CPUMINER Ported for the Cell CPU (Playstation 3)

Check it out - This is a screenshot of my laptop with two terminals open. I'm logged in to my Playstation 3 (over SSH) in both. Bottom terminal (left) is dumping verbose output from cpuminer running on my PS3. Bottom right panel is showing spu-top (similar to htop but for the Cell's SPU cores). As you can see I'm running 4 mining threads, each on one of the PS3's 6 SPU SIMD accelerators. I'm averaging about 5.14 khash/sec per SPU. In the top terminal, I'm running a proxy (bfgminer) between cpuminer and litecoinpool.org to translate cpuminer's json rpc messages to the newer stratum protocol. I compiled both programs on my Playstation 3 which is running a custom fork of Fedora (Linux) for ppc64 that I'm developing for fun (see my website PS3LINUX.NET).

Both programs are available on Github:

cpuminer (cell cpu port)

bfgminer

Both projects are broken in their current state so if you plan on building them yourself, download these patches I made and apply them before compiling:

cpuminer-disable-asm-source.patch

bfgminer-git-submodule-addresses.patch

If you want Cell (SPU core) support in cpuminer you must compile it with both a PPU (powerpc) and SPU toolchain, originally part of IBM's Cell SDK. Modern builds of the Cell SDK's utilities and compilers are also available in the software repos of my experimental new PS3 LINUX operating system. Download my PS3LINUX_Live_ISO.iso (with install script) from my website and install it on your console today!

In case you are wondering, no; mining on the PS3 (even with SPU acceleration) is not profitable. My electricity would have to be virtually free to make it even close to worth it. I mostly did this little endeavor just as a chance to learn some things about some crap I find interesting: Cell development, hash algorithms, C & assembly languages, crash debugging, etc. I picked up some good experience & knowlege fixing all the issues that came up while getting this project to work so overall I'm super glad I did it, even though it will never make me rich.

That is all; hope you are well. Have a good day 😄

MCPS3 (The Model Citizen)

My Youtube

My Github

My Linux PS3 (the Gibson):

Hello fellas. I was one of the unfortunate souls who mined on SBI before. Now it's hanging by a thread and I'm looking to swtich to another pool. What recommendations do you have?

Hi there!
May someone knows about a AntMiner L3++ technician over Colombia? I have two of them and I really want to recover it. Thanx in advance!

I've recently got into mining, but the idea of giving my personal info to some third party doesn't sit right with me. From what I've seen it's commonplace, but maybe you know somewhere where it's not needed?
I'd be greatful.

Hey r/LitecoinMining,

I launched mkpool a little while back as a solo mining pool, and Litecoin is now live, merge-mined with Dogecoin. Point your Scrypt hardware at LTC and you pick up DOGE on the same work, no extra setup.

The idea is simple: solo mining with zero interference, so when you hit a block the whole reward is yours.

A few details:

• LTC + DOGE merge mining, one connection covers both
• TLS support, so your connection to the pool is encrypted end to end
• Built for solo miners, full block reward to you
• Works with common Scrypt gear

If solo Scrypt mining is your thing, give it a look. Happy to answer any questions or take feedback, you all know this stuff better than most.

https://mkpool.com/

Thanks for reading.

I'm just an amateur in all things crypto and I am currently looking to branch out into mining LTC. The only question is where to do it, hence my asking. I would appreciate leads on pools where mining would be easier/faster/more profitable.
Thanks.

Saw a guys post today about his mining addiction back in 2021 I thought ide share what I built taking inspiration from his setup to build mine it was such a fun experience and i actually made a decent profit paying back the loan I took out to purchase my equipment 2nd hand and using what I could afford I had $6500 to build it including purchasing the miners but I was making about $150 to $200 a day for months and I was able to pay back the loan and kept it running for almost 2 years but electric rates and increased difficulty bc the L7s coming online and crypto prices falling forced me to shut it down it was a sad day when I had to flip the breaker it was the highlight of my day coming home after working doing commercial hvac all day and hearing my mini data center humming away making me passive income I felt like I found a cheat code in life when i discovered mining lol ohh well I don’t think it’s for small fish like myself anymore but I still love every minute of it boys lol I turn a few on when winter hits to beat my home on really cold days just for shits and gigs

Just some random photos of my mid 2021 to late 2024 addiction in mining

i'm asking less from a tribal angle and more from an operator angle

if you're still keeping scrypt hardware pointed in the LTC/DOGE world, what still makes it worth the attention now?

stability? simplicity? habit? better than the alternatives?

curious what actual miners say when the conversation isn't just price

I’m currently building out a small-scale mining hosting site in South Dakota (270kW pilot), and I’m looking to connect with a few miners before we energize.

This isn’t a large industrial facility. The goal is to build something more controlled, transparent, and scalable over time.

A few key points:

• Pilot rate target: ~$0.0875/kWh all-in

• 480V infrastructure with containerized deployment

• Designed around high load factor (no overselling, limited phase 1 capacity)

• Direct operator access

• Transparent pricing model (based on actual utility structure)

I’m not trying to compete with the massive 10–50MW sites on price. I’m building this to be consistent, understandable, client-focused, and expandable.

