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Hey guys, Im looking to build a dedicated mining computer for about $300. I know that is a very small sum of money but mining is just a hobby and I'm a poor college student. However... the plus side of being a poor college student is that my school pays my electricity bill! Anyway, let me know if you have any suggestions.

At $300, you're looking at a single video card.

• $35 for a Motherboard
• $40 for a CPU
• $20 for a 2GB DDR3 Stick of Memory
• $15 for a 8GB Flash Drive to Boot From (i.e. Ubuntu)
• $50 for a 400W'ish PSU

That leaves you about $140 for a video card.  Maybe less if you decide to put it into a case.  $140 is an 5830 1GB which can do about 310 MH/s and at a very minimum, it would take at least several months to get your investment back.  Even longer.  But if you're doing it as a hobby...

Cheers,
Kermee

These ones are in stock at the moment:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102946&cm_re=5830-_-14-102-946-_-Product (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102946&cm_re=5830-_-14-102-946-_-Product)

It's closer to "never".

Or yes... Never...

Cheers,
Kermee

So, would it completely not be worth it to mine with only 300 mega hashes/s? I pretty much just want to be able to make my money back...

It might be worth it if you already have the hardware. Buying it for mining won't.

It could be worth it if mining is just a hobby.  You will make your investment back eventually and the worst case scenario is you could sell off your hardware if you lose interest or re-purpose it into a gaming rig :)

I would be looking at refurbished work stations. Cheapest thing you can find with a pcie video card slot.

Alternatively, after I filled all the PCs I had at home, what I did was buy just a card + PSU and slap it in my parents computer ;) I set the priority on the process real low. -F160. Out of the deal they get a more responsive computer capable of HD video and games. I can VNC in to control it and fix it whenever they call me "The printer doesn't work" etc... Their power rate is also dirt cheap compared to mine. Givin em a chip and mobo as soon as I can find a heatsink bracket for it too. Wont increase hash rate but if I'm using a few bucks in electricity every month it's only fair.

if you are going caseless (which I'd recommend for cooling and costs), look for a motherboard with a bunch of PCI-e 1x slots in case you become obsessed like so many in this forum.  I picked up a $50 motherboard with 16x, 4x and 1x PCIe slots...and I somehow filled them all 3 using cablesaurus cables and miners.  I now wished I had originally found a cheap motherboard with three or more PCIe 1x slots for additional cards.

My 0.02 BTC

added other parts

The HDD is not necessary.