Hello everyone, my name is Cuihua, the editor of POWPOWER, POWPOWER has been focusing on the mining area for 4 years, is the official distributor of IPollo, and has established long-term partnerships with Bitmain, Avalon, Jas miner, inno, Whatsminer and Goldshell. Anyone who is familiar with ETH has seen the word Ethash, so what is it and what does it do? Let’s learn about Ethash today!

Ethash is a mining algorithm based on POW workload proof of Ethereum. It is a transitional algorithm. It is the latest version of Dagger-Hashimoto. It is a new variant of Hashimoto algorithm combined with Dagger algorithm.

The main idea of ​​consensus design in Ethereum is to design two datasets, one large and one small, the initial size is:Small:

16M cache Large: 1G dataset (DAG)

The 16 MB cache was chosen because the smaller cache allows the use of light-evaluation methods that are too easily used in ASICs. A 16 MB cache still requires very high cache read bandwidth, while a smaller cache can be more easily optimized. Larger caches can make the algorithm too difficult for light clients to verify blocks.

The 1GB dataset was chosen to require a memory level that exceeds the size of most dedicated memory and caches, but normal computers can and can use it. The dataset is chosen to update every 30,000 blocks because the interval is too large to make it easier to create memory that is designed to be updated very infrequently and only read frequently. Too short an interval increases the barrier to entry because weak machines spend a lot of time at the fixed cost of updating the dataset.

The purpose of designing one big and one small is: large data sets are generated by small cahce through calculation, miners can only save large data sets in order to mine faster, so as not to delay time due to repeated calculation, and light nodes only need to save and save A small cache can be verified.

The basic idea of ​​Ethash is similar to the pow of BTC. It is to compare the value obtained by random nonce with the difficulty. If the conditions are met, the mining is successful, otherwise, continue to try.