Currently only supports Intel (Altera) FPGAs on Linux hosts.
Quartus Prime is required to both compile and run this miner. It is currently available at https://fpgasoftware.intel.com/ . To figure out what edition you need, check the device support list. To minimize your download, choose the Individual Files tab, then download only Quartus Prime, and the device support files for the devices you're using. Install according to the instructions on their website.
After installing, set the variable QUARTUSPATH
to point to the quartus/bin
directory of
your installation. For example export QUARTUSPATH="/home/miner/altera/18.1/quartus/bin"
.
This line should be added to your ~/.profile
file or another file that is sourced whenever a
shell is launched. Don't forget to source the file after editing it.
Local Digibyte node is required.
Install and start a full node via https://github.com/digibyte/digibyte.
- A python interpreter is required and pip is recommended -
apt install python python-pip
(Python 3 should also work, but most testing has been done in Python 2). - Python modules base58 and requests -
pip install base58 requests
Local Digibyte node is not required.
Twisted python module is required, to install use apt-get install python-twisted
or pip install twisted
in case of pip already installed
You need to install a custom udev rule in order to allow a non-root user access to FPGA hardware.
- Open
99-altera.rules
, and change the1000
on the last line to your user id. Alternatively, runsed -i s/1000/$(whoami)/ 99-altera.rules
(don't run this command as root). - Run
sudo cp 99-altera.rules /etc/udev/rules.d/
- Run
sudo udevadm control --reload
Notice: It is highly recommended that you remove the acrylic cover on your development kit (if it comes with one) to prevent it from overheating.
- Connect one end of your development kit's USB cable to your computer, and the other end to the development kit. If your development kit has multiple USB ports, be sure to connect to the one labelled "USB Blaster".
- Connect your development kit's power cable, and turn on the device.
- Verify the presence of your device by running
lsusb | grep Altera
(this should output one line per development kit). - Further verify your setup by running
$QUARTUSPATH/jtagconfig
(this will list all of your recognised development kits).
This will require multiple terminal windows. A screen multiplexer such as tmux or screen may make things easier for you.
- Set mining mode
solo
orstratum
inconfig_mode
variable atsrc/miner/config.tcl
- Command line argument
--testnet
should be used until block 9,112,320 for testnet4 mining - If solo mining with local node - ensure your DigiByte node is running. It is recommended that you do not specify an rpcpassword in digibyte.conf. The rpcuser and rpcpassword options will soon be deprecated.
- In one terminal, go to the
src
directory and run./autocompile.sh --testnet cyclone_v_gx_starter_kit de10_nano
- For Solo mining: in another terminal, go to the
src/pool/solo
directory and runpython pool.py --testnet <dgb_address>
- For Pool mining: in another terminal, go to the
src/pool/stratum
directory and runpython stratum.py --testnet stratum_host stratum_port username password
. Additional argument--workers
can be used to set worker with _ delimiter. Worker name will be automatically taken from a miner hardware device id. - Finally, for each mining fpga open a terminal in the
src/miner
directory and run$QUARTUSPATH/quartus_stp -t mine.tcl [hardware_name]
. Thehardware_name
argument is optional, and if not specified the script will prompt you to select one of the detected mining devices. If you're comfortable using screen, you can runsrc/miner/mine_in_screen.sh
instead to start a screen session with one window per mining device.