OK. So I sent Operatr a PM regarding some FPGA 'tinkering' that I've been doing on my 'lame' AVNET Spartan 6 FPGA LX9 Microboard for scrypt mining.
See this thread: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=220621.0
Basically, scrypt mining is very RAM intensive and you can currently get the best performance in windows utilizing the available host system RAM as the FPGA equivalent of CPU / GPU 'Hyper-Threading' / 'Hyper-Memory'.
I'm trying to find a perfect balance between hardware and software with my 'home brew' project, so that I can perhaps look to scale it up on bigger and better FPGA boards.
Operatr's response thus far has been 'nothing'. A simple not interested would suffice. However, I'm sure he is busy and this might just be an oversight.
Although, I hope this isn't going to be another BFL type project i.e. 'style over substance' ?
I think I'll stick with my 'home brew' project / boards for now and might look to sell them via ebay if they are worthwhile, cost efficient and stable enough.
Good luck anyway. It's an interesting project and I might consider purchasing one in the future.
Cheers
See this thread: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=220621.0
Basically, scrypt mining is very RAM intensive and you can currently get the best performance in windows utilizing the available host system RAM as the FPGA equivalent of CPU / GPU 'Hyper-Threading' / 'Hyper-Memory'.
I'm trying to find a perfect balance between hardware and software with my 'home brew' project, so that I can perhaps look to scale it up on bigger and better FPGA boards.
Operatr's response thus far has been 'nothing'. A simple not interested would suffice. However, I'm sure he is busy and this might just be an oversight.
Although, I hope this isn't going to be another BFL type project i.e. 'style over substance' ?
I think I'll stick with my 'home brew' project / boards for now and might look to sell them via ebay if they are worthwhile, cost efficient and stable enough.
Good luck anyway. It's an interesting project and I might consider purchasing one in the future.
Cheers
Operatr's response thus far has been 'nothing'. A simple not interested would suffice. However, I'm sure he is busy and this might just be an oversight.
Hehe, in the early days he at least Emailed me a "not interested" response (and I *do* have working scrypt FPGA hardware, as evidenced by my scrypt+chacha implementation that mined huge amounts of YACoin while N=32, but have made no claims that they perform anywhere close to the price/performance ratio of GPU's for scrypt+salsa(1024,1,1)).
Guess things have evolved from there to no response at all!
I PMed you early this morning BitcoinFX (Unless I forgot to hit send?...if you got nothing I apologize I did try earlier this morning
) I spent a while today getting caught up with the many messages in my various inboxes. It is really with no offense personally that I must tip-toe around these kinds of questions. I hope it is understood we have our own IP and as such I cannot divulge certain details. That is not to say however I consider it a closed book.
As much as I appreciate offers to help us develop this product, there is a fine line in terms of having too many cooks in the kitchen so to speak. I already encountered that issue sifting through the many developers that applied in the beginning, unfortunately many more got turned down than got "in". I had no idea around 20 of you would want to be a part of it, which totally blew me away. Decisions just had to be made.
What I gathered from this is there are many very talented and passionate engineers around the boards with great ideas. I absolutely encourage anyone with ideas and implementations that can't be a part of BlockBurner at the core (at least not right now anyway) to develop their own efforts. All of it helps create a stronger network which is the more important part. I am doing this personally because I want to see cryptocurrency succeed.
Who knows what comes next. SHA already moved to ASIC, Scrypt is now entering the FPGA phase with a wide market to tap, maybe a third coin with a different hashing algorithm will come about that needs a special device of its own. This is a wild west industry, it is anyone's game