Bitmain Releases Controversial AsicBoost Miner Update

A recent study showcases that bitcoin mining profitability fell in 2018, as higher mining difficulty and increased electricity costs took their toll on the market. In an effort to help their crypto miner chips run more efficiently, Bitmain has released a controversial software update for the Antminer S9 products.

With this in mind, the new software will enable the overt AsicBoost feature, which is expected to grant miners a boost in speed and efficiency. Hardware-wise, the chips were already capable of supporting the functionality, yet they lacked the software support. According to a Bitmain post, the new firmware will make sure that the chips remain efficient when mining Bitcoin, while also helping increase the digital currency’s hashrate. It is believed that the software will reduce the energy consumption of the chips, thus reducing bitcoin’s energy footprint on the environment. The firmware will soon be released for several other devices, including R4, T9, T9+, S9i and S9j.

The update is fairly controversial, due to concerns that the new firmware was protected by several patents. However, after further investigations, the company decided that the software does not directly infringe any patent, and that it’s okay to release.

However, the AsicBoost technology has been criticized in the past as well. For instance, in 2017, Bitcoin Core developers stated that miners operating via this method are actually exploiting a flaw present in bitcoin’s consensus algorithm that would potentially hurt the network. Additionally, the company was also accused of using the technology covertly, before this update.

In a press statement, it was mentioned that: "Now we are pleased to give Antminer users whose miners have the capability to support this function a choice to avail this advantage without any negative impact on the Bitcoin protocol. This variant of the 'overt AsicBoost' simply uses version bits different from those that other manufacturers have been using. It is equally transparent because it can be seen in the block header of boosted blocks."

With the new firmware release, Bitmain claims that miners will have their energy consumption reduced by approximately 13%, rather than 20% as it was first stated in 2017.

Following the software update, some compatibility issues have been reported. As such, Slush Pool, which is a popular bitcoin mining pool operator, has asked miners to refrain from upgrading their Antminer S9 devices, as they’ll become incompatible with the mining pool. On Twitter, they wrote: “Dear Miners, we strongly recommend you DON'T UPGRADE your S9 devices with the new Bitmain firmware. It is not compatible with BIP310 standard and as a result also not compatible with @slush_pool . We are working hard on providing our own fix ASAP and will keep you posted.”

Whether the update is actually patented, or will impact the network remains to be seen.