April 19th, 2013 
CryptoBadger 
In the second installment of our DIY litecoin mining guide, we’ll look at how to install and configure Linux to properly mine with your GPUs at optimal settings. Don’t be dissuaded if you’ve never used Linux before—our step-by-step guide makes it easy.
Linux has a few advantages over Windows, including the ability to install to a USB stick (which means you don’t need a harddrive), lesser hardware requirements (you can get by just fine with less than 4GB of RAM), and simpler remote administration capabilities. Best of all, Linux is free! However, be aware that if you’d like to undervolt your GPUs to save power, Windows might be a better choice for you (update 10/2013: no longer true!).
If you missed the hardware portion of our guide, make sure to check it out first. Otherwise, read on.
Build a Litecoin Mining Rig, part 2: Linux Setup
So you’ve decided to use Linux to run your mining rig—a fine choice! If you’re still a bit nervous because you’ve a complete Linux newbie, don’t be. Simply follow the step-by-step instructions exactly as they’re written, and you’ll be fine. Even if you’ve never done anything like this before, you should be up and running in about an hour.
Step 1: Configure BIOS settings
Before we even get to Linux, make sure your mining computer’s BIOS settings are in order. Power on your computer, and press the “delete” key a few times immediately after power on. You should end up in the BIOS configuration area. Do the following, then save & exit:
- Change power options so that the computer automatically turns itself on whenever power is restored. The reason for this is two-fold: first, it’ll make sure that your miner automatically starts up after a power outage. Second, it makes powering the computer on much easier if you don’t happen to have a power switch connected to the motherboard.
- Make sure that your USB stick is first in the boot-up order (you may need to have a USB stick attached).
- Disable all components that you don’t plan to use. This will save a little bit of power, and since your miner will likely be running 24/7, it’ll add up. For me, that meant disabling onboard audio, the SATA controller, the USB 3.0 ports (I only had a 2.0 USB stick), the Firewire port, and the serial port.
Step 2: Install Xubuntu Desktop to your USB stick
Xubuntu is a lightweight version of Ubuntu, a popular Linux distribution. Most other distros should work just fine, but be aware that the GPU drivers require the presence of Xorg, which means server distros that don’t have a GUI will not work properly.
- Download the Xubuntu Desktop x64 v12.10 installation image.
- You’ll need to either burn the installation image onto a CD, or write the image to a second USB stick. If you use a CD, you’ll need to temporarily hook up a CD-ROM drive to your mining rig for the installation (make sure you temporarily enable your SATA controller if you disabled it in step 1!).
- Once you have the installation media prepared, you’re ready to install Xubuntu to the blank USB stick on your miner. Make sure your blank USB stick is inserted into a USB port on your mining, and then boot into your installation media. The Xubuntu installer should appear.
- Make sure to click the “auto-login” box towards the end of the installer; otherwise take all of the default installation options.
- If you’re using a USB stick that is exactly 8GB, the installer may complain about the default partition sizes being too small. Create a new partition table with these settings: 5500mb for root (/), 315mb for swap, and the remaining amount for home (/home). If you’re using a USB stick larger than 8GB, you will not have to do this.
- When the installation is complete, you should automatically boot into the Xubuntu desktop. Make sure to remove your installation media.
Step 3: Install AMD Catalyst drivers
Open a terminal session by mousing over the bottom center of the screen so that a list of icons appears. Click on “terminal” (it looks like a black box).
- Type the following commands (press “enter” at the end of each line and wait for Linux to finish doing it’s thing):
sudo apt-get install fglrx-updates fglrx-amdcccle-updates fglrx-updates-dev sudo aticonfig --lsa sudo aticonfig --adapter=all --initial sudo reboot - After your computer reboots, you can verify that everything worked by typing:
sudo aticonfig --adapter=all --odgt - If you see all of your GPUs listed, with “hardware monitoring enabled” next to each, you’re good to go.
Important: you may need to have something plugged into each GPU to prevent the OS from idling it. You can plug 3 monitors into your 3 GPUs, but that isn’t very practical. The easiest option is to create 3 dummy plugs, and leave them attached to your GPUs. They’ll “trick” the OS into believing that a monitor is attached, which will prevent the hardware from being idled. Check out how to create your own dummy plugs.
If you ever add or remove GPUs to your rig later, you’ll need to re-run this command: sudo aticonfig --adapter=all --initial
Step 4: Install SSH, Curl, and package updates
- Install SSH by typing:
sudo apt-get install openssh-server byobu
With SSH installed, you can unplug the keyboard/mouse/monitor (put dummy plugs into all GPUs, though) from your miner, and complete the rest of the installation from your desktop computer. Simply download Putty onto your desktop, run it, and enter the IP address of your mining rig. That should bring up a remote terminal session to your miner, which is more or less just like sitting at the keyboard in front of it.
If you plan to manage your mining rig remotely over the internet, you’ll need to forward port 22 on your router to your miner. Make sure that you use a strong Xubuntu password!
Setup should be quicker from this point, as now you can simply copy text from this webpage (highlight it and press control-C) and then paste it into your Putty session by simply right-clicking anywhere inside the Putty window. Neat, eh?
- Install Curl and package updates by typing (or copying & pasting into Putty) the following commands:
sudo apt-get install curl sudo apt-get update sudo apt-get upgrade
Step 5: Install cgminer
Cgminer is the mining software we’ll be using. If the first command doesn’t work, you’ll need to check out the cgminer website and make a note of the current release version. Substitute that in the commands below.
