How to Automate Your Mining Rig's Restart Process?

Understanding Mining Rig Failures

1. Power fluctuations frequently interrupt GPU-intensive operations, causing the rig to freeze or drop offline without warning.

2. Driver crashes accumulate over time, especially when mining multiple algorithms across different kernels.

3. Overheating triggers thermal throttling that degrades hash rate consistency and may force abrupt shutdowns.

4. Memory leaks in miner software lead to gradual RAM exhaustion, resulting in unresponsive SSH sessions or web interfaces.

5. Corrupted blockchain headers or stale DAG files prevent proper initialization during boot sequences.

Hardware-Level Watchdog Integration

1. Motherboards with IPMI or ASPEED BMC chips support hardware watchdog timers that reset the system if heartbeat signals stop.

2. Raspberry Pi GPIO pins can be wired to a relay controlling the ATX power supply’s PS_ON line for physical reboot enforcement.

3. Dedicated watchdog modules like the WDT-500 generate pulse resets after configurable idle periods, independent of OS state.

4. PSU firmware with built-in watchdog logic responds to I²C commands from microcontrollers to cut and restore 12V rail output.

5. PCIe slot monitoring tools detect loss of link training status and trigger external reset circuits via USB-to-serial adapters.

Software-Based Auto-Restart Scripts

1. A bash script running under systemd checks nvidia-smi --query-gpu=temperature.gpu --format=csv,noheader,nounits every 90 seconds and initiates reboot above 95°C.

2. Python daemon parses miner.log for “GPU timeout” or “CUDA error 700” patterns and executes sudo reboot -f on match.

3. Cron jobs invoke systemctl is-failed ethminer.service and restart the unit if return code equals 1, preserving uptime metrics.

4. Custom initramfs hooks verify DAG file integrity using SHA256 checksums before loading kernel modules, aborting boot if mismatch occurs.

5. Dockerized miners run inside health-check-enabled containers where docker container inspect --format='{{.State.Status}}' triggers recreation upon “exited” status.

Network-Triggered Remote Reboot Protocols

1. MQTT broker receives topic messages like rig/0x7A/status containing “offline” payloads, prompting central server to send magic packet via UDP.

2. Webhook endpoints hosted on reverse-proxied NGINX accept POST requests with valid JWT tokens, then execute ssh rig01 'sudo systemctl reboot'.

3. Telegram bot polls mining pool APIs for last reported share submission timestamp; gaps exceeding 180 seconds activate remote shell execution.

4. ICMP echo failures detected by Zabbix agents trigger escalation workflows invoking Ansible playbooks with reboot: directives.

5. LTE modem-connected rigs respond to SMS commands parsed by ModemManager DBus signals, initiating graceful shutdown through /dev/ttyUSB0.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Can BIOS-level fast boot interfere with watchdog timer functionality?A: Yes. Fast boot skips hardware enumeration routines required for watchdog register initialization. Disabling fast boot ensures proper WDT configuration during POST.

Q: Does automatic reboot erase pending unpaid balances in mining pool accounts?A: No. Pool balances are server-side records tied to wallet addresses. Local rig reboots do not affect accumulated but unconfirmed payouts.

Q: Is it safe to use sudo reboot inside a cron job triggered by temperature thresholds?A: Yes, provided the crontab entry runs as root and avoids race conditions with concurrent miner restart attempts. Use flock -x to serialize execution.

Q: Why does nvidia-smi sometimes return empty output during automated checks?A: This occurs when the NVIDIA driver fails to respond due to GPU lockup. Scripts should include fallback logic checking lsmod | grep nvidia and reloading modules if absent.