Bitcoin Forum

Hi there!

I'd like to start mining with my hardware, but I don't know if this is possible.

I've one ASUS HD5870 and one Sapphire HD5970 and I don't know if can I use these cards in the same system. Which operating system do you recommend?


Thanks for reading! :-)

Yes, you can use those cards in the same system.

Which OS to recommend depends on what else you want todo,
if it's a dedicated mining-system, i'd recommend BAMT (http://bamter.org/), quick and easy install, fire and forget.

Thanks for answer.

I'm not a Linux guy at all! There is a guide that explain BAMT to a really newby in Linux/mining? :-)

No need to be a Linux-Guru,
just write the image to an USB-Key, plug it into your mining-rig, configure bamt and your pool(s) on the first startup and that's about it, there's not much else todo.

All info can be found on the BAMT-website, step-by-step setup on the download-page (http://bamter.org/download.html), examples of the bamt.conf and pools.conf on the wiki (http://bamter.org/redmine/projects/bamt/wiki/Examples),
pretty much self-explanatory.

I tried to read something from the links that you sent me, but I don't understand almost nothing! Win 7 doesn't work well for mining?

Sure, Win7 will work too,
it's way more complicated to set up though, you'll need to get some dummy-plugs, drivers, sdk and of course mining-software all by yourself.
BAMT on the other hand is ready to use out of the box, plug and play (and doesn't need a HDD).

I have already tried to mine with WinXP(SP3), but I had some problems that I don't know if they were dependent from software or hardware. I mined very well with a HD5870 (about 470Mhash/sec) and GUIminer (OpenCL miner) (OC 1050MHz... this card is equipped with Accelero XTREME ---> 52°C at 75% fan speed :-) very good!).

Now I've problem with my HD5970. Moreover, seems that only one of two GPUs on this card, works with this configuration... every time that I change videocard on my system, I need to reinstall Catalyst & SDK... what a mess!

Configuration Info for HD 5870: Catalyst 10.7 + SDK 2.1
Configuration Info for HD 5970: Catalyst 11.2 + SDK 2.2

Always with GUIMiner & OpenCL miner


From SDK version 2.3, WinXP is not longer supported...

What are dummy plugs? What is their function?

When you've setup the 5970, the 5870 should also just run fine with it, i had a 5970 + 5850 running fine side by side on WinXP.
You just need either a dummy-plug (http://www.overclock.net/t/384733/the-30-second-dummy-plug), or a monitor connected to both cards (at least on bootup).

I do remember that i also had some problems at first with only one of the 5970-cores  running on Windows, not sure what i did to solve that though, it's been a while ago and all my GPUs are now on BAMT.
Maybe someone else actually using Windows for mining can help you with that.

@ lassdas

This evening I would like to try BAMT... so I hope to solve all problems but I think it will be a hard work to do... I can't understand "english technical language" very well...  In the meantime, I would like to thank you very much for the time you've spent for me!

A lot of useful informations!

Greetings from Italy and happy mining!

No problems.
guiminer is good for u.