Hi All, I am mining using a Sapphire 5870 on a win7/x64 OS. http://www.sapphiretech.com/presentation/product/?psn=0001&pid=287I have a core i3 2100 CPU. My current MB is (was) Gigabyte P67A-UD3-B3 ( http://www.gigabyte.com/products/product-page.aspx?pid=3765#ov) I use the computer for 24/7 mining plus as a home computer. The problem is that this card heats up so much it freezes the system because it heats up the MB chipset. I changed a few Chasis configurations, but when mining (even without OC @ 850Mhz) the system will freeze after 24-48 hours. When I checked the MB temps I saw that it reaches the 50 deg. C, the gfx card itself can handle its own heat whether it is 65C or 85C. The only solution I found was to open the side of the case and put a big house fan there 24/7. But even in this configuration, which gives me ~43C on MB and ~65C on gfx card, after 2 weeks my MB died. Before this MB (P67A-UD3-B3) I had a Gigabyte H67-D2H-B3 which acted the same. I don't want to invest in an MB that can handle 3-4 gfx cards as i have only one, can some one with a similar gfx card recommend anything they are using ?How is your case configured? I run a fan directly over my northbridge and would have at least 2 intakes and 2 exhaust fans for this kind of work. GPU's make for some nice space heaters. |
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[Minimal Investment] I posted this becuase I'm sure a large majority of the miners didn't run out and buy all new equipment. I used leftover stuff to make my 2nd and 3rd mining rig. The few extra dollars I'll pay will surely not be more than a whole new board, cpu and psu over the course of a two years.
[Resell Value] If bitcoin tanks, or I go to prison, or whatever, it's much easier to sell a core 2 quad than a sempron.
[Bugs in the system] Mentioned in my originial post, I could not stop the miners from consuming 100% utilization on one core. The OS will not be dropping voltage and multiplier. It thinks the mining programs need it all.
This is just my situation, which others might be in, and tips for each other if we are.
That is a cool trick if you have a motherboard that can completely turn off cores. However, for those that are using their computer as a workstation, the extra cores won't be able to be used when they are needed, and idle cpu cores do still use only about 10% the power. For that dedicated mining rig, you could sell the Core 2 Quad and buy a half-dozen Celeron D's http://www.aztekcomputers.com/CEL2660D775R-INTEL-1859081.html; the most they can depreciate is $10, and that's if you throw them in the garbage. On either chip, running them at a lower clock and voltage is a good trick. I have a firewall running an Athlon XP 1700 at 600MHz at 1.0V. My kind of man. Are you pfsense, monowall or smoothwall? And yea, I mean I totally get the pro's and cons. Not trying to sound too argumentative. True about the cpu's at 21 for the first, plus 10 dollars each. That site charges horribly for shipping. I'm sure if I hunted on craigslist I could find something close. |
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Yes. 24/7.
I am squeezing 253mh/s out of mine with all the newest software and with a 944mhz clock. In my hot ass house, it stays at 69c.
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If you have the slots, then pick up a pair of 6970's. This way if one card dies you can still be using the other.
If you lack slots and have extra cash, then the 6990 is a good way to.
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Also, you can't RMA oc'ed cards. Or you can, but you'll just end up paying shipping and not getting a new GPU in return because they test cards.
Overclocking and running non-stock voltages voids the warranty.
Please explain the testing manufacture's use to determine whether overclocking has occurred or not. Saphhire just RMA'd my 5870 that I toasted. I didn't touch voltages but I certainly OC'd(980) the hell out of it. Best part is that it was only at 70c with .5amp fans blowin on the backs and front of the cards. These "you can't rma an OC'd xxxx" is just a myth the manufacturers keep putting out because I doubt they CAN test the card. I'm sure it's some chinese guy who throws the pc part into a machine, the machine goes "it's busteded" and he go's ok! And sends a new one back. |
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Thanks. Will even help me is deciding on a new video card.
