Quote from: Epoch on November 28, 2015, 12:28:11 AM

Quote from: RichBC on November 27, 2015, 07:42:07 AM

Quote from: pinhead666 on November 27, 2015, 06:55:16 AM

Quote from: gecox22 on November 26, 2015, 07:47:12 PM

Has any one thought of combining a couple of s3's together sort of like the C1 but not changing over the heat sink. I mean Sort of like how the s5 is done. Would it be worth it? I mean have one controller controlling all 3 s3 instead of three separate units?

Yep, I have done some testing with these. Original S3-controller was propably meant to control more than two boards. It's schematics show connections for 4 hashboards. But problem is that firmware has support only for 2 hashboards. In hw-level I can read code from pic-mcu and reprogram it, but changing that code would need assembler coding. It's propably easier to write new code to do that. But coding isn't one of my best skills. Open-wrt module's software is also capable to update that pic's code so it might be possible to tweak it's drivers. But again,it's beyond my knowledge.
There might also be a reason why they dropped that pic/ar9331 controller out: it has only 2 physical uart's. Some of pins can be programmed for uarts but I'm not sure if that pic is fast enough for it. Some wiser men have told me that it works if the baudrate is low enough. But I really don't know, I'm just a hobbyist.
Ofcourse it can be done with usb/uart adapters like cp2102. You only need to do level shifting too and provide 1v8 and 3v3 to hashboards. It works, I have tested it, but every hashboard needs its own cp2102 adapter. I might try to build an adapter with cp2108 in it. So it could drive 4 boards with one usb connection. And it should have some pwm-controller for fans too.

I think it's all very interesting as an exploration and design exercise, but for most of us the S3, great miner that it is, is well past it's sell by date. Minor changes to efficiency through having a single controller are not going to change anything. So I think it's better to put effort into anything that would improve an S5, as for me anyway even that only lives up until the halving.

I haven't run any S3 units for a while now for that very reason, but I don't think anyone will argue that the more recent generation of Ants (S5, S5+, S7) have become less 'friendly' to home mining if only for the sole reason that they are LOUD. The S3 is whisper quiet compared to the later generations.

The S3/S3+ is still profitable depending on your local electricity costs, and even more so in the northern hemisphere during the winter months because it offsets heating costs. An S3+ can be found on eBay for under $150USD which still makes it attractive enough in certain conditions. Certainly an S5 will be more efficient, but efficiency isn't the only criteria for everyone.

S3's are cheap, they are quiet, and they will remain profitable during the winter in many regions of the world.

S5's and S7's now have the fan control setting, so i'm running them at the same noise level as the S3. So no problem there. The only irk-ish is that their high performance fan wont go under 2400-2600 RPM so its not possible to make them exactly quiet, but nothing prevent you from getting better ones.