Cryptocoin Mining?

[ultimatebob]

I think a GPU miner has been released, but is only for solo mining and the author of the program takes a 10% cut of everything you make. Still, hash rates are very good, especially on VLIW4 cards (before 79XX series).

I'm sure that someone will reverse engineer that guy's work and release another version without the 10% cut any day now.

If they are really smart, they will just reduce the cut to 5% and send it to their own Quark address

 

[wand3r3r]

What do you have to do if you have a Bitcoin (QT?) wallet and are going to reinstall windows?

Presumably take a backup and restore it in the new OS, is that sufficient?

 

[chimaxi83]

What do you have to do if you have a Bitcoin (QT?) wallet and are going to reinstall windows?

Presumably take a backup and restore it in the new OS, is that sufficient?

Backup the wallet.dat file in your user/appdata/roaming/Bitcoin folder. Appdata will probably be hidden, so enable the viewing of hidden files and folders.

 

[cbrunny]

I find the concept of "difficulty" really confusing. What is it about difficulty that actually matters at all? Isn't it just an indirect measure of global hashrate?

I mine litecoin, and i see difficulty go up but the same number of blocks are still found at the same rate (2016 every 3.5 days). Difficulty is just adjusted based on the global hash rate to ensure that this 2016:3.5 ratio is maintained.

So why does it actually matter?

 

[geokilla]

Flashed my XFX 7950 so I can have a slightly faster fan speed, lower temperature and lower VVDC. 1.25V is way too high. Now it's at 1.17V and the temperatures are gorgeous. 80C with case door open and 85C with it closed. I think power consumption should go down a bit even though I raised the TDP limit.

 

[lavaheadache]

Is it best to create new workers for each gpu or have them log into the same one?

 

[chimaxi83]

Is it best to create new workers for each gpu or have them log into the same one?

In my experience, it hasn't mattered, so I'd just do whichever is easier for you. I currently have both cards on one machine under a single worker, and the same for the 2 cards in my second machine.

 

[lavaheadache]

In my experience, it hasn't mattered, so I'd just do whichever is easier for you. I currently have both cards on one machine under a single worker, and the same for the 2 cards in my second machine.

1 worker in total or 2, one for each machine?

I only ask because I'm in the process of getting another rig up and running with a 5870 and 7970.

 

[UNhooked]

1 worker in total or 2, one for each machine?

I only ask because I'm in the process of getting another rig up and running with a 5870 and 7970.

lava

how many cards you got lined up

 

[nwo]

1 worker in total or 2, one for each machine?

I only ask because I'm in the process of getting another rig up and running with a 5870 and 7970.

I use one worker for each rig. That way if something goes wrong or I get a hashrate outage for a prolonged period of time, I know which machine to blame it on.

 

[chimaxi83]

1 worker in total or 2, one for each machine?

I only ask because I'm in the process of getting another rig up and running with a 5870 and 7970.

In using one worker per machine.

 

[lavaheadache]

lava

how many cards you got lined up

currently 3 7970's and 1 5870. Have a potential 4th and 5th 7970 and possibly a 7950 from various friends. I have lots of other cards like 5 different 4870's and 4890's and even a pair of 4870 x2's but I doubt it would be worth running that stuff.

My plan is to get in while the getting is good then get out.

still waiting for my wallet to update on the 7970/5870 rig... 72 weeks left.


Give me coins is all over the place reporting my hash rate for the 2 7970's. I see anywhere from 600k/h to 1.8m/h. From a quick eye-guesstimate, it looks like I average 1.2 on the whole.

 

[nwo]

I have a 4870 and it's not worth the power or the PCI-e slot imo. Only managed to get about 120kH/s without too much tweaking but it probably won't go much higher than that.

Unless you have old rigs that can take those 48xx cards and power/heat/noise is not an issue, then go for it. 4-5 times 100-150kH/s can add up to a decent figure.

 

[lavaheadache]

I have a 4870 and it's not worth the power or the PCI-e slot imo. Only managed to get about 120kH/s without too much tweaking but it probably won't go much higher than that.

