Topic: Re: Stratix-5 A7 or D5 project 01.05.2013 update (Read 6610 times)

Start project with fresh asic chip? how long would it take 2 produce the chip? 2014?

Kewl

Mods please close this topic, I will open another one because I decided to start the project with a fresh ASIC chip.
New topic will be open as soon as I have a team ready. Probably all EU located.
Thanks again for help and my best wishes for all!

I have only mentioned, but not for my project. Thanks for a good luck, I think I need it.

You did mention Cyclones in post #83. It's even quoted in your message. But as I said I could not understand that sentence, e.g. if you refer to Cyclones in your own project or in some other project.  Anyways, good luck on your project.

I have contacted other 2 companies for more information about their chips.
I have some helpers here from the forum for the design and testing part -> so something is moving here also

No, no never mentioned Cyclones so stay tunned on this post.

That's what I thought too, but I got a little confused parsing your sentence regarding the Cyclones. But as I said initially 60W is a lot for a single FPGA.

I'm not talking about Cyclone, but Stratix V

Then you should forward my message above to this person.


60W is a lot for a single FPGA , especially if it's a Cyclone. But it's not a lot for a miner full of Cyclone chips.

Well in this case he's wanting to implement FPGA's that nobody has used for mining yet (to our knowledge) mainly because of their cost. So that's why I'm curious where he's getting these numbers, because 60W for a FPGA is a lot.

And if you're getting this info from a person, either have them join the forums or give you information that you can quote. I don't like empty numbers without some amount of backing.

As I write on an earlier post, I get information from a person, who is working with FPGA, and I think He is not a member in this forum.
I would like to see how much power usage will figure out cyclone chips from Kncminer, so I don't think 60W is a lot.

Actually it's the software which will tell you your hashing performance, not the hardware.

Using your current hardware to check how fast it will run is risky as you don't know the process parameters of the particular part you have in the lab. It might be way faster than it's labeled speed grade. Your next production batch might not be.

Run the RTL code through Quartus. Then you run static timing analysis in Quartus and it will tell you the max clock frequency the slowest part will operate at. Multiply this with the number of hash operation the architecture can perform on each clock and you have your hash rate.

Or you have to make a design which will dynamically increase the clock speed until it fails to calculate nonces and then step down the clock until it starts to produce correct results. This is more complex as you have to make sure that timing errors don't propagate into your safe clock domain. It's also more complex to make sure your thermal solution can handle this behavior.

For power you should run a simulation of the full implementation of the design and generate a VCD (Value Change Dump) file which will show the toggle rate for all the nets in the design. This can be included in a power analysis tool like PowerPlay. This will give you a good estimate of the power consumption of the FPGA.

60W sounds like a lot for a single FPGA.

Well where are you getting the estimates? Or are you just speculating on numbers? I'd like real numbers too.

If you hire a skilled engineer who knows how to do the simulations those  numbers should be acurate enough. At least you could  see how many cores fit into  this or that fpga  etc. BTW its very unlikely that your  hwdeveloper has not some hardware  to test the design. 'Exact' numbers would also depend on the schematic for the power supply which may be different from the one used on the development board.

I wonder the NDA allows you to disclose  you have to pay 80 BTC, as  prices are usually also subject to NDAs.

OK let's try this a different way:

what is the exact hash rate and power consumption reported by the tools for your current HDL design?

In other words, what are the exact numbers the tools are projecting for you right now?

I understand everything, but software is software and real tests are real tests.
As I said the hasrate is 1-3ghash/s, maybe little more, and the power usage is something near 60W, but I would like to put exact numbers.
With the software I don't think I could get exact numbers.

In case you did not understand my previous post, you do not need real hardware to get those answers.   The actual real world numbers will vary a bit (small percentage), but certainly the tools provide enough information for you to figure out if the project is even worth building real hardware for.

(hash rate, power, unit cost)

Obviously, since unit cost is in several thousand dollar range, the hash rate and power consumption from your analysis would need to be compelling to be marketable.

I know and I agree with you. But I don't like to say for example:
New BTC/LTC machine with xy hashrate using yz power and than when I start selling, sorry people I give you wrong hashing numbers and wrong power usage.
I would like to be honest with everyone. I know that I'm asking too much, but I would like to do a project and be proud that I'm not one of the scammers who would like to sell something that doesn't exists.
I said that I'm doing a new project from scratch, before I get some answers from some company, so everything changed.

And when I will start selling, I will start selling on the date written!

I want write the real hash numbers and power usage!

Sorry, but for what it's worth, this is not customary and since you have already declared you don't have any experience developing anything (let alone HDL or boards with high end FPGA on them), asking for 80BTC in donations might diminish people confidence in you.

You may want to defer asking for donations until you have demonstrated that your plan is more fully thought through, and that you have the capability to produce something.  There is already a lot of people on here angry at multiple organizations for taking their money and not producing anything 6 months / 1 year / 18 months later.

Again, IMHO, you don't actually need to have physical hardware until you want to establish the (marginal) performance gains you'll get through overclocking/cooling in the real world.  Under normal conditions, the reports from the tools are accurate enough.