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This guide is for Windows users. Guides for Linux and MAC coming soon

This is a guide for installing, setting up and mining Gridcoins in tandem with BOINC. This guide will be updated as necessary. if you see information that is missing or that you would like to have added, please let me know.

Setup/Installation:
Step 1: Download and install BOINC (http://boinc.berkeley.edu/download.php) to the default install directory, if you install somewhere besides the default directory you will need to add these lines to your gridcoin.conf otherwise you may continue to step 2 (replace the file paths with the correct location of where you chose to install):
Step 2: Download and install Gridcoin (http://gridcoin.us/download/gridcoin.msi)
Step 3: Right-click the gridcoin-qt shortcut, go to compatibility and select "launch as administrator", save, start Gridcoin and allow it to sync
Step 4: Close Gridcoin and create a file called gridcoin.conf
Step 5: Add the following lines to your gridcoin.conf (be sure to edit "rpcuser", "rpcpassword" and "rpcport" with your own choice values):

Here are some additional flags which may be used used in gridcoin.conf:
Code: Values: or - use to join the integrated pool


Code: Values: or - Allow/deny Gridcoin to close command prompt windows


Code: Values: or - Enable/disable BOINC cpumining


Code: Value: - Use if you change BOINC's defualt install directory.

Code: Value: - Use to restart your wallet every "#" minutes.


Code: Values: or - Use with restartwallet= to keep your miner mining

Setup Cont...
Step 6: Save gridcoin.conf and place in %appdata\roaming\Gridcoin
Step 7: Start BOINC
Step 8: Start Gridcoin and wait for it to fully load/sync

Pool Mining:
IMPORTANT: For pool mining with Gridcoin, you won't be mining at a lower difficulty, but you will receive a small piece of every block found.

The only requirement is that you must find a block first to begin receiving payouts from the pool and you must find at least one block during every look-back period.

The look-back period is dynamic and is adjusted based on the difficulty/hashing power of the network. Basically, once you have found a block as long as you don't disable pool mining you should have no problem finding one block during each look-back period.

Since gridcoin has it's own internal pool, pool mining is VERY easy:

Step 1: Add the following line to your gridcoin.conf file:
Step 2: Start Gridcoin

At this point if you have a preferred external miner you may begin mining the same way you would with any other coin (Yes, you pool mine Gridcoins using your own client and your own solo mining IP). If you do not have a preferred external miner and would like to use the packaged cgminer, advance to next section.

Solo Mining:
Step 1: In Gridcoin, go to Mining>Mining Console
Step 2: Click "Configuration" at the top of the mining console
Step 3: Select your GPU in "Device ID", check "load defaults for" to see if your GPU is listed there. If not, then please refer to this page for your card's settings: https://litecoin.info/Mining_hardware_comparison
Step 4: Make sure the "enabled" box is checked, click "save" and then click "create cgminer instance".
Step 5: Exit the configuration screen and on the mining console page click "Restart Miner" and allow a few seconds for cgminer to compile the kernel
Step 6: Click "Show cgminer" if you'd like to see the cgminer console

CPUMining:
cpumining is not currently enabled but should be enabled soon. When you are ready to cpumine, please refer to this guide: https://cryptocointalk.com/topic/1922-cpu-mining-tutorialtopic/

Troubleshooting:
If you have an issue where your BOINC utilization is not displaying properly, be sure that you are launching Gridcoin as admin. If this does not work, try deleting "c:\programdata\boinc\gridcoin.dat" and restarting gridcoin.

If Gridcoin crashes on startup, verify that BOINC is installed in the default location, if you installed BOINC somewhere besides the default location, you will need to add these lines to your gridcoin.conf (replace the file paths with the correct location of where you chose to install):



This concludes this guide. Once again, if you see anything missing from this guide or have any information you would like added, please contact me and let me know, thanks!

Happy mining!