Update: Cgminer 3.7.2 is the last version to support scrypt—do not use any version after that! In addition, depending on which version you choose to use, you may receive an error complaining about libudev.so.1 when you try to run cgminer—you can find the fix for that here.
- Type the following:
wget http://ck.kolivas.org/apps/cgminer/2.11/cgminer-2.11.4-x86_64-built.tar.bz2 tar jxvf cgminer-2.11.4-x86_64-built.tar.bz2 - If everything was uncompressed successfully, we can delete the downloaded archive; we don’t need it anymore:
rm *.bz2 - Now check if cgminer detects all of your GPUs properly:
cd cgminer-2.11.4-x86_64-built export DISPLAY=:0 export GPU_USE_SYNC_OBJECTS=1 ./cgminer -n
Step 6: Create cgminer startup script
We’re almost done—now we just need to create a few simple scripts to control cgminer.
- If you’re still in the cgminer directory from the previous step, first return to your home directory:
cd .. - Type the following to create a new file with nano, a Linux text editor:
sudo nano mine_litecoins.sh - Type the following into nano (note where the places you need to substitute your own usernames!) :
#!/bin/sh export DISPLAY=:0 export GPU_MAX_ALLOC_PERCENT=100 export GPU_USE_SYNC_OBJECTS=1 cd /home/YOUR_XUBUNTU_USERNAME/cgminer-2.11.4-x86_64-built ./cgminer --scrypt -I 19 --thread-concurrency 21712 -o stratum+tcp://coinotron.com:3334 -u USERNAME -p PASSWORD - Save the file and quit nano, then enter the following:
sudo chmod +x mine_litecoins.sh
Note that the cgminer settings we’re using in our mine_litecoins.sh script correspond to a good starting point for Radeon 7950 series GPUs. If you followed our hardware guide, these settings will give you good hashrates. If you’re using another type of GPU, you’ll want to use Google to find optimal cgminer settings for it.
Also note that you’ll need to create an account at one of the litecoin mining pools, and plug your username and password into the script (the -u and -p parameters). I have Coinotron in there as an example, but there are quite a few to choose from.
Step 7: Create auto-start scripts
We want cgminer to automatically start mining whenever the rig is powered on. That way, we keep mining losses to a minimum whenever a power outage occurs, and we don’t have to worry about manually starting it back up in other situations.
- Type the following to create a new script and open it in nano:
sudo nano miner_launcher.sh - Enter the following text into the editor (substitute your Xubuntu username where shown!):
#!/bin/bash DEFAULT_DELAY=0 if [ "x$1" = "x" -o "x$1" = "xnone" ]; then DELAY=$DEFAULT_DELAY else DELAY=$1 fi sleep $DELAY su YOUR_XUBUNTU_USERNAME -c "screen -dmS cgm /home/YOUR_XUBUNTU_USERNAME/mine_litecoins.sh" - Save and quit nano, and then type:
sudo chmod +x miner_launcher.sh - Now we need to call our new script during startup; we do that by adding it to /etc/rc.local. Type the following to open /etc/rc.local in nano:
sudo nano /etc/rc.local - Add the following text, right above the line that reads “exit 0” (substitute your own username!):
/home/YOUR_XUBUNTU_USERNAME/miner_launcher.sh 30 &
Step 8: Create an alias to easily check on cgminer
We’re essentially done at this point, but you’ll probably want to manually SSH into your miner from time to time to manually check on your GPU temperatures & hashrates, etc. Creating an alias will make that easy.
- Type:
sudo nano .bashrc - Scroll to the end of the file, and then add this text above the line that reads “# enable programmable completion…”
alias cgm='screen -x cgm' - Save and quit out of nano.
That’s it—you’re done! You’ll probably want to test everything now. The easiest way to do that is to close your Putty session and power down your miner. Turn it back on and the following should happen:
- Your miner should boot into Xubuntu. This may take about a minute, depending on the speed of your USB stick.
- 30 seconds after Xubuntu has loaded, cgminer will automatically start and begin mining. You’ll probably notice the fans on your GPUs spin up when this happens.
- You should be able to SSH into your miner at any time and type cgm to bring up the cgminer screen. To close the screen (and leave cgminer running), type control-A, then control-D.
- If you ever need to start cgminer manually (because you quit out of it, or kill it, etc), simply type ./miner_launcher.sh
If all went well, you should see something like this when checking cgminer via your “cgm” alias.
Congratulations—you have your own headless linux litecoin miner!
The next section of our guide covers setup under Windows, and then we take a look at optimizing cgminer settings for better performance.
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Hi Cryptobadger et al,
Thanks for the great setup guide. I’m running three XFX R9 280X Black editions at 700-720KH/s, using the settings in your article about initial testing for the 280x.
I am however having a problem with the miner_launcher.sh. When I reboot, xubuntu loads and mine_litecoins.sh loads. cgminer starts. However, it starts using the settings that I entered for the 7950 in the initial guide before tweaking them for the 280x. This only give me hash rates of about 430KH/s, so if there is a power failure, it will mine at a much slower rate. Some kind of link has been broken in the miner_launcher program.
Any ideas? Should I delete miner_launcher and rewrite it? Will that start it over?
