During the bull market phase, Bitcoin miners' profits grow faster than mining difficulty. However, growthgives way to recession. When complexity rises and price does not, competition intensifies.
Before 2018, there were two ways to get an advantage in mining:
- find cheap electricity;
- acquire more efficient equipment.
In October 2018 the companyBraiins presented firmware for ASIC devices with support for the open-type AsicBoost optimization algorithm. Miners were able to reduce costs by 13% by simply configuring the software.
In this material, we will analyze auto tuning in more detail, which allows you to increase the performance of miners up to 30%.
Auto tuning is the new AsicBoost
The biggest benefits are always received by the early adopters. The graph below shows the growth in the use of AsicBoost technology since 2018:
Currently, approximately 70% of blocks are mined using AsicBoost. This means that these days this algorithm is no longer an advantage, but rather just a way to keep up with competitors.
But software development, as you know, does not stand still. Miners can now take advantage of auto-tuning.
What is auto tuning?
ASIC miners are made up of many siliconchips that produce hashing. It is important to understand that each silicon element may vary slightly in its electrical properties. Some chips hash better than others.
Equipment manufacturers know the frequency thatBest suited for lower quality chips. This is the frequency they use for all chips to ensure that the ASIC meets the stated specifications. This limits the upper limit of the device's hashrate.
Auto tuning is the process by which algorithmsfind the optimal frequency for each chip without considering ASIC as a single device. For a chip capable of doing more calculations per second, a higher frequency is set.
Auto-tuning the firmware allows you to circumvent factory restrictions and get a higher hash per watt, which increases the profit of miners.
Why is auto tuning not so popular?
There are several answers to this question. Many miners still do not know what auto-tuning is and how much it can improve performance.
Miners suggest that ASIC manufacturers optimize their products for greater competitiveness, and are not looking for ways to optimize firmware and increase productivity.
Many manufacturers also do not want users to use alternative firmware, refusing in this case a guarantee for equipment.
How to do auto-tuning?
Braiins has released auto-tuning software called Braiins OS+.
It currently supports devicesAntminer S9, S9 and S9j. Developers are already working on support for Antminer S17. This firmware can potentially increase device performance by 20-30%.
Antminer S9 Life Extension
With the approaching halving of the Antminer S9 devicegradually, but inevitably leave the market. With factory settings, they are about 50% inferior in efficiency to the new generation miners - S17 or Whatsminer M20S. This made the S9 very cheap to buy in the secondary market, sometimes for less than $ 100 per unit.
With auto tuning, you can set the low power mode. For S9, we are talking about reducing consumption from 85 J / TH to 65 J / TH with the current mining difficulty.
For miners, especially with cheap electricity, this will provide an opportunity to increase the hashrate at a minimal cost and remain competitive.
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