest a bit first.

Off the top of my head I think it's 32 midstate, 24 pre-calc, 12 data, 8 clk cfg and with 8 chips/bank 32 bytes nonce data. Maybe it's not 12 bytes data. I don't have it in front of me now but I recall the Avalon driver having 12 bytes in it's task structure.

That would be 84 same for both banks + 32 different = 116 bytes.
At 4Mbps that's 29uS, though I think it will take a bit longer due to software clocking limits.

edit: oops. That's bytes not bits. x8 = 232 uS.

[/quote]
How big of a performance hit would there be if a software clocking algorithm took 500uS to 600uS to load the Avalon chips?
Thanks 

Ente,

Cumon Bra.... help.

Lazy I am.

Thank you Dunkelheit667 and wrenchmonkey. I will check both threads again.

BR.

The List of Avalon-ASIC-Miner-Developers and Assembler might help to find some upcoming Klondike PCB sources in the EU. Guess going this direction should be a bit more hassle free.

The design is not completed yet, and the files on the git should not be relied upon until the design has been tested and finalized.

You will need to program the boards, the designer is considering implementing the ability to flash over USB, but no promises.

Avalon has released the relevant information and it has been utilized. The current stage is to wait for developer chips, in order to finalize testing. There's not much that can be done with it until then. If you want to utilize the Avalon reference design, you still can. There are people offering to create Avalon clones.

Heatsinks will be required. Much of the recent crosstalk in this thread has been in regard to designing and sourcing heatsinks. You will need to source your own, or get on board with a group buy.

Hi all!

I am looking for a local PCB maker to build a few Klondike boards. I guess it will be expensive buy it may be worth it.
I have just very basic electronics knowledge and would need answers to a few questions:

About K16:
- It is a 4-layer PCB, right?
- will the chips need heatsinks or fans? I can't find any in the parts list.
- are the github files enough for a competent maker to produce the PCB and solder all the components? Or maybe will they need some more specifications?
- Will the board need to be programmed or just start cgminer with correct parameters and it will work?
- there is a folder named protoboards/power. Is it necessary information for building the PCB or just for prototypes?

About the project status
- As stated in Readme: "This project is incomplete and in progress. There may be errors, mistakes, incomplete portions at this time. Do NOT use these -- project files to order circuit boards until they have been finished and confirmed to work."

I think the Avalon reference design is needed to complete the project. Did they release it yet? The modifications are likely to be in PCB/components or just firmware?

Very basic questions but I have not been able to figure the answers out.
I want to say THANK YOU to Bkkcoins for such a great work and for his generosity (please post a bitcoin address to receive some well deserved donations)

thanks again!
p.s :   I am based in Spain.
p.s. 2: I found the adress