Hey everyone,
I’ve been putting together a little update on documentation for home setups, especially for ASIC miners focusing on those BM1366 models like Bitaxe and Nerdminers.
Most guides out there are all about the setup, but hardly any talk about how the heat in the environment can affect the chip's efficiency in the long run.
I’ve come up with some technical notes on how to run a Stress-Heat Test to make sure these machines perform at their best. I’m considering suggesting these notes as an addition to the Mining Hardware section on the Bitcoin Wiki to help newcomers avoid burning out their gear too soon.
I think some of the older posts might find this useful!
In all cases.
* Replace the stock thermal paste with something reputable, use Arctic MX6 or MX7 or an equivallent.
* On BitAxe, ditch the dodgey low cost heat-sink. take the time either to buy a BitAxe with a good heatsink or buy one like the Thermaltake AXP60-50 "Copperzila"
* On the NerdOctAxe prior to and including V3.1 the thermal management monitoring is a complete joke.
The temperature sensor is placed over 10mm away from the actual ASIC's so its idea of temperature is way off I expect there's frigs in the software to compensate for the lets face it a CRAP design.
The only recommendation here is to crank the fan speed to maximum and hope the thermal paste doesn't give out, because the reported temperature is not the ASIC temperature.
I Would like to ask you about the necessity of such operetion for Bitaxe i mean is it necessary really ....
Knowing that it reachs 63 ° nearly at a hashrate of 1,25 TH .... i say so because someone told me run it untill it brakes then get a new one ...... and i beleive that s fair .!
I've had 7 BitAxe devices in total
5 Died due to the poor heatsink mounting.
Changing the thermal paste is mandatory. You can reduce temps by as much as 8-10C by doing this depending on the type of heatsink fitted.
The type of heatsink is typically sub-standard and has weak mounting points which causes poor contact with the ASIC.
If you're happy to run it until it drops dead then buy a new one, why are you asking about protecting longevity?
If you want reliability
Change the thermal paste, change the heatsink to a good one with solid mountings.
Otherwise it'll eventually break.