Thanks for any advice.
Hey stafnsnake
delete ~/.cgminer/cgminer.conf if there is any and delete *.bin from your cgminer directory.
I had the same problem.
Thanks GMC Will do as soon as I get home today.
Hi again GMC,
I deleted the bin file with the old settings in the name, but I left the one with the new settings. Should I delete that also?
The situation hasn’t changed. However, when I enable byobu, it’s as if there exists a second instance of the cgminer program that terminal. In my home directory I cannot access a screen using the command “cgm”, but if I enter byobu, then cgm shows the cgminer screen, which is the screen showing the GPUs with the older settings.
But if I am in my home directory, not byobu, and type “./mine_litecoins.sh”, then cgminer starts with the newer settings.
There was no cgminer.conf file to delete, just and example.conf.
This is very weird to me and it seems that my having used byobu stuffed it up. I shouldn’t have ventured onto other web pages in the setup process. For now I don’t know how to make it start from scratch.
Thanks for your help
Did you by chance upgrade your drivers for the new 290s?
To use the new R9 series cards you’ll have to install the new drivers as well as compile cgminer 3.7.2 with some flags that will set the new SDK. Otherwise you won’t get hardware support – which means you won’t be able to spin up the fans, etc.
cgminer -n output should show “hardware monitoring enabled”
miner@miner-001:~$ cgm -n
[2013-12-22 13:26:13] CL Platform 0 vendor: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.
[2013-12-22 13:26:13] CL Platform 0 name: AMD Accelerated Parallel Processing
[2013-12-22 13:26:13] CL Platform 0 version: OpenCL 1.2 AMD-APP (1348.4)
[2013-12-22 13:26:13] Platform 0 devices: 2
[2013-12-22 13:26:13] 0 Hawaii
[2013-12-22 13:26:13] 1 Hawaii
[2013-12-22 13:26:13] GPU 0 AMD Radeon R9 290 Series hardware monitoring enabled
[2013-12-22 13:26:13] GPU 1 AMD Radeon R9 290 Series hardware monitoring enabled
[2013-12-22 13:26:13] 2 GPU devices max detected
Thanks Vegim,
I am using 289x not 290, with Tahiti.
In the end it seemed that I had two instances of cgminer running, so I deleted it completely and deleted my scripts and started again, downloading and installing cgminer from the command line rather than dragging and dropping. It all works now and since I unplugged the monitor, hash speeds have gone up to 730-735H/s.
Thanks again.
Typo: 280x
Why there is no step of AMD SDK installation? Isn’t it neccessary?
every time i try installing xubuntu i get the same error of “no root file system is defined, please correct this from the partitioning menu”. how do i fix this
Hi!
I started mining with two saphire radeon R9 280X. First one gets about 700 kH/s and the other one just 20-40 kH/s. The settings should be the same. Any idea what´s the problem?
PS. Great guide, thx!
-Manu
Everything in your guide works when I have one video card installed. When I add the second one, my computer freezes at the Xubuntu loading screen. I can’t do sudo aticonfig –adapter=all –initial because I can’t open a terminal from there. Anyone know how I can fix this?
Need mobo type.. and do all usb ports work… my gigabtye board acted weird with xubuntu. And my asus board didnt like 12.04 xubuntu.
It’s a Gigabyte GA-F2A88X-UP4. The usb ports are acting weird. I had to turn off the IOMMU option for the keyboard and mouse to work for installing.
Everything works until I get to the load screen. I couldn’t even load into the installer with 2 cards installed, I just got a black screen.
It turns out the 2nd card is faulty. I tried it by itself and it won’t even show anything. I got to that Xorg I think it is, listing and one of the GPU’s was failing. I have 4 cards here so I tried the 3rd card and I am now running 2 at once.
[…] http://www.cryptobadger.com/2013/04/build-a-litecoin-mining-rig-linux/ […]
I followed the guide and it works perfect for 1 card. However, when I run 3 cards, the gpus barely do anything. I am getting 20kh on each card and they are basically in idle still. If I turn 2 cards off, then the first one works again. Any ideas? I am running 3 280xs, all the same type.
Hi Cryptobadger ,
Great site. Thank you. I followed your instructions and am finally up and mining for a few days.
Im a using a single HD5870 on Xubuntu 12.10 and cgminer 3.7.2.
I have played extensively with all the cgminer settings and cannot get more than 268Kh/s. I have read numerous posts that are getting close to 400Kh/s from these cards. I have played with engine/memory speed combos, intensities, threshold concurrency, shaders, lookahead-gap.
Here are the settings for the best hash rate:
./cgminer –scrypt -o stratum+tcp://coinotron.com:3334 -u -p –thread-concurrency 8000 -I 16 –worksize 256 -g 1 -d 0 –lookup-gap 2 –auto-fan –auto-gpu –gpu-engine 650-850 –gpu-memclock 1200 –temp-target 68 –temp-overheat 75
At this point I am suspecting the Catylst Drivers. I am using the fglrx-update drivers.
Do you think my next step would be to reinstall the fglrx-update drivers or try and download the latest ADM Drivers(13.12)?
Thanks for your help.
Mike
Hey all, some disturbing issues:
Built a new system, installed Xubuntu 12.04 on and now run from a flash drive.
Went to step 3, installing drivers.
-First command went well, looks like all packages installed.