***1/7/2014 EDIT***
Updated the guide to reflect that Gridcoin should ALWAYS be launched as admin.
Updated the guide with a troubleshooting section.
Added instructions for pool mining.
Added instructions for installing BOINC in places besides the default directory.

***1/9/2014 EDIT***
Updated the guide to correct information about the pool mining look-back period.

***1/26/2014 EDIT***
Updated with guide with additional flags for gridcoin.conf

***2/21/2014 EDIT***
Made the guide easier to read

***4/11/2014 EDIT***
Updated addnodes for .conf

good tutorial.

Thanks m8!

Wonderful...Good Job ;)

Thank you, I appreciate the feedback   :)

Nice tutorial, hopefully it will help the new people.

I'm glad you posted this. It was confusing before.

thanks a lot!

Well done!  I'm going to be busy for a bit but this is where I will start when I can throw some more time into it.  Thanks for taking the time to do this!

No problem m8, happy to help!

I want to use the linux guide later, thanks.  :)

I will try to get the linux guide up in the next 24 hours, I need to partition a drive for Debian on one of my boxes and do the process myself first and I just didn't get time today. I will get it done ASAP.

Good job. Thank you.

I'll translate it into Chinese.

done.

http://gridcoin.me/?p=46 (http://gridcoin.me/?p=46)

Nice work man! Translates perfectly!

That was easy to follow and efficient, you definitely just made Gridcoin accessible to many more people. Awesome job, TribalBob!

Hey Bob! Mind if I use this on www.gridcoinnetwork.org? I'm remaking it to look better and be a little more organized/updated so it's currently inoperable. I'll give credit to you in the article

No worries m8, feel free!

How does this work with the new pool website and pool mining?  How can you GPU mine additional Bionic projects not listed in the projects console?

I found that if i specified the following lines at all, then it would give me an md5 error. However, i did misread the instructions and applied it despite the default installation location being the place i installed gridcoin/boinc to.

For now the pool is down but when it comes back up Rob says we will likely be returning to the "poolmining=true" method.

To work on any BOINC project that you wish, just use the same methods as you used to join the ones listed in the project console:

1) Click add a project
2) select the project from the list
3) enter new account info
4) click next
5) click finish

Please help!(( After i start cgminer, windows has blink and hide. I click show and see cgminer not working.
[10:20:23] Pool 0 slow/down or URL or credentials invalid
 [10:21:22] No servers were found that could be used to get work from.
 [10:21:22] Please check the details from the list below of the servers you have input
 [10:21:22] Most likely you have input the wrong URL, forgotten to add a port, or have not set up workers
 [10:21:22] Pool: 0  URL: http://127.0.0.1:9339/  User: Sglasio.1  Password: тyт мoй пapoль
 [10:21:22] Press any key to exit, or cgminer will try again in 15s.
 [10:21:38] Pool 0 slow/down or URL or credentials invalid

Is there any profitability calculator for this coin?
How many coins will get if mined along with BIONIC?

Before doing anything I recommend you to read this page http://wiki.gridcoin.us/Main_Page to familiarize yourself with Gridcoin and it's history!

I know what grid coin is.
I have a lot of mining experience.
But manual profitability calculation is boring.
Just interested in what I asked.

The new POR GRC is a stake coin, so you need to have a grc balance to stake. Here is the calculator: http://pool.gridcoin.us/ProfitabilityCalculator.aspx

Thanks for the link.

So, I followed the procedure but I am still getting the "wrong mail" error:

Command" : "cpids"
},
{
"Project" : "einstein@home",
"CPID" : "7ab90b82259fda59e33973c59ddf430f",
"RAC" : 8174.00000000,
"Team" : "",
"Verified RAC" : 8188.00000000,
"Verified Team" : "gridcoin",
"Is my CPID Valid?" : false,
"CPID Link" : "http://boinc........9ddf430f",
"Errors" : "CPID invalid. Check E-mail address."
},


My e-mail is correct in the gridcoin.conf file - it's been so for a few days. What could be wrong?

check this forum out: https://cryptocointalk.com/forum/2380-technical-support/