If anyone still running the new firmware, would you please post here the line used to start cgminer? It "should" be in the System Log (under Status) immediately after starting up (I think that is where I saw it before, but may be wrong!) or even better, if you SSH into the rig open the file /etc/init.d/cgminer with vi editor and scroll down to the line that starts PARAMS= (not #PARAMS=). I think the issue of dropping hash-rate may be due to the setting of auto-voltage / frequency (and the startup line may reveal that!).