-Next typed “sudo aticonfig –lsa” to which terminal replies “No supported adapters detected”.
I retried the first command, and the terminal just tells me that all 3 packages are already installed, nothing to update. Still, no supported adapters detected. Reboot system, no supported adapters detected.
I am using 2 R9 290x’s on an MSI mobo with the suggested Sempron CPU.
Can’t see what I am missing… Please help?
Think you have to get the beta driver from amd for the 290’s. Also think you might want to try 13.10 xubuntu.
Thank you for the input. I can manage getting the latest xubuntu on my own.. but do you have any pointers on how to intstall the latest beta drivers? I know where the find them on the AMD site, but I am used to windows. That being said, where would you download the .zip files to in xubuntu and then how would you extract and install?
Greatly appreciated.
apt-get -y remove fglrx-updates fglrx-amdcccle-updates fglrx-updates-dev
cd ~
wget http://www2.ati.com/drivers/beta/amd-catalyst-13.11-beta-v9.4-linux-x86.x86_64.run.zip
unzip amd-catalyst-13.11-beta-v9.4-linux-x86.x86_64.run.zip
rm -f amd-catalyst-13.11-beta-v9.4-linux-x86.x86_64.run.zip
./amd-catalyst*.run
Wanted to install latest 13.12 AMD drivers for use with 280X cards, ran the above commands, rebooted, ran the amd installer and it then says no supported cards available…even tho I have 2 x 280X cards sitting there..they work ok with your main instructions, but they are slow compared to other systems..500 to 550 compared to 750 on Windows – thought latest drivers might help, but no go at the moment.
Did you ever get this working? I’m having the exact same problem (trying to install brand-new Gigabyte Radeon r9 290’s. I’m in the process of upgrading Ubuntu to 13.10 in hopes that helps.
Great instructions here pastebincom/AFDwXdwy
Well would help if I didn’t typo that. http://pastebin.com/AFDwXdwy
Love the tutorial, although a Linux newbie I followed the directions and met with success right up to the point of actual mining. I see nothing on my screen that indicates CGminer is working like the terminal window I see with my Win7 computer, and the card does not get warmer.
I’m using a 1x to 16x riser cable to connect the one HIS 7950 card I’m currently using to test the system.
The cut and paste into Putty is wonderful, love that so much.
I’m using a Gigabyte Z68MA-D2H-B3 mobo and an i3 with 4gb ram.
Why isn’t it mining?
Dennis, “cgm” command will either get you the screen of your miner, working, or a “no screen” response. Go from there to check your auto start programming. Try these commands to get cgminer to start; “./miner_launcher.sh” or ./mine_litecoins.sh”. If cgminer doesn’t start with either of these, review and double check all your steps from create mine_litecoins through the end of the tutorial. Good Luck!
Hey Ezpacer, please help.
I’ve tried the 2 commands you mentioned. when I do the
./mine_litecoins.sh
THIS comes up http://imgur.com/yz4kjYN
When I do ./miner_launcher.sh …. nothing happens.
I’ve doubled and triple checked my typing to make sure all t’s are crossed and i’s are dotted.
Can you please help?
I’m running Ubuntu 12.04 and cgminer 2.9.6
it’s taken me so much effort to get to where I am now, I MUST make it work!
I’m having an issue with Xubuntu. When I go to install it will say “Empty security header” for a minute then it goes to a screen that displays a stream of text ending with “panic occurred switching back to text console” and I can’t get past this screen, does anyone know of a fix for this issue?
After looking into it a bit more I realize my Kernel is dying for some reason, the panic message opens: “Kernel Panic – Not Syncing attempting to kill init!” Does anyone have any ideas or fixes?
I have a question about Step 3: Install AMD Catalyst drivers
I ran the commands as written, however I have 4 GPUs(7950) instead of 3
It recognizes 3, but not the 4th.
I entered, (sudo aticonfig –adapter=all –initial ), still only 3
sudo reboot, still only 3.
Any thoughts or ideas on a fix/troubleshoot for this out there?
sudo aticonfig –adapter=all –initial, that is
hmmm copy paste only gives one dash, well, anyway I entered it correctly
Anything special I should know about installing the brand-new ATI Catalyst Drivers that just came out today (non-Beta), and attempting to get Gigabyte Radeon R9 290 cards working with a rig?
I’m finding that it “acts” like it installs, then I reboot, but when I query: sudo aticonfig –adapter=all –odgt
I get a “no adapters” error.
Since these drivers are so new, I was basically following the driver-installation instructions from here: http://askubuntu.com/questions/124292/what-is-the-correct-way-to-install-ati-catalyst-video-drivers-fglrx/286775#286775, for Ubuntu 13.10
Hi,
Finally got my miner working using this guide, thanks!
Just out of interest, do any of you guys schedule any downtime into the mix? I’m debating scheduling a reboot every evening.
Cheers
Hi all! Thanks for the guide, it has got me up and running with 2 GPU’s (r9 290x).
The issue I am having is with adding a third. Unfortunately, when I add the third riser to the mobo, Xubuntu does not fire up. I am left with a blank screen, and cannot SSH in. I do not have a dummy plug in the card at the moment, but will be trying with a spare monitor tomorrow. Is this the reason? Does anyone have any other tips?
Thanks in advance.
PS. Current head is a TV, VGA to HDMI out of GPU0. All on powered risers.
