That is flawed logic.  "Upgrades" are new capital.  If it makes sense for existing miners to deploy new capital then it makes sense for new miners to do so also.

I think most of the caution comes from the fact that noobs tend to make horribly stupid rigs (gaming CPU, fast HDD, expensive cases, etc) and have lots of naive assumptions.  At one point when margins were much higher, pretty much any two GPUs in a box could be profitable so mistakes were less painful.  Today it is all about MH/$, MH/W and your electrical cost.  The days of slamming together some random junk and breaking even in 3 months are gone and will never ever come back.

If you got a 6-12 month time horizon and cheap electricity (<$0.10 per kWh) new GPU rigs can still be viable but you likely need to be willing to build a large number of them be comfortable buying used GPU, and know what parts you are buying and why.  Margins are very tight.

If you got a longer time horizon, access to significant capital, and willing to lose almost everything if Bitcoin fails then FPGA are another option.

If your goal is to casually throw some random parts together and make 20% profit per month well you shouldn't be mining.

Mining will never be a get rich quick system.  It is a commodity based "business" with almost no barriers to entry and global access.  Margins will be a small % over the lowest cost producers.

Without overvolting, and with lowering memclock. Yes.
4x5970s
Sempron CPU
optimized BIOS
usb drive running linux
~1050W AC at the wall.

Figure at 90% efficiency that is ~950W DC (which is what PSU is rated on not AC wattage).

You can send it to the Bitcoin 100

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=52543.0

I like the updated direct pay and direct deposit version.

It has a lot of potential.  I would make an account but I see it is a closed beta.

No I think I will pass.  To much uncertainty.  BFL may be prioritizing delivery of the Rigs given their high pricetag.  They may have less startup issues given the lower power per chip.  There is less of a backlog. 

Yup.  When "black friday" (US Justice Dept war on online poker) hit some online poker players had six figures in their online poker accounts.   Some of that is still in limbo a year later.

 
1) Close bitcoin client (if it has been crashing you may wish to reboot or check task manager to ensure process isn't still running).
2) Open the Bitcoin data directory. https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Data_directory
3) Backup your wallet.dat if it has any value (of course you already have a backup right)
4) Delete* everything except the wallet.dat file
5) Start bitcoin client - it will download and re-index the blockchain (may take a couple hours)

* alternatively just move the files to another folder for temporary safe keeping

Have you tried deleting the blockchain.  It is indicating problems in the blockchain index.

Tragedy of the commons.

Thats a good plan.  I just went the brute force aproach.



two of them for a total of 240*30*2*80% = 11.52 KW (derated)

I must be the only one prayyyyyyyying BFL doesn't delivery mine in 6 weeks or less.

Come on May 25th or later ...

I am with you.   It shows there is no perfect GPU they all have advantages and disadvantages.  I don't regret going with 5970s.  Highest MH/W and awesome density.  I couldn't imagine running a 15 GH/s farm using 5830s.  Thats what 50 GPUs?

Still everyone's needs are different.  If someone is a gamer who wants to mine part-time I would say get a 7970 (or two).  Cooler and quieter than 5970 but I wouldn't want to try and build a farm out of them.

To be fair one thing you may wish to do is make the "minting bonus" only payable to those who enable "minting bonus" donation.

Could make it something like 2% max donation.  If you donate the max and solve a block you get the payout.  If you donate say 1% instead you get half the payout, 0.5% gets you 1/4 the payout.  The payout is based on the optional minting donation/fee set by the miner at the time the block is found.

That way the minting bonus money circulates among "players".  More likely to encourage donations that way.

Yeah just been busy.  I should be able to hook it up to an existing rig to test it this weekend.  Thank God it is Friday this week has been brutal.

Just an FYI.  I bought the X-1250 it was packed well and arrived quickly in good shape.
Haven't had a chance to test it yet but JWU42 is a solid seller.

This.  Now data might be a little different than voice but since you report good signal quality on the Walmart special Sprint is likely your best bet.

Unlikely.  I am pretty certain of the chip they are using and without special pricing you are looking at $1400 for a pair of them.  Obviously BFL found a sweet deal and congrats to them but simply knowing the chip doesn't help you a whole lot.

Well "Server Core" (command line only version of Windows Server that I don't know anyone who actually uses) will obviously not have it.

Lots of nice stuff in 2012 (we have been testing it) but the Metro UI nonsense is not one of them.

If you think think using Metro UI for a desktop is crazy then shield your eyes.

Windows Server 2012 start screen:


No .... No I am not kidding (although I wish I was).

hmm given the major difference is the the # of orphans it makes me think your connectivity is the largest factor.

If the p2pool and/or bitcoind instances were slow (due to insufficient memory, I/O, or CPU time) then at least in theory one would expect to see higher deads not orphans.

Obviously more testing is needed but my guess is the datacenter has a lower latency link to the avg peer.  Thus you are learning about new shares quicker and getting your shares into the chain quicker. I may need to play around and see about recording latency to peers.  See if there is any correlation between orphan and peer latency and/or # of peers.