Right when it started getting interesting... It died out.
This isn't something that gets done on the forums, the progress gets shown here. The reference design is literally insane so they set a high bar to start with. I mean.... anyway, you'll see
Topic: The Open Source Block Erupter Project (Read 18966 times)
This isn't something that gets done on the forums, the progress gets shown here. The reference design is literally insane so they set a high bar to start with. I mean.... anyway, you'll see
Hopefully the silence means gears are turning and the oil lamp is burning!
Right when it started getting interesting... It died out.
Looks more like this to me (IBM Dec 2012):...
I'll leave it to ntekcomputers to comment on this, but it looks like this type of modular design has been conceived before.That just gave me an idea, maybe nTek Computers could somehow contribute to this project in exchange for Asicminer chips to test with on our new hardware heatsink, enclosure and special cooling design. Your all going to really love the next design! You will have to wait until it is released and in people's hands this time. Okay....Maybe we will show a sneak peak in the near future! ;-)
Lol.. What a spontaneous idea this man just had. /s
Wow man, so much fuss over a CHUNK OF ALUMINUM THAT WILL BE OBSOLETE IN 2 YEARS TIME!!!
Go ahead and waste $$$ on a patent I say!
Go ahead and waste $$$ on a patent I say!
Looks more like this to me (IBM Dec 2012):...
I'll leave it to ntekcomputers to comment on this, but it looks like this type of modular design has been conceived before.We have seen the IBM patent, and we have also seen all the threads, and conceptual CAD 3D views that Bicknellski posted. They have been referenced in our patent application as prior art.
I would like to say something to clear up a topic that keeps coming up more and more that I feel is both intriguing and hugely offensive:
Other people have pointed out on this forum and through private messages to me that it should simply be expected that a cloned version of any product showing up from China is inevitable. I feel that this is an insulting and unfair stereotype. Many people have the misconception that there are slack laws in China and that it is some wild west like place. I am not trying to generalize China at all but I would be naive if I said that products do not get counterfeited all the time there. Contrary to many peoples' belief China does have courts and they are actually quite strict. When you hear stories about people being scammed, bamboozled, taken to the bank, or their product copied in China, it is usually because they were simply being lazy or just down right ignorant. When someone from outside of China has a solid contract with a legitimate company inside China and that Chinese company breaks the contract or worse the law, well that Chinese company is just as accountable for their actions as the company outside of China. It goes both ways and I do not think it is so one sided.
Not trying to get off the subject much but I just feel like it is ridiculous to keep hearing people say "Ooh...weell...you know Its China and they steal whatever they want. What did you expect...it is China!" I know many amazingly talented people who are either from or have moved to China and none of them strike me as being part of the image that many people paint of China. In fact I have experienced some of them to have much higher ethical standards than a lot of westerners. I will even admit that when the A1 Coincraft fiasco started to occur this past February; nTek Computers invested A LOT of money into purchase a large amount of A1 chips from the first production batch. Ouch! I was very upset when all the A1 clone miners started to pop up from China for half the cost of what we were selling ours for here in the United States. It nearly destroyed our company to be honest and we are still recovering from the huge loss we took! You know what though? Those clones could have been produced anywhere else in the world with the same result so it was never a problem isolated to China. I just feel that stereotyping a whole nation of people is wrong. Each person chooses themselves to do right or wrong.
Each time an accusation of someone copying someone else's design comes up, each case is different. The fact is though that it can happen just as easily in America, the UK, Japan, Germany, Australia, etc...Does it happen more in China due to the structure of their legal system? I am not sure as I am not a lawyer either (phhheeewww). Maybe it simply happens more in China because it is the epicenter of manufacturing for the entire world. Still I am not sure and I am not trying to start a debate over this. That would be off topic for this thread but as this open source project now has come under scrutiny of using someone else's design without the right to do so; I am very interested to hear other people's opinions who also have had directly experience with this topic. Please do not blast off ridiculous claims unless you have actually real meaty facts to back them up. We do not need to add more fuel to the fire that is already burning under China when it comes to this subject.