Hi @Scott,
Although I don’t have the answer to your question, I’m looking to purchase the Gigabtye 290x cards.
Can you confirm that you got it working in Ubuntu with the latest Catalyst beta?
Trent
Hi, yes 2x R9 290x’s working.
I downloaded and unzipped amd-catalyst-13.11-beta-v9.4-linux-x86.x86_64.run driver into /home/user using the gui. I had to change the file name of the extracted file as there was a space which seemed to upset things.
sudo su sh amd-catalyst-13.11-beta-v9.4-linux-x86.x86_64.run –force
sudo aticonfig –lsa
sudo aticonfig –adapter=all –initial
I then untar’d AMD-APP through the gui, you get a folder, I moved all items within the folder to /home/user and then:
sudo sh Install-AMD-APP.sh
sudo reboot
The above info is thanks to an earlier poster Paul, but played with.
Hope it helps speed things up a little!
My previous post disappeared!
I’m having an issue setting up a third GPU on my miner. When connected, Xubuntu does not fire up and I cannot SSH in. All three R9 290x’s are on powered risers, though currently without a dummy plug.
Can anyone offer any tips? Will connecting a monitor (dummy) solve the problem?
Thanks, Scott.
Typical, now its back!
Tonight I have been playing around a bit with how the GPU’s are connected to the mobo.
2 on risers works fine,
3 on risers xubuntu will not fire,
2 on mobo works fine,
3 on mobo, xubuntu fires, and 3rd is recognised by the system, but not CGMiner!
[2013-12-22 18:06:36] ADL found more devices than opencl!
[2013-12-22 18:06:36] There is possibly at least one GPU that doesn’t support OpenCL
[2013-12-22 18:06:36] Use the gpu map feature to reliably map OpenCL to ADL
[2013-12-22 18:06:36] WARNING: Number of OpenCL and ADL devices did not match!
[2013-12-22 18:06:36] Hardware monitoring may NOT match up with devices!
Just incase anyone is following, I tested each GPU individually, 2 of my 5 would not allow Xubuntu to fire. One would just give me a black screen straight away, the other would flash the bios, and then give 4 options, ubuntu, memory test and something else!
Are these GPU’s useless? The 3 that would fire Xubuntu are now mining happily. The remaining 2 I am a little annoyed about!
Scott,
For some reason the blog isn’t accepting my post. I’ve put it on pastebin.
http://pastebin.com/XKvs0xFZ
Let me know if this helps.
Hi Vegim. I had tried what you had posted in the bin. I have been playing again tonight, and with the GPU connected to the mobo (It would seem this GPU does not like risers!), xubuntu will fire up, and after typing sudo aticonfig –lsa, the GPU is listed.
When i type the ogdt command i do get ERROR – X through SSH. Through xubuntu command line, it works ok and the GPU is seen. I rebooted, and waited for CGMiner to automaticaly launch, i was then kicked from Xubuntu and had to log in again, after which i could not launch CGM.
Made some progress I guess!!
Depending on why they’re struggeling it’s definitely ok to go with snarky comments in my opinion 😉
Hey everyone I need some help. I am at the part where I am trying to install Xubuntu using a usb flash drive and installing on a second empty usb flash drive but when I start up my miner PC and I get to the install Xubuntu screen and click install I get this error message:
(initramfs) Unable to find a medium containing a live file system.
I googled and after making sure bio setting is set to other OS not windows and even trying windows I get same message. I turned off all sata controllers and 1394 controllers and usb 3.0 as well. Can someone please help me???? Thanks in advance.
I’ve been stuck on this problem for almost a week now. I posted a message here but got no response.
Which motherboard are you using? I’m using the Gigabyte mobo suggested here since they were out of the other one he suggested.
I did manage to get a version of xubuntu installed using the One Button Installer app, which allows you to download and install a compressed version of xubuntu directly onto you computer. Unfortunately it can only install the 32-bit version, which it turns out is incompatible with cgminer. So basically it’s useless for our purposes.
Hopefully someone answers your post.
Motherboard is Ga-990fxa-ud5
You guys are both attempting to install TO a USB drive, correct?
What happens if you use a hard drive?
Haven’t tried yet. Gonna try now and report back.
Thx for replying to my thread. Hopefully I can test tonight if it works with HD but I really don’t want to go that route. I would prefer usb flash drives. Hope we both get it working.
Well why not throw in some information.
(Xubuntu + USB drive really ISN’T specific in any way)
– Xub version (13.10 12.04 ? x32 x64 ?)
– screenshot of UEFI usb config as well as boot priorities.
— do this while everything is plugged in when starting up the rig !
— screenshot via phone / camera
— upload to imgur.com, link here
– how many cards are present when installing
– what tool did you use to create the bootable usb, also on which platform (win / linux)
Greetings
Oliver
I had the same problem.
Solved it by installing Ubuntu Server x64 with Basic + SHServer + Xubuntu Desktop from USB-Stick. (Nice tool for creating bootable USB-Sticks http://www.pendrivelinux.com/universal-usb-installer-easy-as-1-2-3/)
The only difference is you have to manually set autologin for your user (sudo /usr/lib/lightdm/lightdm-set-defaults –autologin YOURUSERNAME)
I would advise you to use the 13.11 beta ATI Linux Driver for R9 280/290(x) cards hash rate is much (20%) better with it (http://www2.ati.com/drivers/beta/amd-catalyst-13.11-beta-v9.4-linux-x86.x86_64.run.zip dont use wget!).
