Bitcoin Forum

Bitcoin is a lost cause as far as mining goes, so what alt-coin are you mining (or what do you recommend). Ive been checking dustcoin for the past few weeks and it looks like the profitability of LTC is going down each day, terracoin on the other hand looks to be putting out great rewards. I'm just glad I looked at this before I started building a miner (I don't pay for electricity as a side point). Bytecoin looks sort of promising?

So is mining even a good idea to get into at this point (im doing this as a hobby to)? If so, what coin?

LTC is a good bet, but be prepared for the fussy tuning scrypt based coins need if one wants to fully optimize their rig. If you enjoy tuning and tweaking, you will be in heaven.. :D  . This is not to say that one must fully optimize ,LTC is  profitable just running the default the mining software has for your GPU. LTC is also immune from any kind of ASIC manipulation,

PPC would be the safest bet amoung the SHA-256 coins at the moment as it is relativity safe from ASIC manipulation right now. SHA-256 coins are much easier to tune ones GPU for.

Just my 2 cents...

Honestly everything other than PPC and LTC are over hyped.

TRC is DOA. Wtf is bytecoin.....

So yeah, LTC has scrypt and is the most accepted currently. PPC has proof of stake which has a lot of potential on its own.

No matter what anyone else says, remember, my opinion is the only got good one.

Dream watcher is correct litecoin or ppc. Though, litecoin will eventually have asics developed for it, that isn't possible that we know of yet. Byte coin and TRC have shown big vulnerabilities to 51%/asic issues.  
The other alts can be merged with bitcoin(which I don't think is dead quite yet for mining).  There are a few being revived such as BBQ, and new ones such as freicoin and min coin that need time to really establish themselves.  Novacoin had its controversies but that's an alternative to litecoin if you're looking for a scrypt coin.

Personally I believe litecoin is the most stable coin right now as it isn't manipulated by ASICs currently. Scrypt mining does take some significant time in optimizing if you build your own system, but at the end it's worth it. :)

What's a good GPU right now? I have about $800-850 for a build, I heard 7950's were good right now. Don't need a HDD or a case.

7950s are definitely the way to go for scrypt (from what everyone is recommending).  Just ordered a 7950 that will be here Monday for litecoin mining.

What not to mine: TRC or BTE  ;)

Mine LTC and trade it for BTC afterwards!! ah, and dont forget: come and mine them at www.WeMineLTC.com :P :P

I am in the same boat, looking for a coin for my limited resources. PPC looks to be only for ASIC owners so not viable for a hobby miner and Litecoin difficulty is skyrocketing.  Novacoin looks interesting - scrypt, high value on BTC-e, the developer is active on this forum and he just sent me a free coin!

There is nothing making a coin "for asiic owners'' . Its about profitability. If its more profitable than the next one, your 1/100th of 60ghs is worth just that. The opposite might be true though. But then it would be sha vs scrypt.

NVC is plagued by its manipulated launch (launched in Russia for a couple days before released in English, premined, and also heavily pumped by those elected few with premine exclusivity). It will never get accepted by principle by the community.

Ya it does appear that the developer made some poor decisions on launch which sucks because it is the only scrypt alternative. Oh well LTC it is then.