So getting to the bottom of the 4/8 VRM thing, it was just brought up within an interview for a new engineer, which was cool as I have an answer from Marcus and it was definitely not a cost saving issue. The reason; KnC bought the entire world's supply from General Electric of those VRMs and could not get anymore without a month's wait, meaning a lot of people would have been without their kit if every board required them. They were indeed a margin and as you can see not necessary to reach the promised spec. GE could not supply more for any money, and there was actually a scary period where it was believed 8 may be necessary, in which case then there would have been a problem fulfilling all orders.
Thanks! I think you did post them but I couldn't remember if it was in this thread or somewhere else..but thank you for indulging me
And that's quite different from the reading in Sweden @ 850-ish watts, so I think one can safely say that there was something different between those two, and by extension what eventually made it out for customers. And thanks for the background on the VRMs...very interesting and makes perfect sense in the timing of it and why it was rolled out without extensive testing. I withdraw my "reckless" statement and replace it with "unfortunately timed".And finally we have an answer. Not the endless ignorant mocking of orama about this issue. (planking anyone?)
KNC just had to own up and say, "guys, we are low on VRMs but good news we can still power the chip fine with 4. But, there is a power issue we are working to fix with firmware ASAP so please use a higher than 850W PSU to be safe or just wait until we get the firmware fixed before running your miner. We know you can't wait, so please keep the VRMs cool just in case. (they are running 30% over spec in regard to amps out) Heat on the chip will stay safely in spec, no worries there."
As I said all along, just own up to it. Thanks finally