Bitcoin Forum

Hello Everyone,

I want to get the forum's opinion on the best card for mining.  I'm wondering because I'm currently using a ATI Radeon 5750 but that's on a computer I don't want to keep on all the time and I'm thinking about building a new computer soon.

(Also, if the responses are good, I might feature them on my BitCoin podcast, BitCoin Review (http://fancyshowtech.tv/bitcoin-review-podcast/))

Thanks for the input everyone!

-Carmen

it depends what you mean by best, best mhash/$or£ would probably be the 5830 if you can find them. best mhash/w would be the 5970 but are very hard to find, the 6990 is more realistic

take a look at https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Mining_hardware_comparison

No offense Carmen, but some serious research is needed if you're planning to include this in a Bitcoin podcast and you can't answer that question.

Research != making a new forum post to ask about it, either.  You're in the right spot though, this place is a trove of information.  Just start reading and see what people are using.

IMO, the Radeon HD 5850 and 5870 seem to be the sweet spots for simple price vs performance vs power usage, too bad they're impossible to find new.

5970s on the other hand are amazing hashers, but $$.  Same deal with 6990s.

curretnly the 5770 isn't a bad bang for buck.
doesn't use to much power either.
just need to find it on sale.

5770s are really great if you can control the heat, and have lots of open slots for them =p

i made a cheep waterblock for mine and for mining it is doing well
http://inlinethumb37.webshots.com/39204/2844673480106201080S600x600Q85.jpg (http://entertainment.webshots.com/photo/2844673480106201080EDfEEm)

It depends on what you can get at a good price. If you can find any 5850s for around $150 USD, personally I think this is the best bang for the buck. They can do upwards of 400+ Mhps with a little overvolting and are very efficient. I currently have four in a rig that I have undervolted for efficiency, and I'm getting 300 Mhps out of each and only pulling 450 watts from the wall. Great cards for mining.

ATI Radeon 5770, 5830, 5850 have the best $/mhash ratio.
Too bad they aren't that easy to find anymore, at least in mint condition/new

I got sapphire 5850's (8) in 2 rigs, they use about 1K each with system and pull 400-410 mhash each. THey will push higher too 425/430 pushing the clocks from 970 to 1000 but im keeping it lower for server performance :) They were £120 each which to me is the best bang for buck and 5870 that CAN overvolt are as rare as rocking s**t. I just picked a 5870 Vapour X and it does 1010/300 WITHOUT overvolt, gigabyte board seems to be not alloing it cause its with 2x non reference XFX 5870's. There 900 and top out :) 5870 vapour X @ 1010/300 = 460m/hash, Payed £140 but good luck getting them that cheap, gewtting them full stop. 5850 Xtreme 970/300 (all go to 1000+) =410+ m/hash, Payed £120 each.

Unfortunitly, in that month i brought my cards, they raised the price from 120 to the current 162!!! Making it better to pay £180 for a 6950. Dumb asses at overclockers :)

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/productlist.php?groupid=701&catid=56&sortby=nameAsc&subid=1711&mfrid=

Priced themselves out for me. Wait for new series i will :) 7850 looks like it may be the better card £/mhash wise over even the 7950 imho. 90W and you'll be able get 8 in a system on a 1200W PSU. Heat will be down and generally everything will be sound. Alot better than 150W/190W beasts. Cant wait see :L)

it's best not to mine at all. just buy BTC @ current prices instead.

Im waiting here for a crash, BUY BUY BUY :)

if you pay for electric, i don't think its a good idea to buy new parts to mine solely for profit. As you'll likely never make your money back.

It depends what you do with your coins though isnt it :)

That is... so... awesome... Ghetto, but awesome..

+1 I like seen inivation and inventiveness :)

thanks...
except for CPU i have my hole machine watercooled this way.
MB
http://inlinethumb04.webshots.com/20035/2040907220106201080S600x600Q85.jpg (http://entertainment.webshots.com/photo/2040907220106201080jMRzmh)

Ram
http://inlinethumb58.webshots.com/45625/2672386830106201080S600x600Q85.jpg (http://entertainment.webshots.com/photo/2672386830106201080zopNgu)

but this is going off topic...

Oh, that's ok, we don't mind looking at porn.

How about you get comfortable and show us a little water-pump ;)

fap fap fap
more pics pls ;)

 ;D  ;D  ;D  ;D  ;D LOL

Could I pay you for ghetto waterblocks for my sapphire 5830 and reference 5870? 1/2 inch ID :)

these geto waterblocks won't remove the amount of heat made by suce video cards...
my 5770 is running prety warm.
but does teh job... (not over clocked)

Yeah, they're not running water through 100 small veins really close to the surface, it's a thick plate with a single pipe running over it, you're getting contact of only a sliver of the curve at the bottom side of the piping.

Definately cool, but not practical for other than "Hey I had a pump on hand and some cheap copper." factor, maybe if he used the big piping for the rest but stepped down to 1/4 that size woven back and forth a few times it'd be a lot more efficient pulling heat away.

the only problem i have is bending the pipe to get the pipes woven back and forth.
that is why i have just a signle pipe across teh GPU itself.

Your local home improvement store should have a tubing bender which looks like a tightly coiled spring. The spring keeps the tubing from collapsing when making tight bends. You can also fill the tube with water and freeze it to accomplish the same thing (but more time consuming.

Auto parts stores should care a tubing bender for brake lines also, but you'd probably have to braze the brake tubing to the copper water block.

Also, did you lap the surface of the waterblock after soldering the pipe to it? If not, you probably have some heat distortion that is impacting efficiency.

Heh, now this is getting a little off topic, but the OP seems to have disappeared anyway.

I do think this deserves it's own thread, a nice fat DIY watercooling guide would be amazing ;)

not much of a guide...
take some copper plate... cut it up...
cut some copper tubing solder it to gether...
solder it onto the coper plate

i ponly have 1 piece of advice...
take your time and thihnk it through...
it takes me about a week to make a block...
most of it thinking...

Hacker if you could standardize your blocks you'd probably sell quite a few

not worth my time...
it cheaper for me to buy the blocks then it would be for me to make them time wise...
i just enjoy making them from time to time...
i have 8 6970 video cards that i bought blocks for...
just waiting for resevoirs.. then i can dump all the heat into my cold air ducts for the winter...

 ;)  Methinks someone should convert a dorm fridge into a miner!

Asus Ares 2 ;)
I just burned mine last week, so waiting for a new one ...

Nice resurrection! I haven't seen one brought back from that long ago in a while!