Yes, Jay, I know I'm a noob on this forum, but please don't make the assumption that I'm a 12 year old.

Nowhere in my first post did I say it would be easy. I just asked if people had considered it as an option.

Printer controller cards are probably not used for motor control and robotics because they're bulkier than an arduino with a motor shield and yes, it would be hard work to hack the firmware.

But in THIS case it MIGHT (notice the MIGHT) be worthwhile doing rather than all these people running out and buying power sapping GPU card to try and compete against FPGA's and ASIC's.

Like I said before, these units are being thrown out in the trash. IF the maths proved it worthwhile and someone could produce a hack for them (the JTAG pins go to test points), thousands of these printers could be saved from being trashed and could be utilised as miners merely by a firmware update and then being plugged into a USB hub.

What I'm looking for is someone here with FPGA skills willing to see if the maths adds up, rather than people trolling to jump down noob's throats without offering anything constructive to the debate.