I will follow up on the responses here as soon as I can. Right now I need to wait until I hear back from our patent law firm or I might shoot myself in the foot. I am pretty sure they will advice me to not discuss the details of our design here on the forum. I can just say that our design has evolved since the last versions we have showed publicly. Even in the original Provisional Patent application though there are many features to our design that are not being discussed here, not in the IBM patent, and not in the AM/FC design. That is all I can say right now.
Directly to FriedCat if you are out there listening, I think this project is insanely cool. Maybe I should have started with that instead of just kicking the front door in. My apologies ahead of time. Would love to hear a response from you or just get a confirmation if you still plan on using this design. I am sure everyone else would as well.
That just gave me an idea, maybe nTek Computers could somehow contribute to this project in exchange for Asicminer chips to test with on our new hardware heatsink, enclosure and special cooling design. Your all going to really love the next design! You will have to wait until it is released and in people's hands this time. Okay....Maybe we will show a sneak peak in the near future! ;-)
Keep on Hashing On!
Ry
Your whole response is a rant and an attempt to create sediment in the mind of readers that ASICMiner copied your non-invention and it's because, well you know, they're from China... Such bigotry!!
Your non-patent references prior works from these very forums you say? Outstanding! You are, I have no doubt, aware that USPTO issues many invalid patents. As soon as you try to "use" your patent, there will be a motion filed to revoke/invalidate your useless, non-patent and your fight will take on a new meaning for you.
And finally, your true intent, leaching through every sentence of your uttering, is exposed at the end: You want free chips!!!
This resembles hints of borderline extortion as you have no capacity to say I'm sorry. Humility is a foreign, but hopefully, one day, attainable concept for you it seems.
What a ridiculous and most disingenuous attempt on your part.
Shame on you!
PS. You deserve a warning on your trust to deal with extreme caution, or not to engage in any endeavors with you at all!
Looks more like this to me (IBM Dec 2012):...
I'll leave it to ntekcomputers to comment on this, but it looks like this type of modular design has been conceived before.We have seen the IBM patent, and we have also seen all the threads, and conceptual CAD 3D views that Bicknellski posted. They have been referenced in our patent application as prior art.
I would like to say something to clear up a topic that keeps coming up more and more that I feel is both intriguing and hugely offensive:
Other people have pointed out on this forum and through private messages to me that it should simply be expected that a cloned version of any product showing up from China is inevitable. I feel that this is an insulting and unfair stereotype. Many people have the misconception that there are slack laws in China and that it is some wild west like place. I am not trying to generalize China at all but I would be naive if I said that products do not get counterfeited all the time there. Contrary to many peoples' belief China does have courts and they are actually quite strict. When you hear stories about people being scammed, bamboozled, taken to the bank, or their product copied in China, it is usually because they were simply being lazy or just down right ignorant. When someone from outside of China has a solid contract with a legitimate company inside China and that Chinese company breaks the contract or worse the law, well that Chinese company is just as accountable for their actions as the company outside of China. It goes both ways and I do not think it is so one sided.
Not trying to get off the subject much but I just feel like it is ridiculous to keep hearing people say "Ooh...weell...you know Its China and they steal whatever they want. What did you expect...it is China!" I know many amazingly talented people who are either from or have moved to China and none of them strike me as being part of the image that many people paint of China. In fact I have experienced some of them to have much higher ethical standards than a lot of westerners. I will even admit that when the A1 Coincraft fiasco started to occur this past February; nTek Computers invested A LOT of money into purchase a large amount of A1 chips from the first production batch. Ouch! I was very upset when all the A1 clone miners started to pop up from China for half the cost of what we were selling ours for here in the United States. It nearly destroyed our company to be honest and we are still recovering from the huge loss we took! You know what though? Those clones could have been produced anywhere else in the world with the same result so it was never a problem isolated to China. I just feel that stereotyping a whole nation of people is wrong. Each person chooses themselves to do right or wrong.
