It's not easily swap-able for chip upgrades. This assumes an upgraded chip is pin- and signal-compatible, which is almost universally incorrect.
It's just a usb stick you trash whole USB not just the chip because it's not possible to swap only the chip like you know. You trash whole stick put the newer keep radiator/waterblock/power cables/fan/power supply/hub/usb cables so almost can be keep for years but replace only what is replaceable the usb stick.
It's swap-able easily by keeping all other stuff.
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if you've got the skill to modify the USB stick for external power without wrecking anything, it can be done with the stick as-is. This idea has been presented I don't know how many times in the seven years I've been building high-performance stick miners and it gets dismissed every time. It will continue to be dismissed every time.
You can't have two different power source but you should know that so you need to destroy an usb cable or usb connector for remove power line but keep data lines and solder external power source only. It's just weird and harder to solder if not designed for do that. It's easier to design that directly on the PCB and it's may be not for nothing than a lot of people every year since seven years ask you exactly the same thing no ?
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If you want external power, you no longer want a stick miner.
Why you let these devices be overclocked if it's for put on a 5V 500mA USB port ?
Why some people sell custom USB powered hub if these people not want more power for their stick miner ?
Why all USB devices asking for more than 1A add a second power plug like some external HDD and all usb devices who can't take enough power from some computers ?
People need easy swap-able devices and usb miner because want to be able to control exact power consumption and design their own "pod" but keeping materials on the long run and not trash the whole pod each time.
And may be easier to solder two cables than made their own custom designed hub for have the right position with cooling system or use awg20 usb cables for can sustain 5V 3A on longer cable because their cooling not fit on the powered usb hub design
I not need reply it's your choice and you customers