By Colin Harper, Blockspace Media
In the beginning, there were only CPUs, then GPUs, for bitcoin mining. Then came the mighty ASIC in 2013, and with it, the “shoebox” form factor that has become emblematic of the bitcoin mining industry. What comes next? Will the shoebox design persist as standard for bitcoin mining ASICs? Or will another form factor that more resembles traditional datacenter servers win out? This article first appeared on Blockspace Media. ASIC manufacturers are increasingly betting on the latter – or at least, that a hydro-cooled server rack design will become a substantial portion of bitcoin mining fleets. Moreover, they’re leaning into the “direct-to-chip” cooling for further efficiency gains. Last September, Bitmain announced its model U3S21EXPH (a bit of a mouthful, eh?) developed in a partnership with Hut 8. Its U3 design means that one unit takes up three spaces in a traditional server rack. MicroBT soon followed with its M63 Hydro series, as did Bitdeer’s Sealminer A2 Hydro unit. Following suit, Auradine released its server rack model, the AH3880, this March. Its U2 design, which occupies two server slots, is a bit smaller, but it packs more hashrate per unit of space at 600 TH/s (or 300 TH/s per slot) versus Bitmain’s 860 TH/s (286.66 TH/s per slot). So, what’s with the switch up from the traditional shoe box? For Auradine, it’s all about customer demand. “[Our new model is] based upon a lot of feedback that we got from our miner customers … we've been working with the miners even throughout the design process,” Auradine CSO Sanjay Gupta said on the most recent Mining Pod. “They indicated to us that they were looking for a quality hydro based miner.” In its partnership with Bitmain for the U3S21EXPH, “Hut 8 was instrumental in the custom design for the infrastructure, particularly the U form factor which is compatible with HPC style architecture,” Hut 8 Head of Investor Relations Sue Ennis told Blockspace last September. (More on the high performance computing angle later). The benefit of a server rack ASIC lies in standardization. Bitcoin miners are increasingly marching in step with the traditional datacenter industry, and that industry could see 40% adoption of direct liquid-to-chip cooling by 2026, according to data center developer Cyrus One. If miners adopt this design, then theoretically, they can optimize their supply chains by converging on server designs that are becoming best practice in the big-boy data center sector. | 