AntRouter : mining bitcoins on another pool

by William Mcmurray

When you buy an AntRouter it says "mining on Antpool is forced". They don't specify if you actually CAN mine on another pool or NOT. The answer is : you can't unless you are ready to hack things a bit. It's not very complicated so let me show you how.

You will need : a basic knowledge of SSH and Vim.

Initial setup

Plug the power and ethernet cable into the device if you haven't done it yet. The device broadcasts a wifi network named AntRouter-xxxx by default. Connect to it via your computer (there is no password).

Then connect to the AntRouter's web interface located at http://192.168.200.1 by default. (username: root, password : root).

Now heads towards Status > Processes and locate the process beginning with cgminer and looking like this :

cgminer --antrouter-options 115200:7:100:0783 -o antrouter.antpool.com:3333 -u :R1:0:2:my_email@adomain.com_b0411d07aa31 -o antrouter.antpool.com:443 -u :R1:0:2:my_email@adomain.com_b0411d07aa31 -o vip.antrouter.antpool.com:443 -u :R1:0:2:my_email@adomain.com_b0411d07aa31 --api-listen --api-network --version-file /usr/bin/compile_time --queue 10

This command is the miner software (a custom version of cgminer) running with all the pool addresses and logins you can set in the web interface. As you can notice, the usernames (after the -u option) are prefixed and suffixed with weird data. That's why you can't just change pool addresses in the web interface and expect it to work.

We will have to find a way to run this command with our custom parameters. The most straightforward way is to use SSH.

Lets do it !

Run ssh root@192.168.200.1 (password : root)

Or you can add your public SSH key in System > Administration. (that's what I did)

Now we will have to edit a file with Vim :

vi /etc/init.d/cgminer

Reach the line looking like this one :

PARAMS="$AOPTIONS $POOL1 $POOL2 $POOL3 --api-listen --api-network --version-file /usr/bin/compile_time --queue 10"

Comment it and add a line under it with your pool credentials (or use mine if you feel generous ! ^^ )

PARAMS="$AOPTIONS -o mint.bitminter.com:3333 -u wimantis_donations -p thanks"
  • -o is the pool address
  • -u is your username (+worker name, depending on your pool)
  • -p is your password

In the end it should all look like this :

Then go to System > Reboot and reboot the device. That's all folks ! It should be mining bitcoins on your own pool now. You can double-check in the processes tab just to be sure.

Happy mining ! :)