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So my  4 module, Batch #3 unit I have had since August 7th.

It has found 4 blocks on Slush's pool in less than 3 months.  Thats 100BTC vs 47 BTC earned on Slush pool.


I am considering using my Avalon (110 gh/s)  to solo mine and my Bitfury (170gh/s) to Pool mine.


What are you guys thoughts?

You are crazy if you are solo mining today with anything less than 25 TH/s.

The variance is going to kill you. You have a very significant chance of losing it all.

Good luck  ;)

The difficulty is raising so fast you will be lucky if you find another one solo mining with this. It  is interesting in theory, but not funny when you mine 0 BTC in one month  :D

yeah well i just found 2 blocks yesterday on a 110gh/s machine.


The calculators are not very accurate for solo block generation as they cannot predict chance of luck, etc.  My idea is dedicate some hash power to solo mining and some to pool mining.   When solo mining becomes luckier than pool mining i switch to all pool mining and maximize my return.

I highly doubt you found two blocks in one day with 110gh/s.

The calculators work flawlessly, they show you the statistical chance of finding a block on your own solo mining. If you want to ignore that, go right ahead...

Luck does not have memory. When solo mining becomes luckier, it doesnt mean your more likely to be unlucky in future  ;)

Ok you are correct, its not 1 day. its 2 blocks in a little over 2 days.  Oct 24th and Oct 26th.  The point is 4 blocks in under 3 months.   This could have been 100 btc versus 47 btc.   My results and other's results indicate that the average time to generate a block solo mining is not accurate on the mining calculators.

https://i.imgur.com/TYauroh.png

Something to think about: The input used to find those blocks would never have been used if you were solo mining.

I still say no way, not in any recent two days.

Do you understand statistics at all? If you know how bitcoin works, and you know statistics than you wouldn't say the calculator is wrong.

You would be gambling solo mining. Don't fall for gambler's fallacy.

Yes in recent two days I have found those blocks...look those block #s up in the block chain.  That will give you timestamps of when the blocks were found and by whom.

As far as statistics I have a degree in Mathematics so I probably understand Statistics much more than you ever will learn.


The calculator is using extrapolation.  Extrapolation is inaccurate the further you go out.  If you knew statistics you would know this.  This doesn't even account for sample size.

In a month or two, solo mining/gambling will be way better than the .0001 BTC/day that 280GH/s will earn, lol.

I agree with this assessment as well.  It will be better to roll the dice on some or all assets in a few months from now unless one has free electricity to run mining equipment.  Right now I think its better to diversify the risk (hashrate).

IMHO solo-mining is only worthwhile if you except to mine on average at least 1 block per 6-12 months. Anything beyond that and the variance is so high that you might mine for years without a block, the problem with this is you have no idea if it is due to bad luck or a setup issue.

I feel for your luck. I first discovered bitcoin and tried mining in Jan 2012. I CPU mined (with a laptop CPU) for 12 hours and found a block, but my payout was less than 0.0001 BTC due to the very low hash rate. How is that for crazy high luck. Then in 2012 with 1 GPU mining card I found 4 more blocks, but recieved significantly less in payout.

It just goes to show how high the variance can be, and there is a long tail of probability with zero payout.

I think solo mining is more for the fun of it, but make sure you have enough hashrate to make it worthwhile. With the expected difficulty increases I think you are below the limit...

That's like saying saving $2/week will never add up to anything so you might as well spend the money on the NY Lotto.

That's EXACTLY what I was saying!   ;D

This.

Unless you are confident in your software setup, and have monitoring in place to ensure that everything is working correctly, and that you will know if it's not, the risk of mining for days/weeks/longer on a broken or underperforming setup outweighs any disadvantages you may encounter mining on a pool.

</my_two_satoshi>

Luck doesn't have memory but it sure follows statistical average. Lucky rounds will be followed by unlucky ones to bring the earnings back to normal, average level. We are playing with average numbers here, observing only a day or two of data is not enough to make any conclusions.

So not true at all!!

The problem with something like mining that follows a poisson distribution is that it has an infinitely long tail.

There is no point where you have a greater chance to find a block. The chance is always the same.

Let's say you expect to find a block after an hour on average (50/50 chance). After an hour you haven't found a block. What is your chance you'll find a block the next hour? Still 50/50.

Now let's say it's been 24 hours and you were really unlucky and haven't found a block. What's the chance you'll find a block in the 25th hour? Still 50/50.


It's like flipping a coin. Very long strings of heads (and tails) WILL occur and in fact occur quite frequently. If you are solo-mining and your average block mine rate is greater than a couple days, you run a great risk of losing as it is very common for you to have long periods that last many times longer than your average mine rate where you get nothing. And with difficulty rising fast you have no chance of making that back.

Old topic is old.

Ppl have been having this same discussion since pools first came into existence.

Set up your own pool (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=158105.0) and mine on the testnet first to debug your setup.

Exactly why I prefer to mine on a pool rather than solo, since a while now.  I'd found lots of block in the pool, that would have rewarded me much more if I had found them solo mining, BUT, in solo mining I dont have a way to know the rigs are hashing fine, on the pool, I see if there is problem, reboot machines, fix setup issue..

It's clear that I would have found half of those block if I were solo mining..

At current difficulty, and the rise comming, I would'nt feel comfortable to solo mine under 10 Th/s, even at that level of hashing power, I would still use a pool.

That's why my suggestion was the OP should at least expect a block every 6 months on average before trying this, and if it was me I'd prefer on the order of 1-2 months. This way if you go a period with no blocks you can understand that statictically odds are you have something wrong that needs to be fixed.

I also think you should only solo mine in a stable difficulty environment. Right now the full "bet payoff" for ASIC mining is over the next 3 months, just pool mine and get that value, then go for high variance if you want.

On this date: 2013-10-20
It took eligius 5 hours 35 minutes and 56 seconds to find a block, using a total of: 1,540,824,552 shares. This was mining at 328.33 Th.
The amount of shares your avalon had, was a fraction of that.
The fastest mined shares on eligius are based on shares in the millions..
You finding 4 shares, just proves luck within the share space.

that is an extreme luck. Look at total amount of shares mined on your pool for those blocks, and HOW MANY shares you were participating in..then you can easily calculate your amount of luck.. Extreme!

Why not set up your own pool, with statistics ?
You'll see shares being found and when really lucky find a block.
It's a doable challenge, I've done it.

This message was too old and has been purged

I've been mining 24x7 since June 2013 and I have never found a block.

Since getting a KnCMiner Jupiter in October 2013 I've been running pretty decent hashrate too.  I'm currently at 1.7 TH/s. 

Think about that for a moment.

Who cares?  As long as you understand the likelihood, and potential cost of pursuing it-- do what you want.
It doesn't hurt anyone else if you never find a block again  ;D

I'm curious if the OP has found a block ever since... ;D

Have been investigating the issue (pool vs solo mining) and came around this thread... 8)

bump for OP block find curiosity, especially these days  :)

Does it matter what op tells you?

We have solo mining service right here



https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=763510.0


run by ck  the writer of cgminer a huge mining program.

fee is small  he has paid 30 plus people off

math to figure odds is easy

2.5th is about 1000 to 1 shot at todays rates for 1 day of mining

so 2 s-5's  = 1000 to 1 each day

Well if you do pool mining, you get more work offered since the pool finds more blocks in general.

Unless you have a matched performance of hashes, but why waste money on just to find blocks? so most people just opt in a pool.

Larger the pool, the more chances of more work. +/- the rejected work