This is the review and testing from twentyseventy
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The top right hand corner has the LED display screen and the power button.
Actual Hashrate:
100MH/s @ GHash.io LTC, 50,000 Diff
94MH/s @ Clevermining (still testing), 65,536 Diff
How much did it cost?
96MH/s Alchemist - $1,500
Get a good PSU!
It will need 900W @ 12v, so ensure that your PSU can handle that - I've got a EVGA 1300W just to ensure that there's enough for the draw. Also, the EVGA PSU came with a pin connector so that you don't have to short the PSU with a paper clip to start it - talk about foresight!
Red Power Led
The LED fades in and out constantly while it's hashing - you wouldn't want it in your room for this reason... or because it's loud and hot!
The hashrate, when first powered on, spikes up to well above 100MH, but later comes back down to the standard 90 - 98MH/s range. I'll be interested to see if the boards can support higher hashrates with future firmware updates.
Loud!!
This is best suited to a garage, cool basement, or other area away from main living area. The fan is pretty loud and it does generate a significant amount of heat if kept enclosed with little venting.
Webpage managment
The backend is easily interfaced through a web browser and allows pools settings, hashrate monitor, IP settings, password change, and firmware updates.
Performance
The miner did require a firmware update when I first received it; there was an issue with the pool settings.
After getting everything set up, I was hashing at Ghash.io LTC pool at an average of about 75MH/s - there would sometimes be a ramp up and down, but that was the average after about 24 hours.
Tom, the lead engineer, sent a new firmware update with promises of better performance. After breaking it in for 14 hours, it was hashing at an average of 100MH/s!
You can see here in GHash's performance history - the change in variance is the new update. The miner does better with larger shares (50,000+) instead of smaller shares like 4096 or 8192.
This is the cause of the big variance and the increase in stales/rejects. Even with the increase in rejects, the hashrate is still far better than before.
Conclusion
With KNC's Titans plagued with such issues, it's been great to see that the Alchemists were made with such high quality.