Bitcoin Forum

Hi Guys,

Ive just found out about bitcoins thanks to Silk Roads demise, before that I thought it was some teenagers game. :) What happens to us when we grow old and start losing touch with technology.

Anyways, Ive been reading a bit about bitcoins plus some of the other digital currencies there are out there. Everytime I look at buying equipment I consider the price of the equipment, the electricity charges and wonder if it is still worth mining? Especially when all these new Cointerra machines and the likes are about to hit the scene. Once they do  im sure the difficulty level will sky rocket in days after people start receiving their machines.

So as a newbie who has limited funds, is it too late or would I be better off to mine a different currency hoping that it may eventually go up in value like bitcoin has?

Anyways this board has helped me a lot and I hope to learn a lot more.

Thanks

It's pretty late as of now for mining Bitcoin if you want to go solo with limited budget and technology. You may want to try your luck with Litecoin and some other altcoins.

I'm in the same boat as Khoder; I read the story about the guy who's $27 investment grew to almost a million dollars and decided to investigate more. My gut is telling me that Bitcoin will likely crash (or be forced to crash) at some point, and whatever comes after will probably have more long-term success, but I feel like there's still time to dabble and potentially walk away ahead. This forum was recommended multiple times, so I couldn't not at least pop in and say hi!

So you are looking for a get rich quick scheme? Wrong place

What about no.

If your interested in mining you kinda have to look at it as more of a hobby then an investment at this point.  Most people who look at it as an investment just buy bitcoins and hold them.  When it comes to mining, its a crap shoot.  No one knows if it will pay off but I mine and I like to watch my balance slowly grow even if it I never break even.  I also find the tech aspect of mining fascinating and enjoy being part of it.

Yes too late, people hardly ROI these days. Most miners are happy if they break-even now...

buy bitcoin instead of miners. that's your only chance right now :)

Not sure what in that came across as 'get rich quick', but if I can take my family out to dinner off my cumulative earnings, I'll consider it a win. And I base my second point off the fact that Bitcoin was first; history shows that the early bird gets the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese. Bitcoin is where all the mistakes will be made and the lessons will be learned, and something will come along after and profit from that knowledge. Again, it's just my impression.  :)

I am new to mining also but fortunately I have an unhealthy obsession with speculative math and predicting futures and I would have to agree that there is no value in buying miners currently. It makes much more sense to buy $4000 worth of bitcoins than it does to buy a $4000 miner and only get $3000 back in bitcoins. With the miners currently on the market or the ones shipping soon this isn't far off from being the best case scenario with the way difficulty is going up. Worst case is you order a miner and by the time it arrives its a $4k space heater and nothing more. On the flip side if you bought that $4k of bitcoin at $200 a coin by the end of the year when they are at $300 you will have $6k ;)

It is never too late. The key is to buy something that will actually generate a profit. The problem is that there are too many math-challenged people that are paying far too much for equipment and bidding up the prices. It is unlikely that you will find reasonably priced equipment at this time, but that doesn't mean that you can't start sometime in the future.

The difficulty is going up too quickly for any miners to be profitable, even if you get free electricity. I actually don't know why people are still buying miners because it's just not possible to make a profit the way the difficulty is increasing.

Some people might be thinking along the lines of "well if my 20BTC miner mines 15BTC but the BTC/USD value goes up I will still profit" but this is bad logic because they would have been better off just buying 20BTC instead of the miner. Some people enjoy the hobby of mining Bitcoins but I don't see how it could possibly be enjoyable if you take away the financial aspect of it. To each their own.

Existing miners are still making a profit but if a bunch of mining doesn't die off then no-one will be making a profit. Still, mining is an essential part of Bitcoin so I'm glad people are still doing it.

I agree with this. As hardware becomes cheaper to manufacture and wattage/gh goes down I think it will definitely become profitable again. Combine that with a difficulty plateau and things could be looking pretty decent some time next year.

The only advice I can give is that mining right now is a go big or go home ecosystem, my feeling is that mining to date has oversold the market (at least asic power in the sha-256 coins), due to this dynamic you have to continually be getting the best hardware at significantly reduced cost vs. hashrate.  To be viable and present day profitable you really must go big which comes with a big $$$ investment.  As BTC price rises the lifespan of this hardware would be better but network difficulty growth is currently much greater than what even this can handle at the moment.  When network growth stabilizes it will be much easier to answer this question.

In the meantime you're really much better off using your money to buy and hold the coin directly or investing in non-mining based investments from reputable cryptocurrency companies.  Much like the wild west was there is big opportunity for gains but the risks are equally large and as with any developing economy as it grows the gains will be less significant and the risks will be reduced as well in time.  And I can't stress this more, don't invest what you can't afford to loose and don't invest it all in one source if you can afford to diversify.

If you are interested in attempting to mine to support the network and willing to treat your electrical bill like a currency exchange as a small scale/hobbyist miner, I recommend you seek out mining  equipment on the second hand markets where you can sometimes find great deals which have a chance to break even and/or profit from in the long run (check out offerings at bitmit.net for example, you can find ready to ship BFL, asicminer, KNC, bitfury and avalon based systems which are often sold significantly under "retail" value and remember it's all about the hash rate vs. dollar cost of the equipment vs. utility bill of operating the equipment vs network difficulty when deciding what to buy)

The funny thin is I agree with this.. When I first started reading about bitcoins a week or so ago. They were at approximately $135 a bitcoin. Today they are at approximately $200. If for example I had purchased 10 Bitcoins for $1350 then I guess I wouldve made a nice profit of $650. And I cant see myself making a profit like that by mining.

On the other hand the hobby side of it looks like fun. But indeed an expensive hobby. :)

Also if anyone can help. Is it true you can not mine Litecoins with an Asicminer? Cant find any information that tells me so.

I am looking to buying mining since hardware since for a whole year i have free electricity, have about 3000 watts that i can use without having to pay it. So if you have an option like this it would be profitable.

GPU mining on alt-coin is best for now. Stay away from ASIC :)

It's not too late! To mine bitcoins now you'll need more investment!

Hello. I think that mining still can be profitable, it depends what miner and delivery date you choose.
Also profitability depends on exchange rate and it's hard to forecast it.
There is a mining calculator on Genesis block (http://mining.thegenesisblock.com/), where you can set device, price, hashrate, delivery date and see what you can expect.

Here's some friendly advice from someone who's been mining, involved with mining and mining projects; don't buy any mining hardware for the next several months. While others may argue that you will make back your money if you "spend" enough wisely, it is quite honestly a gamble in which the odds against you (Insane rising difficulty / more competition than ever). You would basically be praying that the exchange rate for BTC rises beyond what is currently is to break even and that some competing hardware manufacturers fail at delivering their hardware.

You are better off buying BTC and sitting on it rather than getting into the mining game.

And you will need more and more as time goes.

I believe it is too late, and waiting where the difficulty stabilizes is better option now

If people stopped paying absurd money-losing prices for mining equipment, two things would happen:

1. The price of the equipment would fall.
2. The difficulty would not rise as quickly.

Both of these effects would quickly restore profitability to mining, but a long as people continue to pay stupid prices for the privilege of mining, it will never be profitable.