Unless you have old rigs that can take those 48xx cards and power/heat/noise is not an issue, then go for it. 4-5 times 100-150kH/s can add up to a decent figure.

I have maybe 4 more rigs that I could put into service but I'd rather not if it's not going to do anything.

My total investment for my mining setup is $400. I won't have to spend 1 more cent to put the other stuff to work.

I got 1 7970 from newegg for $249. Powercolor refurb. The other from a friend, 660 ti plus $150. The third is a loaner from my little brother. He hasn't gamed in 3 or more months. The 5870 comes out of my immense collection.

 

[IEC]

I find the concept of "difficulty" really confusing. What is it about difficulty that actually matters at all? Isn't it just an indirect measure of global hashrate?

I mine litecoin, and i see difficulty go up but the same number of blocks are still found at the same rate (2016 every 3.5 days). Difficulty is just adjusted based on the global hash rate to ensure that this 2016:3.5 ratio is maintained.

So why does it actually matter?

Network hashrate goes up 2x
Difficulty goes up ~2x to compensate
As a result, reward per block is now half (e.g. instead of 50 coins per block, now 25)
Repeat ad infinitum until all coins are mined

Gross oversimplification, but here are the cliff notes:
Higher difficulty = fewer LTC mined per kH = less profit for you

 

[blastingcap]

It doesn't work that way.

Difficulty is a lagging indicator of global hashrate. If hashrate goes up, difficulty proportionately increases to compensate so as to keep production of coins at a constant rate. Who controls the difficulty resets? The program itself controls it--it's built into the software and nobody can change it short of getting a majority of the entire network to agree to a software change. As it stands, the software simply adapts to hashrate and artificially increases/decreases difficulty to maintain a constant rate of production.

The 50 to 25 thing is different; it's built into the algorithm that every 4 years, the reward per block halves. So for ~4 years, bitcoin was produced at a rate of 50 coins per block, one block per 10 minutes on average. Right now the block reward is 25 coins per block. 3 years from now it'll be 12.5 coins per block, and so on and so forth. This restriction on coin production is ALSO built into the software as a means of artificially tapering down supply so that by 2100 or whatever, we will basically have a fixed supply of bitcoins since block rewards will be tiny.

Also, profit drops faster than revenue if you pay more than zero for electricity. A thought experiment for illustrative purposes (these are not actual numbers): say it costs you $1 in power to generate one coin worth $3. If the difficulty doubles, it means you generate only half a coin, which is worth $1.50. So before your profit margin was $2, and now it's $0.50. Difficulty doubled and thus your revenue fell 50%, but your profit fell 75%. This is something people seem to miss--a doubling of revenue results in the loss of more than half of profit, unless you have free electricity.

Regardless of electricity costs, there are opportunity costs (could invest the money elsewhere, such as by directly buying coins instead) and depreciation costs--every day, computer equipment loses some of its value. Just like how a $600 cell phone today will be worth almost nothing in 3 years. And of course the risk of hardware malfunction, a PSU blowing out and starting a fire, etc. If you're going to mine, do it with premium equipment that won't burn down your home, that is for sure.

 

[Silverforce11]

currently 3 7970's and 1 5870. Have a potential 4th and 5th 7970 and possibly a 7950 from various friends. I have lots of other cards like 5 different 4870's and 4890's and even a pair of 4870 x2's but I doubt it would be worth running that stuff.

My plan is to get in while the getting is good then get out.

still waiting for my wallet to update on the 7970/5870 rig... 72 weeks left.


Give me coins is all over the place reporting my hash rate for the 2 7970's. I see anywhere from 600k/h to 1.8m/h. From a quick eye-guesstimate, it looks like I average 1.2 on the whole.

If you got old 5800 cards, they really pump out impressive kHa/s for their low power use. A 5850 only pulls around 170W and does 367 kHa/s, thats about onpar for 7950s which OC to do 600 kHa/s for 300W. An old 5970 (dual GPU) card is very good, better than a 7950/70 in one slot. They are flying off the shelves on ebay.