God I hate ATI
How much do you want to spend? Dollar for dollar the best cards I can think of that come to mind... Hd 5770: less than $100. Generates 200mh/s easily enough. hd 5830: Between 100 and 200. Generates 300mh/s or more. Hd 5870: If purchased for less than $200. Generates 360+ mh/s. The hd 6950's are around 200 dollars after rebates from XFX, those put out about the same hashes at 5830's Now, if like me, you find a 5850 or 5870 for less than 200, pick it up asap. You should overclock them all. Even a bit. It gets you more for your money. |
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hmm you can do that? i should give that a try lord knows i have enough crap to sell.
Overall in life, if you aren't using something that depreciates over time, you should sell it while it still holds value. Else you'll end up like my uncle with 38 cars that are rusted to the core he still thinks are "worth something." |
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That's why you build your mining rig with a low power CPU from the start, a good example would be an AMD Sempron 140, which I run in one of my rigs. While the maximum TDP is 45W, it automatically cuts the voltage and multiplier during low usage to enter a lower power state using AMD Cool 'n Quiet technology (set your Windows XP power profile to "portable/laptop" to fully enable it after installing the AMD CPU driver.) A running Windows 7 Sempron system draws 35 watts from the wall!: http://www.servethehome.com/amd-sempron-140-sargas-whs-review/. The other factor is power supply efficiency. You need to look at the efficiency of the power supply at the actual wattage you will be drawing when mining. http://www.jonnyguru.com/modules.php?name=NDReviews&op=Story2&reid=142 is a good site for finding real-world efficiency of power supplies at different power draws. The linked review is of an 850W power supply, but it is most efficient (85%) at around 519 watts (using 611 watts AC), and above that the efficiency goes down. I picked this power supply for you because 520 watts is about what a Sempron + 3x overclocked 6850s + 1GB slow DDR + a small HDD + fans would use while mining ( 20W + 3x160W + 20W ). Overclockability is enhanced because the +12V quality is higher when you aren't using your power supply at it's maximum. Now you have 480 watts of video cards running for 611 watts at the outlet, which is about as low as it can go! [Minimal Investment] I posted this becuase I'm sure a large majority of the miners didn't run out and buy all new equipment. I used leftover stuff to make my 2nd and 3rd mining rig. The few extra dollars I'll pay will surely not be more than a whole new board, cpu and psu over the course of a two years. [Resell Value] If bitcoin tanks, or I go to prison, or whatever, it's much easier to sell a core 2 quad than a sempron. [Bugs in the system] Mentioned in my originial post, I could not stop the miners from consuming 100% utilization on one core. The OS will not be dropping voltage and multiplier. It thinks the mining programs need it all. This is just my situation, which others might be in, and tips for each other if we are. |
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I"m currently deployed to Iraq with the US Army, and would like to buy or build a bitcoin Mining Rig. Though I live in a metal box, they do provide me with Air Conditioning, electricity, and I'm able to purchase the Internet... sooo,
Right now, I'm dabbling in the bitcoin mining world on the high end laptop that I brought with me, but would like to build/set up a 3 Ghash/s (or more) to use during my next 6 or 8 months here, while I do'nt have to foot the electric or cooling bill.
I saw where eintstienXX had a couple rigs for sale, then was going to ship the parts bck. I've people in Orlando that can send the stuff to me, so...
Thanks,
The CRYPT
Are you just looking for a completely preconfigured, unbox from USPS, plug into power/network and go? Having your people in Orlando buy the parts on ship them to you would be the easiest. It's all still packaged well. If you are base, between you and a few buddies you should be able to assembled the pc, install windows, download updated drivers, get guiminer and go. Would also be much cheaper. |
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I haven't read across anyone doing this, nor did I do a specific search. I had this posted in the newbie forums until I could post here. If you are using a dedicated rig or want to restart before you do gaming, you should consider underclocking your rigs. I have 3 dedicated miners. As example one is using an evga 780i sli, core 2 quad 6600, and 3x 6850's (got a killer deal on them, but they kinda suck). With that board I could disable the last 3 cores. I then underclocked it to 1.6ghz (I might be able to go lower, but that was easy) and undervolted it. My hashing did not change. It's a little laggier to VNC into it but I'll put up with that. Next I'm debating about lowering the bus speeds and ram. I'm only running a single one gig module of ram as it is. While I might only be saving a buck or two a month, the guys who are running some serious hardware and 10 machines will get much more benefit out of this. Update: Here's a link to determine your old vs new wattage! http://extreme.outervision.com/tools.jspI went from 95w to 41w with 2400/1.25v to 1600/1v! |
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I sent mine out on a tuesday, they got it on a friday, then i got the card back exactly 2 weeks later.