Right now I’m putting together a small group of “founding miners” before powering up the site.

If you’re currently hosting somewhere (or looking for a spot), I’d genuinely appreciate feedback or questions.

Even if you’re not interested.

My goal is to build this the right way from day one.

so I was always curious to why no one have modded a Dell EPP PSU and so I did it myself.

I could only solder 2x 6 pin connectors, so that's kinda a downside but overall it's pretty robust compared to the official futurebit PSU.

probably could use a different pcie cable to get more connectors but didn't have any on hand.

Seems not bad. 14 $ a day.

I'm mostly mining doge, so I'm interested how things are in that regard, especially during peak network hours.

Fireware upgrade on Fluminer L1 failed. Can someone provide instructions on how to recover firmware via the SD Card? Thanks in advance!

(I know this is long so there's a TLDR at the bottom)

I recently bought a replacement control board for one of my 2 L3+'s and it came with hiveon installed. (The original was throwing some error about not being able to read the config file so cgminer just wouldn't run, even when I tried starting it manually via ssh. I plan on looking into it a bit more eventually...) I've been using blissz up until now as I didn't like the idea of dev fees on hardware which will surely never have any new firmware developed for it, but I've found the ability to manually tune each individual chip to be a delightful experience, especially when its primary use is to generate heat for a garage.

That said, I don't like that I can't ssh into the device on port 22, and while I can appreciate the intent the devs had when setting the miner status page to refresh every 10 seconds, I personally find it maddening. (pretty sure I could change this if I could ssh into it, but I digress)

After searching this subreddit it looks like awesomeminer is one of the favorites as far as L3+ firmware goes. (although I'm open to others too) Given the age of the hardware, is there a version that doesn't have a dev fee built in? And does it allow ssh access? Another thing I have found particularly useful about hiveon for manual per-chip tuning is the ability to color-code each chip based on how many hw errors it's generating. I know awesomeminer has per-chip tuning but does it include something like this? (I'm also quite intrigued by the ability to set a target temperature, as the machine I'm doing this on insists on running its fans far faster (and louder) than they need to in order to maintain temps of 55C or below) (My other unit will tolerate temps as high as ~68 before it spins the fans up above 2000rpm; which I assume is a perfectly acceptable temperature. If not, I'd love to know what I should be targeting)

Another question: How many times can you flash the firmware on these controllers? Do they have a cycle life low enough to make "shopping around" with different firmware versions a bad idea?

At risk of making this post entirely too long, I'm also curious about hw errors. I've seen conflicting stances on what an acceptable level is, ranging from "almost none" to "as long as its not excessive it's probably fine". I've usually targeted keeping the hw% in the "Nonce#" column at or below 0.01%, and the "DiffA"/"difficulty accepted" (ie equivalent shares of difficulty 1 which you get by multiplying your submitted difficulty by the shares submitted, accounting for any changes in difficulty) hw errors to be low enough to register as 0.0000%, ie effectively no impact. Is there a general consensus on the topic that I've missed? Also, what exactly is a hw error? I'm assuming it means that some sort of error correction/detection was triggered, and that it means that somewhere in the ASIC's pipeline there was a transistor that didn't quite open/close before the next clock pulse came along and the end result is that somewhere you end up with a calculation that essentially says "1+1=3". Am I anywhere close to what's actually happening there?

TLDR: I'm looking at switching firmware on an L3+ from hiveon to awesomminer (or other firmware that has these features + preferably lets you set a target temp, I'm open to suggestions)

1) Since nobody is writing new firmware for this old machine, is there a version without a dev fee?

2) Does it allow ssh over port 22?

3) Can you see the number of hw errors generated by each chip when manually tuning on a per-chip basis?

4) Does repeatedly flashing the firmware run the risk of damaging the control board?

Bonus questions!:

5) What's a reasonable target temperature to aim for?

6) What's a reasonable hw error % or hw error/unit time?

7) What exactly happens when a chip produces a hw error? Does it harm the chip?

8) When undervolting, overclocking, tuning, etc, is there anything that will damage the chips/boards besides excessively high temps? ie, can the board/chips be damaged by some combination of low voltage settings and high frequency settings even if temps and hw error frequency are in the green?

I'm relatively new to the mining scene as a whole, so the question might sound stupid. I've been mining litecoins through emcd, and I just got funds deposited into my account. I now want to move them to another wallet, but I want to make sure there aren't any fees in doing that. Can anyone help with that?

Absolutely makes no sense even if you have .05 power to spend thousands on a miner that will never payoff before it breaks.. seems like this subreddit is dying.. I enjoyed in prior years most of us had with all the excitement but the flame is out

Hey guys,

I’m currently heating my home with 2 L3++ , what difficulty would I need to achieve to hit a block? My best difficulties are already in the 11 digits.

Update: I figured it out LTC 103G Doge 27G

Finally bit the bullet and cleared out the room the miners were in from Jan 2022 to August 2024. Industrial Fans, chords 2 exhaust manifolds broken obsolete E9.. probably about 23,000-25,000 initial out of pocket expense