 

[Accord99]

If you got old 5800 cards, they really pump out impressive kHa/s for their low power use. A 5850 only pulls around 170W and does 367 kHa/s, thats about onpar for 7950s which OC to do 600 kHa/s for 300W.

300W is way excessive for a 7950 unless it's heavily overclocked.

My experience is that a properly optimized 7950 will do 550 for 170W, while a 7970 can 650 for 190W.

 

[Z15CAM]

Lets say I have 2 x's R9 290X's - Can I use one for every day use and gaming and assign the other for Mining?

 

[nwo]

300W is way excessive for a 7950 unless it's heavily overclocked.

My experience is that a properly optimized 7950 will do 550 for 170W, while a 7970 can 650 for 190W.

I am kind of disappointed in my 7970... I am able to max it out at about 650 with GPU/VRAM tweaking and bat file tweaks. Not sure what the power draw is, but I am disappointed that my two brand new 7870s outperform it by about 20% without any tweaking while the cost is pretty much the same.

Lets say I have 2 x's R9 290X's - Can I use one for every day use and gaming and assign the other for Mining?

Of course. You can always enable/disable mining on the fly. You can mine on both. When you are gaming all you have to do is disable mining on one of the cards (the one with your monitor/s plugged into it) and you will be good to go.

 

[SimianR]

I had a 5870 I sold on Ebay about a month and a half ago for about $80.. kind of regret it now :/ But I have an R9 290 on the way.

 

[nwo]

I had a 5870 I sold on Ebay about a month and a half ago for about $80.. kind of regret it now :/ But I have an R9 290 on the way.

Ouch. I don't blame you though. The card is 3 generations old. I would love to be able to get one at that price now to add it into the 5870 rig I have on the way.

 

[Silverforce11]

300W is way excessive for a 7950 unless it's heavily overclocked.

My experience is that a properly optimized 7950 will do 550 for 170W, while a 7970 can 650 for 190W.

Even a stock non-OC 7950 won't be pulling 170W mining, gaming sure, not mining. At stock speeds it only does ~500 kHa/s, needs to be OC to push it higher, especially the 600 kHa/s mark people are expecting of this card. That needs clock speed around 1.1ghz core, which would require upping the vcore, and we all know what happens to the 7900 series when you up vcore, power spikes up massively.

 

[f1sherman]

It doesn't work that way.

Difficulty is a lagging indicator of global hashrate. If hashrate goes up, difficulty doubles to compensate so as to keep production of coins at a constant rate.

Close, but not exactly

The difficulty is adjusted every 2016 blocks based on the time it took to find the previous 2016 blocks.
At the desired rate of one block every 2.5 minutes, 2016 blocks would take exactly 3.5 days to find.
If the previous 2016 blocks took more than 3.5 days to find, the difficulty is reduced.
If they took less than 3.5 days, the difficulty is increased.

The change in difficulty is in proportion to the amount of time over or under 3.5 days the previous 2016 blocks took to find
https://litecoin.info/Difficulty

 

[Silverforce11]

Lets say I have 2 x's R9 290X's - Can I use one for every day use and gaming and assign the other for Mining?

I set the primary one (driving monitor) to intensity 13 or 14, the other one gets intensity to 18 and I do my work on this rig. Its smooth.

You can also do a trick, once both intel iGPU drivers and catalyst is installed, go to the MB bios, set primary graphics adapter to onboard, boot to windows WITH your monitor hooked to the R290, you will see a blackscreen til windows is loaded, then it shows up fine. Go to catalyst overdrive, set fan speed cap up high, apply. Then pull out the monitor cable plug from the R290, and put it into the onboard plug. Takes a few seconds, but the intel iGPU gets going, and becomes the main display driver. This way you can mine with 2 x R290 going full speed, intensity 18-19, and have a very responsive system. It also ramps up the fan to whatever you set it to keep temps low or prevents throttling.