You can sudo sh the *.run driver from console your System maybe misses some dependencies, if this happens read the error message carefully and install these dependecies.
It took me a week to run my 2 rigs and I have ongoing problems with to long (24cm) PCIe riser cables.
Atm they run on 2 GPUs I dont want to risk 3 GPUs without riser.
Thanks! Will try this as soon as I get back home this week.
Can I ask how you installed Ubuntu Server x64 with Basic and also SHServer and also Xubuntu Desktop onto the USB stick with using the USB installer you recommended? The Universal USB installer only seems to allow me to load one of them at a time onto the stick, and SHSserver doesn’t seem to be one of the options.
Thanks
You need to enable IOMMU in the Peripheral’s section of your BIOS. It will probably at the bottom of the page. I was having the same issue as you and spent almost a full day googling for an answer before I happened upon a discussion on a different forum…http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2143433 post #6.
As soon as I enabled IOMMU it booted right up. I hope it helps you.
Just to clarify, my earlier post is in reference to the error message “(initramfs) Unable to find a medium containing a live file system.”
Enabling IOMMU will fix this problem.
When I had this enabled on my mobo… I got it to install but pic 1st slots were turned off. Finally just got an old hd.
hi everyone,
excellent tutorial, im building two 4 x r9 290 rigs and im having some difficulty. im getting no signal to my screen, not just black screen but no signal and on start up one long beep fallowed by 3 short beeps (beep bios say faulty keyboard…) hdd led flashes 1 long fallowed by 2 short flashes about 20 seconds after start up. cpu fans spin and r9 290 fan spins. i have a hdmi from gpu to screen, i have double and triple checked connections, tried switching all 4 x 4gb ram in different slots one at a time two at a time and tried switching gpu slots and tried all 8 gpus. i removed the cmos battery over night and also shorted the cmos jumpers to reset bios but still no signal. i think im starting to go insane… lol
gigabyte ga-990fxa-ud3 motherboard x 2
Kingston 4gb ddr3 1600 ram x 4
ocz gold power supply 1000w x 4
r9 290 sapphire x 5 gigabyte x 3
amd sempron 140 and 145 cpu (one of each)
raiser cables x 8
will gpu display graphics without drivers being installed?
this is my first build so im a bit of a newbie but i used anti static wrist strap, if anyone can solve my problem i can show my appreciation by sending some litecoins your way
You have tried the HDMI cable in different GPUS, right? The one closest to the processor should be the one though, but maybe the next one over. I have never tried HDMI. DVI-A to VGA has worked with 7950s and that exact board for me. Also, I did not have to have amd catalyst drivers installed to get a signal. I DID have the wrong DVI adapter once though and it threw me for a loop (same symptoms as you– no output but rig powers on). I needed DVI-A not just regular DVI.
**Once you get a signal, make sure you dig through the Gigabyte BIOS settings and find the IOMMU setting and hit enable. I can’t remember exactly where it is, but it is back in there. This is if you plan on using Xubuntu. Otherwise I hear there are problems.**
whoops!
The 290 are dvi-d so vga adapters wont work. Second withbiommu turned on in bios it will disable usb’s and pci slots… was very weird… once you get it going you can turn it iommu in some grub file the turn it off in the bios.
That IS weird. I haven’t tried it with IOMMU disabled, but my pci-e slots and usbs are working ok with it enabled. I just saw it as a tip in these comments somewhere for this motherboard so I did it and didn’t have problems. So is everybody using HDMI to see/setup rigs with r9 280x? I might get a couple. Sounds like they are a little tough though.
How some of you people can afford to set up a rig with 8 or 10 GPUs is beyond me! It sounds like you don’t even need the money lol!
Me envy ….nah.
@phil:
It just depends on your job.
As a bus driver I could for one not afford the machines, but also I wouldn probably not even know about it 😉
The more you invest in this the more profit to be gained later right ?
For those of you having troublewith R9 290X boards on Xubuntu 13.10…
[2013-12-07 21:53:37] CL Platform 0 vendor: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.
[2013-12-07 21:53:37] CL Platform 0 name: AMD Accelerated Parallel Processing
[2013-12-07 21:53:37] CL Platform 0 version: OpenCL 1.2 AMD-APP (1214.3)
[2013-12-07 21:53:37] Error -1: Getting Device IDs (num)
[2013-12-07 21:53:37] clDevicesNum returned error, no GPUs usable
[2013-12-07 21:53:37] 0 GPU devices max detected
UPDATE: Found the fix !!! via http://devgurus.amd.com/thread/167775. Need to set the following before running cgminer
LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/usr/lib/fglrx/:$LD_LIBRARY_PATH
Thank you for posting that! I could not figure out why all my other cards work and not the 290X!
Hmm…am I missing something? I’m typing that in the terminal and nothing is changing.
I’m quite new to linux haha :).
Can you tell me EXACTLY what to type, and what directory to cd into before I type it?
I just want to be sure that I’m not doing this incorrectly.
Thank you!