They used UPS ground, and it's 3 days ground to where I live.
So in essence, say 3 weeks. I wanted to kill them.
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Definatly no.
Edit: At current difficulty, at 17 dollars per BTC, at those 5870's hashing 350mh/s, it calculates out to $527.63.
So it maaaybe worth it, but it's no gold mine.
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Just did this thanks for the tip you saved me some power thats for sure.
To lazy to get the clamp meter out and check how much tho.
Should be able to calculate with the link in my OP. The website has a list for all the CPU's so you'll know what the starting voltage and mhz is. |
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I hear quite good things about Sapphire! Must have high variance with supply then :S
I've looked into liquid cooling but BLEH! It's so expensive. Deliciously awesome and sexy but I just can't justify that price tag at the moment.
Liquid cooling is NEVER worth it unless you want silence or are going for a very high overclock. IMO, for the price of watercooling a dual gpu rig you can just get better video cards or a second rig with another gpu and that will more than make up for the mh/s increase you'll get over watercooling. Plus.. it's one more component that can fail and if your h2o setup goes south, you bork your whole computer. |
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Was using some patch to get a few extra mh/s yesterday, but I just downloaded this new one and get about 6 more! Badass! I need to find a way to stop having to implement all these changes across all my machines!  Thanks! |
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best way for you would be selling your nvidia gfx and buying AMD/ATI instead. I think you will be able to find good candidates among AMD lines in threads already existing.
That is the BEST way. A $50 dollar 5570 would outmine your 460. |
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I you want your hardware to last long time then don't buy sapphire. I already got one faulty graphics card even out of the box. People are complaining that fans in sapphire cards die after even a month. 2 months seems to be maximum expected life for sapphire cards.  That is so odd you mentioned that! Literally a month ago I got barely used sapphire 5870 (I knew the originaly purchaser personally) and that damn thing died within 3 days of me using it for mining at stock speeds.. It took them 3 weeks to RMA it! I wish I could get the idiots to reimburse the btc I lost over that period of time. |
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I would like to get whitelisted as well. I have already made some posts in the newbie section to get me started. I've been reading these forums for over two months. I've would like to ask some questions to get some projects rolling in the more technical sections of these forums.
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the no name PSU
There in lies your problem. Spending good money on on a quality PSU keeps everything running longer in your system. The hardware today is much better than it was 10 years ago, but still. I've been running a q6600 overclocked from 2.4 to 3.4 in my main machine nearly 24/7 for the last 3 and half years. My 5770 has been running at 950mhz core for well over a month. I know this isn't the 'dawn of time." F@H on my old gtx 260's was non stop for... must be over a year. Not sure how long really. I guess if you are go through this much hardware. You need to buy stuff with great RMA service. XFX, Corsair, OCZ, Western Digital. Etc. Also, you could sell the card after 6 months to some poor sap. Then buy newer faster stuff. Would keep it from aging in your hands, value wouldn't depreciate as much, etc. |
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I wouldn't get 6990's if you are buying new, personally. If you go for dollars/mhs then it still seems like the 58XX series is king. If you hunt around you can pick them up for 200 (or less) used. My 5870 is putting out 390mh/s on slight overclock (880) that I picked up for $175. That's better than 2mh/s per $1. If you have lots of pci-e slots, the 5770's are amazing. The one I have has been running nonstop for a month at over 200mh/s (link on how to do it, plus I've read some optimizations elsewhere http://www.smpake.com/?p=59) and those sell from between $80 and $100. |
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