Each time an accusation of someone copying someone else's design comes up, each case is different. The fact is though that it can happen just as easily in America, the UK, Japan, Germany, Australia, etc...Does it happen more in China due to the structure of their legal system? I am not sure as I am not a lawyer either (phhheeewww). Maybe it simply happens more in China because it is the epicenter of manufacturing for the entire world. Still I am not sure and I am not trying to start a debate over this. That would be off topic for this thread but as this open source project now has come under scrutiny of using someone else's design without the right to do so; I am very interested to hear other people's opinions who also have had directly experience with this topic. Please do not blast off ridiculous claims unless you have actually real meaty facts to back them up. We do not need to add more fuel to the fire that is already burning under China when it comes to this subject.
I will follow up on the responses here as soon as I can. Right now I need to wait until I hear back from our patent law firm or I might shoot myself in the foot. I am pretty sure they will advice me to not discuss the details of our design here on the forum. I can just say that our design has evolved since the last versions we have showed publicly. Even in the original Provisional Patent application though there are many features to our design that are not being discussed here, not in the IBM patent, and not in the AM/FC design. That is all I can say right now.
Directly to FriedCat if you are out there listening, I think this project is insanely cool. Maybe I should have started with that instead of just kicking the front door in. My apologies ahead of time. Would love to hear a response from you or just get a confirmation if you still plan on using this design. I am sure everyone else would as well.
That just gave me an idea, maybe nTek Computers could somehow contribute to this project in exchange for Asicminer chips to test with on our new hardware heatsink, enclosure and special cooling design. Your all going to really love the next design! You will have to wait until it is released and in people's hands this time. Okay....Maybe we will show a sneak peak in the near future! ;-)
Keep on Hashing On!
Ry
https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.2362815
There were a number of different "unique" ideas for a tunnel and boards mounting in a cube for the discussion on the BKKcoins Klondike designs.
There were a number of different "unique" ideas for a tunnel and boards mounting in a cube for the discussion on the BKKcoins Klondike designs.
Here's an idea I had. It's not really feasible since the heat sinks aren't readily available and would be crazy stupid to custom make. It was fun to put it together in Sketchup though.
What if you could make a heatsink like this?
They would fit together with the Klondike 16 board on the back, like this:
Notice how the pin placement is more dense towards one end of the heat sink.
When you put four together, they create a tunnel:
Less dense end. This is where you blow air in:
Dense end. This is where you want the air to come out:
Now, since there are more pins towards one end of the tunnel, more heat will be given off in the denser end. Thus, the board temperature is the same in both ends.
So, make a case of plexiglass boards and some screws/rods:
Put some fans and feet on, and you are good to go:
Those are two 140mm fans, which will ensure good airflow both inside the heat sink tunnel and over the top of the boards. Air is sucked in at the bottom, and pushed out on top, working with the natural flow of hot air.
Voilla! The K64 cube.
So, the heatsink I made up for this design is, as I said, not feasible. However, it would be possible to use the same tunnel design with a normal heatsink - but the chips towards the top of the cube would get a little warmer than the chips on the bottom.
The cubes could be arranged in a square at least 2x2 for a 256W space heater.
What if you could make a heatsink like this?
They would fit together with the Klondike 16 board on the back, like this:
Notice how the pin placement is more dense towards one end of the heat sink.
When you put four together, they create a tunnel:
Less dense end. This is where you blow air in:
Dense end. This is where you want the air to come out:
Now, since there are more pins towards one end of the tunnel, more heat will be given off in the denser end. Thus, the board temperature is the same in both ends.
