Bitcoin Forum

Hello Guys,

It's strange but as I said, there is no any electricity cost.

I've started with 2x Radeon 7970 XFX (950Mhz) and getting 700MH/s for each GPU on Windows 8 and cgMiner.

I heard about ASICs these days with huge amount of power and low electricity consumption. But I don't care
about electricity at all.

What do you think for me? Should I continue invest on GPUs? Which GPU do you prefer and which OS?
More GPU on same motherboard or separate them on different motherboard?

What would you do if you hadn't any electricity consumption?

Thanks

Yes, you should continue to invest in GPUs

Why wouldn't you include the price of electricity?

You should do the math. Determine if the cost of the GPUs will be less than the BTC you will mine. Keep in mind that the GPUs won't last forever and the difficulty will be rising quickly very soon and continue rising quickly for a long time.

gpus soon won't be profitable

More GPU on a single motherboard without question.  Why waste money buying another Motherboard, CPU, Memory, Power Supply, Hard Drive for each additional GPU?

Not to mention all those additional parts generate additional heat that you have to get rid of.

I personally would get GPU's until those creating the ASIC people manage to deliver their product reliably on time. I think it is just not worth the risk at this time. However, you also don't want to have to get a separate "computer" for each GPU, so you will need a motherboard that can hold multiple GPU's. Best of luck! I'd say start with GPU's if you can use them profitably, because theoretically once you buy them, if you have no electricity cost, you have until they break to get your money back, which I think is still possible. When ASIC get in there and become reliable, then get them.

I wonder who is footing the bill for your little venture. Family, perhaps? I'm not judging, I'd use other's electricity too!

As for what you should do since you do not have an electricity concern, I would say to check out the mining section and in particular the threads about high output rigs. Personally, I would invest in a couple motherboards that can support multiple GPU's and string them together in a low-heat environment. It would take some start up funds, but if you don't have any expenses past the initial then I see no reason to go full force.

I was just reading this thread if you want to check it out: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=186877.0

Thank you all.

Actually it's not family money at all !

Regarding the less motherboard, which one do you prefer to handle more GPUs?

Is it possible to have a motherboard with 4 GPUs but in original shape and without taking out the fans !?

Because as I see 4x 7970 won't fit on the same motherboard in the original size i believe!
Maybe on Supermicro motherboard we can do that.

Also if I put them on PCIe 2.0 instead of 3.0, the result will be decrease or what?


Thanks again.

Currently running 7950's on PCI-E x1 at 2.0 connections without issue on litecoin, one ever reports 1.1 with TechPowerUp.  Doubt you will see any difference.

If his electric source is parents than sure they will say something when the power bill goes up $50 plus more for cooling.  In a dorm or barracks probably will never be noticed, what's another 7 to 8 more 100 watt bulbs running 24/7 in the grand scheme of things..    ;D

As I said it's not parent's electricity , It's something legal in someone office .

I got 2x  7970 XFX with 925Mhz core .

I tried to flash the following BIOS (http://www.overclock.net/t/1281425/amd-release-hd-7970-ghz-bios-upgrade-for-reference-hd-7970)
to upgrade to GHz edition :

http://www.techpowerup.com/vgabios/122148/ATI.HD7970.3072.120607.html

Everything went well and Catalyst showed it's increased to 1500Mh aand 2000 for Memory Clock.

But as soon as I run the CGMINER the Windows got stuck and rebooted. I have Windows 8 professional !

I couldn't install the .EXE file (that every one says that works fine) because of compatibility I think .

Which rom should I use to upgrade the BIOS?

And why I can't run the exe file on Windows 8?

Please help me :(

1500mhz on the core???  That is way too high.  It may work fine when you are on your desktop, but when you put any load on the card (when you open chminer) the display driver crashes.  You can use the GHz edition BIOS, but roll the clock speed down a little.  You should be able to get higher speeds than the 925MHz the card came at, but you wont be able to get 1500MHz out of it.

Heed what others have said about bitcoins becoming less profitable on GPUs over time. Be sure to figure for the long run how much you will be able to mine.

For example I'm using a mining model that says each future month I will make roughly 33% less bitcoins than the previous month. So if I can make X amount of bitcoins this month, then I expect to have minted X*(1-0.67^n)/(1-.67) coins over n months. Then I figure where the rate of generating bitcoins equals the cost of electricity to get a *rough* idea of how long my mining hardware will go. Though since you're not paying for electricity you can just use the equation to figure out how many coins you can make in n months or figure out how many months it will take to make Y coins.

This may help you as well: http://dustcoin.com/mining

Everyone getting this !

But maybe it got problem with CGMINER or any BitCoin mining !

As soon as I started mining , it crashed .

On CGMINER bat file when I choose 1200MHz also it crash but I can go for 1150Mhz which is 25MHz more than
highest original MHz. Is there any way to overclock it in a custom way to get more MHz?

As I said people are getting 1500Mhz on 7970 HD version with changing the GHz edition bios.

But the only bios that worked was the url I mentioned . You are telling GHz edition bios works on my cards? It didn't when
I used them. Why?

If power isn't an issue, it doesn't really matter what you buy; and as the difficulty increases, you can move your cards over to other coins, like LTC.