Did you ever figure out exactly what to type because I cannot figure this out either?
cgminer REQUIRES that an X windows server be running at the time it is executing. You don’t necessarily have to have a screen attached, but the process needs to be running. When you kill cgminer, it also kills the xwindow server and cgminer will not start up until another X window server instance is started.
l0r3zz.. I googled some info on X windows after reading that reply. I went into terminal and typed “startx” and got a black screen.
I restarted the rig and now it brings me to a login screen (even though I have the rig set to auto login) and when I enter the CORRECT password….it flashes a black screen and takes me right back to the login page.
I will literally pay you if you can help me get this thing mining. Is there any way I can contact you more directly? If you are interested in making some easy(for you I’m sure haha) money, email me. cntougec AT gmail.com
I have been trying to get this rig running for weeks now and I’m all out of answers… Thanks for your time.
My knowledge of X is really limited but don’t you first have to set a command like runlevel 5 at the prompt and then do a startx? Each of the levels (1-5) has an increasing level of capability.
I think, though, it’s more likely that something choked during a library or driver installation.
Everyone,
you need to set some environment variables for cgminer,
when you set these variables you won’t “see” anything.
The easiest thing to do is to put them in a little shell script and execute the shell script…
————————————————————————–
#!/bin/sh
export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/usr/lib/fglrx
export DISPLAY=:0
export GPU_USE_SYNC_OBJECTS=1
export GPU_MAX_ALLOC_PERCENT=100
/opt/CGMINER/cgminer-3.7.2/cgminer –scrypt -I 20 –temp-target 80 –auto-fan –thread-concurrency 24000 -o stratum+tcp://middlecoin.com:3333 -u 1KpJXrzSymt52d6mvg92Ar82umDMT58jAS -p i_needs_me_gold
————————————————————————–
Make sure you set the execute permission on the script
chmod +x scriptname
or run it with
sh ./scriptname
I am using the R9 290 cards without the x, will this fix the problem for me there as well?
That is not the fix. You didn’t install the SDK and set the proper environment variables. You’ll also need to copy over header files with the ADL SDK package to cgminer*/ADL_SDK. AMD-APP should have 1348.4 after it, this is the APP-SDK 2.9 version.
I’ve written a full guide targeted towards R9 290/X users: http://bit.ly/1iIFTkR. I haven’t found many that actually work or have this much information and screenshots.
Hope it’s useful.
Bill me later or newegg
6 or 12 months no interest…
N8c I was only having a laugh! Poor old nvidia must be tamping with this mining business going all to and .
Good luck in finding this post it’s all gone tits up here.
Btw if anyone needs any advice on power circuit s I’m an electrician.
Hi, since you’re offering electrical advice, do you know the maximum wattage a circuit can handle before blowing? I believe its 15Amps * 120V = 1800W * (80% load) = 1440W. Is this correct for North America / Canada?
Thanks!
When I go to the site- http://ck.kolivas.org/apps/cgminer/, I receive a WARNING message from Norton Security of a malicious site;
This is a known malicious web site. It is recommended that you do NOT visit this site. The detailed report explains the security risks on this site.
For your protection, this web site has been blocked. Visit Symantec to learn more about phishing and internet security.
???? What’s the real story???
No real story. Site is fine unless your DNS is actually not taking you there. You should see a directory listing, go to 3.1.1 or 3.7.2. Pick your poison.
It is not malicious.
Is there any reason to be worried about the Malicious Website message that I receive from my Norton Security program when I attempt to access the cgminer website for the download?
OOPs! I didn’t see my previous post about the malicious site message because it came as anonymous..excuse the repeat and thanks for the reassurance.
Been having issues with linux install, posted a few times with no reply but let’s try again. I tried the recommended LinuxLive USB Creator to create the Xubuntu Boot, when i tried to boot from the flash drive i got an error saying “No Default or UI configuration directive found” I tried the simple renaming isolinux to syslinux fix, it didn’t work so I used UUI, a different usb installer and got a little further before the kernel killed itself with the message “Kernel Panic-unable to sync” or something to that effect. So i’m at a standstill with Linux and really need help, can anyone shed some light on why i can’t even boot without these errors?
For anyone encountering this issue, I fixed the problem by booting with 13.10 written to the flash drive with the UUI installer. Now trying to use the 13.10 live installation to write 12.04 to the second flash drive, will keep updating.
After inputting this command in step 3:
sudo aticonfig –adapter=all –odgt
I get this annoying error:
ERROR – X needs to be running to perform AMD Overdrive(TM) commands
After trying to start xinit I get an error that I am an unauthorized user. This is annoying please help! How do I fix this?
I am running xubuntu 13.10, AMD 13.101, R7950 cards.
I wanted to add that I have successfully enabled/registered the R9 290x cards on Xubuntu and wrote a small article to augment this one. Since the cards are pretty new I modified parts of this how-to. Hope I can help you guys out who’ve decided to use the R9 290x cards like myself!
Thanks for the awesome article!
Where is this article…?
Hi Vegim,
The article is at the following site:
http://litecoinstuff.com/tutorials/
Let me know if you have any issues when you run this or find any problems in the tutorial.
Mike
I’m going through this right now. You realize the latest beta driver is older than the latest stable driver that was released?
This is my result on installing the drivers: http://pastebin.com/4nXeHDDh
I’ve found many, many potential “fixes” for this all with no luck. Do you have this running in 64bit Xubuntu? Would you mind chatting with me on freenode? PM KoSoVaR if you’re around.