So, make a case of plexiglass boards and some screws/rods:
Put some fans and feet on, and you are good to go:
Those are two 140mm fans, which will ensure good airflow both inside the heat sink tunnel and over the top of the boards. Air is sucked in at the bottom, and pushed out on top, working with the natural flow of hot air.
Voilla! The K64 cube.
So, the heatsink I made up for this design is, as I said, not feasible. However, it would be possible to use the same tunnel design with a normal heatsink - but the chips towards the top of the cube would get a little warmer than the chips on the bottom.
The cubes could be arranged in a square at least 2x2 for a 256W space heater.
k16 is too big (100x100) and heatsink is max 50x50:
http://www.fischerelektronik.de/web_fischer/de_DE/K%C3%BChlk%C3%B6rper/D02/Miniaturl%C3%BCfteraggregate/PR/LAM5_/index.xhtml
or sub-optimal solution:
http://www.fischerelektronik.de/web_fischer/de_DE/K%C3%BChlk%C3%B6rper/D04/L%C3%BCfteraggregate%20mit%20Axiall%C3%BCfter/PR/LA5_/index.xhtml
http://www.fischerelektronik.de/web_fischer/de_DE/K%C3%BChlk%C3%B6rper/D02/Miniaturl%C3%BCfteraggregate/PR/LAM5_/index.xhtml
or sub-optimal solution:
http://www.fischerelektronik.de/web_fischer/de_DE/K%C3%BChlk%C3%B6rper/D04/L%C3%BCfteraggregate%20mit%20Axiall%C3%BCfter/PR/LA5_/index.xhtml
Looks more like this to me (IBM Dec 2012):...
I'll leave it to ntekcomputers to comment on this, but it looks like this type of modular design has been conceived before. This design is copying our design shown here: http://ntekcomputers.com/blogs/news/12885165-some-sneak-peak-photos-of-our-unique-miner-case-design-patent-pending
Ehhh. I'm not a patent attorney (thank goodness - though it would come in handy to give insight on whether dissemination of design files for a product that, if assembled and distributed, also infringes on that patent), but unless your patent (I don't suppose there's an active link to the application - uspto's not returning anything useful) is phrased like something out of Apple and you feel that it covers any loop configuration of N boards with heat sinks on the inside...The heat sinks: Yours are a lop-sided semi-overlapping design. This one is a very basic trapezoid design (leaving a cavity in the center).
The assembly: Yours requires beams/rails. This one screws together with the end plates straight into the heat sinks with the heat sinks interlocking at the edges.
The geometry: Yours requires the boards to be at an off-angle from the end plates. This one has the boards aligned with the end plates.
Housing: Yours is demonstrated to be mounted inside a case. This one is intended to be used 'as is' with stacking options via the end plates that double as stand-offs.
Now, if you still think that should be covered, then in true Apple spirit, it would also cover the earlier June 2013 design by bitcoin49er; https://github.com/bitcoiner49er/Bitburner_Quad
( Though for all I know, you licensed your design from him? )
Heck, phrased broadly enough, you'd be covering the Mac Pro
As an aside...
made it open source??!???!!! This violates the open source licenses.
...that would depend entirely on 1. your patent being granted, 2. the patent covering the design, and 3. the license chosen (unfortunately the github repository has no license file). Most 'open source' and even 'Open Source' licenses make no mention of patents at all, with the GPLv3 being an exception and its clause has a different applicability, not to mention that GPL is ill-suited to hardware anyway (TAPR OHL would be a more common choice). 
We had AM_BE200_X24 boards sampled and tested. We also sampled the compatible heatsinks and supporting structures for them. It hashes at 768GH (each board 192GH) with 0.85-0.92W/G (PSU loss excluded). Power draws on higher/lower hashrate with higher/lower voltage is under testing. The design files of heatsinks/structures are going to be released a little later.
It should be emphasized that QUAD and X32 are also sampled and well tested before X24.
It should be emphasized that QUAD and X32 are also sampled and well tested before X24.