Would you please be more specific?

Is it worth to go for LTC instead of BTC?

If you mean beside of this how it would be ?

You can mine without electricity cost several ways, none of them are honest.

You could rent an apartment that has electric included in the rent.

You could install your mining rig at work, if that is possible for you anyway.

You could install your mining rig someplace other than where you live, such as your parents basement.

I'm sure there's more ways, you just have to be creative.

Actually I have free electricity available at the moment.

With ASICs upcoming devices, I'm a little scared to run huge graphic RIGs .

But i dono when there is no any electricity cost , that would be same if I invest same amount of ASICs in GPUs or not ?!

What will be the future of BitCoin with ASICs?

I don't think you will even get the money for your GPSUs back with the network reaching 10TH in may.

I wouldn't buy a lot of new GPUs because 1.  Free electricity can't last forever, 2. Soon it will be so slow going as to be pointless with the difficulty increase. 3.  Even if your electricity is free, the capacity available in most buildings is going to keep you from expanding your operation eventually and again with the difficulty increase you might not even make back your initial cost for GPUs.  If you can get cheap used GPUs and mine the crap out of them for a while and resell them, that would not be a bad plan. 

I don't understand why I should convince every one that how is the life time free Electricity !

It's not for just one location or building , please just consider that It's free forever !

Also as I mentioned the ASICs will be so expensive as they are right now on Ebay and with that amount
maybe you can reach close to that power.

I can't wait for 4 months for shipping !

If you just stated how or why its "free for life" instead of being so purposely vague and annoying, people wouldnt keep asking.

Also Ive never seen anyone running a 7970 at 1500. I have mine at 1125 as the heat and power requirements dont justify overclocking it much more. Core is at 63c running 100% 24hrs a day. Thats with water cooling running to my household water tank in the attic, so I get some benefit from the heat generated and its not just wasted.. ie heat there reduces heating cost for hot water and central heating.

You can't convince us that you have free lifetime electricity because that doesn't exist. You have free electricity indefinitely, not forever.

Honestly, I urge you to invest in one or two efficient mining rigs (1,000. - 2,000. USD) and run them in the location that you have free electricity up until the point that they pay themselves off (it may be a while, but without expenses it will happen). Once they have done that, then I would reevaluate your GPU mining situation.

In the meantime, follow the ASIC developments and buy into them when they are reliable enough. See, you're not necessarily trying to have each rig cover its own costs; you're trying to make a profit with your entire Bitcoin operation. It does not matter if your GPU rigs pay themselves off merely off their own mining, it matters if the ASICs can push your cost over the expense threshold.  

uk college dorm room ftw

Solar Panel from China very cheap :)

haha

That was my case few years ago - I had apartment with "free" electricity. Okay, well, the rent itself was pretty expensive, so I even those people who used quite a lot of electricity were not a concern for the landlord ...

Electricity costs are more due to the increased labour. For me, the higher than average price is justified by the far superior product. The service would have the advantages and disadvantages of centralization: easier access and no need to maintain the program on your own machine, but on the other hand it makes the system more vulnerable. A friend of mine pays his broker better than average fee per month.

gpu can be re-sold and used for litecoin and bitcoin and other cryptocoin mining. asic is only for bitcoin mining... no other usefulness..

Upon reading the title to this post I immediately imagined little "mining rigs" perched high in the trees.  Screw windmills, I want a solar-powered bitcoin farm.

I changed the 7970 BIOS to the GHz edition which is released by AMD officially but Windows got stuck as soon as mining started.

Now I bought 2x 7970 XFX GHz edition that will be overclocked till 1500Mhz by Catalyst but same issue !

CGMINER just working with maximum 1125 MHz otherwise Windows will hang !!!

Really don't get the point here :(

As soon as I increase the MHz from 1125 to anything above, driver get stopped !

I have 1000W power and 2x 7970 XFX Ghz Edition :(

The funny part is when I connect the CrossFire, first one get lower and gives me around 500 Mega Hash per sec and second GPU gives me 680 M hash per sec !!!!

And when I disconnect the CrossFire, everything gets reverse !

If the ASICs comes out then those guys with 50 or 100 GPUs , what they do?

Maybe some guys don't like to find any competitors on GPU mining :)

If you want to continue investing in GPUs, you better start mining litecoin and watching the other altcoins closely.  Knowing which coin is more profitable on a daily basis is important and will maximize your profits.

When do you think ASICs get the market?

If they get it what would the price though ?

As long as my electricity is free of charge, wouldn't be useful to have GPUs ! I was considering about the ASICs price that
for sure will increase hugely !

Stealing isn't the same as "free", not judging just saying ::)

Litecoin profitability had dropped quite a bit just in the last week alone.

Even though electricity might not be a "cost" in terms of money coming out of your (conventional) wallet, it still does make sense for me to optimize things.  I.e. to have cards / systems that do not consume too much power unnecessarily, that do not create too much heat in the room for nothing, and that don't create too much pollution as a consequence.  ;)

Better don't say that !

When do you think ASICs get the market?

If they get it what would the price though ?

As long as my electricity is free of charge, wouldn't be useful to have GPUs ! I was considering about the ASICs price that
for sure will increase hugely !