Minimal Logic,
I’ve followed your guide except for I’ve installed the 13.12 drivers instead of 13.11 beta. Caveats include having to patch and build the package (see http://phoronix.com/forums/showthread.php?91885-AMD-Catalyst-13-12-GPU-Driver-For-Linux-Released&p=381943#post381943).
I have gotten 13.11 beta to work but I have issues with rebooting & crashing. If I press Q in cgminer the machine locks up, just like in Windows. If I force kill the process I’m unable to reboot the machine..
After following your guide and running cgminer -n, I’m not getting this:
CL Platform 0 version: OpenCL 1.2 AMD-APP (1348.4)
I am however getting the old SDK:
CL Platform 0 version: OpenCL 1.2 AMD-APP (1214.3)
I’ve set all the correct flags. I never even had the old SDK or old ADL installed/downloaded.
miner@miner-home:~/Downloads/cgminer-3.1.1$ sudo aticonfig –adapter=all –odgt
Default Adapter – AMD Radeon R9 290 Series
Sensor: Temperature – 38.00 C
Default Adapter – AMD Radeon R9 290 Series
Sensor: Temperature – 38.00 C
Drivers are definitely installed correctly…
What do you think? I’ve set:
export CFLAGS=”-O2 -Wall -march=native -I /opt/AMDAPP/include/”
export LDFLAGS=”-L/opt/AMDAPP/lib/x86_64″
Still no luck during the build. Always get the 1214.3 AMD-APP instead of 1348.4.
How did you get ATI driver 13.12 working?
I can’t even install this driver without errors.
I tried to install the driver directly and made *.deb but nothing without errors. I ve all dependencies installed (13.11 installation without any problems)
Ubuntu Server 13.10 + Xubuntu Desktop
Did you see this link? http://phoronix.com/forums/showthread.php?91885-AMD-Catalyst-13-12-GPU-Driver-For-Linux-Released&p=381943#post381943
First make sure you have the proper tools to do this.. this should most likely cover it:
$sudo apt-get install openssh-server screen build-essential autoconf libtool libcurl4-openssl-dev libncurses5-dev pkg-config libudev-dev devscripts debhelper dh-modaliases libqtgui4 execstack lib32gcc1
You may need more, just look for errors about packages
./amd-catalyst-13.12-linux-x86.x86_64.run –extract catalyst
You’ll need to create a “patch file” with these contents: http://pastebin.com/0zTvfpUs Call it amd_forgot_to_patch.patch and put it a directory above catalyst extraction.
Then patch:
$patch -Np1 -i ../looks_like_amd_forgot_this.patch
Then build:
$sudo ./ati-installer.sh 13.251 –buildpkg Ubuntu/saucy
And install the build packages, placed one directory up:
$cd ..
$sudo dpkg -i fglrx*.deb
Should do it.
Ah try to install the SDK separately. The cgminer Readme for GPU use state to install the driver+SDK
http://developer.amd.com/tools-and-sdks/heterogeneous-computing/amd-accelerated-parallel-processing-app-sdk/downloads/#one
Yes, I have done this. Installed both the SDK and the drivers. Also copied the header files over from ADL…
No dice.
Do you use riser cables?
If you use them try the 13.11 beta driver without them. I had issues with freezes and hanging system it drove me crazy coz I couldnt find a clue what went wrong. I suspected faulty hardware but while installing my second rig without risers (they are distributed too late) and only 2 cards I had no problems add all from the outset.
Now my rigs running only with 2 cards but I ve ordered new shorter ones with additional powersupply.
> How did you get ATI driver 13.12 working?
> I can’t even install this driver without errors.
> I ve all dependencies installed (13.11 installation without any problems)
I bet 100 € on you still having the 13.11 installed and just trying to install the new ones without the fear of problems arising out of mixed installations.
Let’s see if this helps you:
http://nerdoholic.org/uploads/hiddencube/ltc/installnewamd.txt
I would accept the bet 🙂
I have tried installing the 13.12 driver on a clean system without any ati drivers or ATI components/modules present.
Haha damn 😀
Please try it again after installing these dependencies:
apt-get -y install lib32gcc1 libc6-i386 build-essential cdbs fakeroot dh-make debhelper debconf libstdc++6 dkms libqtgui4 wget execstack libelfg0 dh-modaliases linux-headers-generic xserver-xorg-core libgcc1
Vegim,
Did you force uninstall fglrx first? Your paste been seems to be referring to it.
M
M1n1mal L0g1c –
I did force uninstall fglrx. Do you mean my paste seems to not be referring to it? Did you get 13.12 drivers working?
* I’ve copied the header files from ADL_SDK_6 to cgminer/ADL_SDK
After I install 13.12, or think I install it, I check out the Ubuntu Software Center and search for “fglrx” and ATI binary X.org driver is installed. It’s fglrx 2:13.251-0ubuntu1. This seems to be the right version and indicating that I’ve installed from the patch that I did after extracting amd-catalyst-13.12-linux-x86.x86_64.zip to a directory and then building, and installing the 3 debs:
fglrx_13.251-0ubuntu1_amd64.deb
fglrx-dev_13.251-0ubuntu1_amd64.deb
fglrx-amdcccle_13.251-0ubuntu1_amd64.deb
I’m completely stumped… been spending way, way too much time on this.
Any problems with cgminer 3.7.2, if upgrade to xbuntu 13.10?