Have you released the design files of the heatsink/structures already? Please check the email you have listed here as the projects primary contact. We have sent an email to [email protected] kindly asking that we discuss this matter ASAP!
It is really not fair that you say here, "3) We offer Bitcoin rewards to contributors who submit significant improvements or new designs." yet you have used the design we have worked very hard on. You are not rewarding developers here, but rather you are taking advantage of other developers.
This design is copying our design shown here: http://ntekcomputers.com/blogs/news/12885165-some-sneak-peak-photos-of-our-unique-miner-case-design-patent-pending
FriedCat, you have copied our design and made it open source??!???!!! This violates the open source licenses. Please stop offering sell miners with heatsinks designed like this immediately. We spent many months working on this design and testing it and then spent a lot more time and money to produce a lot of these heatsinks for our miners. You have pretty much copied all aspects of our design and it is really not cool of you FriedCat!
We have also filed a Provisional Patent on this design well before you have shown it in the public realm.
Nice looking miner, but the heatsink and modular design is not yours! It belongs to nTek Computers, Inc.
We did original hard work to prove that this special heatsink design is much more efficient at dissipating heat away from ASIC chips then regular heatsinks used on all the other miners on the market. It took a lot of expensive CNC prototyping and testing to prove this design with our team.
You could have just asked us! We may have been open to working with you and licensing out the patent for the design. The design (our design) was posted all over Bitcointalk.org on the first page of the mining hardware section for months so you must have seen it! Why didn't you just talk to us first?
FriedCat, you have copied our design and made it open source??!???!!! This violates the open source licenses. Please stop offering sell miners with heatsinks designed like this immediately. We spent many months working on this design and testing it and then spent a lot more time and money to produce a lot of these heatsinks for our miners. You have pretty much copied all aspects of our design and it is really not cool of you FriedCat!
We have also filed a Provisional Patent on this design well before you have shown it in the public realm.
Nice looking miner, but the heatsink and modular design is not yours! It belongs to nTek Computers, Inc.
We did original hard work to prove that this special heatsink design is much more efficient at dissipating heat away from ASIC chips then regular heatsinks used on all the other miners on the market. It took a lot of expensive CNC prototyping and testing to prove this design with our team.
You could have just asked us! We may have been open to working with you and licensing out the patent for the design. The design (our design) was posted all over Bitcointalk.org on the first page of the mining hardware section for months so you must have seen it! Why didn't you just talk to us first?
Does anyone know the minimum purchase quantity / price is for these chips?
I'd be willing to throw some decent cash in along with some partners to get some of these made...but before I get partners here excited about it, I need to know if it's even close to feasible cost-wise.
I love the designs so far so PLEASE give me a reason to pull the trigger here
I'd be willing to throw some decent cash in along with some partners to get some of these made...but before I get partners here excited about it, I need to know if it's even close to feasible cost-wise.
I love the designs so far so PLEASE give me a reason to pull the trigger here
great work guys
Friedcat,
Is hashratio an official BE200 manufacturer?
Thank you
Is hashratio an official BE200 manufacturer?
Thank you
More like a BE200 buyer?!
Friedcat,
Is hashratio an official BE200 miner manufacturer?
Thank you
Is hashratio an official BE200 miner manufacturer?
Thank you
I just wanna comment here so i can come back and read shit i dont understand.
I am not an EE or fabricator but I could obtain ~6,000 chips for a GB maybe a few more if friedcat is feeling generous about this project. Since, I am not a well known member and have not yet been vetted I would accept escrow for this order and would only place it if there was enough interest.
Edit: current price would be ~$5 per chip
Edit: current price would be ~$5 per chip
Anybody working on upgrades for the original block erupter cube? Or maybe drop in cards I had seen mentioned earlier? If thats not possible can we open source all the block erupter cube and blade info. I would like for the community to have a shot at recycling them or at least underclock them a bit.
Steve
Steve
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