I live in the Northeast (US) and cigs here are $9-$10 a pack. I just came back from St. Maarten and they are $19 a carton. Im seriously debating taking trips down their every couple months jsut to get cigs. And I may have to use this site in between. After I get through these cartons I'll try my luck with placing an order. What I'd like to do is go down there and set up a service to ship directly to US customers.

Wow, that makes life really easy.

Using my own pool but was going to set up a coinking profile since PiMP has that as a default listed pool. But for some reason though I dont think the MSI 290x Lightnings are used much for mining. I dont see any pre-configured settings for them. Coinking.io and others never seem to have my card listed. Of course, I was thinking about just getting a handful of 280x's or maybe even 7950's. Ive seen some 280x's pretty cheap and, tell me if Im wrong, but they seem to be the easiest and most miner friendly right now.

FYI, Im using your faucets (in your sig link) so you can earn some referral coinage. Good idea using Wix. I didnt even think of that. I may do something similar. Get ready for some friendly competition!

This is a hard topic/idea to begin to address. The main reason is because there is no real good way of investing a small amount and getting a good return without luck. (You can get a small return and I explain below) Let me explain...

As someone who has participated in countless high interest BTC "investments" they all, in the end, turn out to be Ponzi style scams. Its only a matter of time before they pack up, take all the money, and disappear. Im not going to list them all here. But the last one, and arguably the most cunning yet, was Our Beks (ourbeks.com). And it was so good at scamming everyone because it didnt make the typical huge promises that most scam sites do. They offered a very low daily interest rate (starting at 1.5% daily), ability to withdraw at any time, and like any seemingly legit service, had a fee for withdrawing principal. It was equal to about 5-6 days of what you would earn in interest. So you had to keep your money in for about a week before you actually started to really earn anything.

They had claimed that they were a fund that moved with BTC's (and other crypto's) price fluctuation and also included other Forex currencies in the fund (to offset the days when BTC's price didnt fluctuate a ton). I put .25 BTC in at first to test it out. I went a month earning on that deposit. Think about it, At 1.5% daily it takes less than 90 days to double your BTC. I withdrew my profits daily. Then after a month, I dropped 1.15 BTC into my account. I earned on that just long enough to break even. And I got lucky. Because they clsoed up shop and disappeared with everyones money

It started when I went to withdraw the daily earnings on the last larger deposit one day and I got an error message saying "That only 4 withdraws per month were allowed" At first, I didnt think much of it. Most funds try to discourage you from withdrawing daily. It doesnt give them any time to really make your $$. I figured it was a new policy. I waited. I waited into the next month. Still got the same message. At this point I knew they didnt have the money and would be gone any day.

No replies to my emails asking if I had to wait 30 days from my last withdraw or if it reset when the calendar month reset.

Then, the site wasnt there. Gone.

Like I said, I got lucky. How many people deposited BTC after I did and didnt get the chance to break even?

So,

1) you can invest a small amount in the newest ponzi scheme and hope you get lucky

2) you can buy BTC when the price dips and then sell it when it goes back up

3) you can invest in the official (and regulated) Bitcoin Investment Trust which was just recently cleared by the FCC and SEC.

Small, more trusted way to get a return

1) Loan your BTC via BTCjam.com

I have been doing that for quite some time. Since the loans are crowdfunded you can invest a very small amount into a loan. I have had two people default on their loans. And I have a wide array of complaints with how the site works and the level of sophistication of the staff (basically, they clueless and have no business trying to run a site like that). But of the borrowers have an established history and an ok credit rating, then you will most likely get your money back plus interest. You should really try that out. After successfully getting your money back plus interest your wife may even give you some more play money

So, 290x's...Im assuming the PiMP 1.6 with the 13.12 drivers is the best option? Or am I totally wrong? Should I be going with the 14.6?

Checking out GetPimp now and re: your last statement...
I know, right? Why bother with Windows? The short story...I built a Windows gaming box and went pretty much all out. While I was doing that I tore down my main computer and scrapped it. Normally I would jsut dual boot with GRUB (on this new Windows machine) but Windows 8.1 seems to be finicky with GRUB. So I am in the process of throwing together another main computer (various distros).

And also, I really wanted to figure this out on Windows. I figured it had to be much easier. Buts its not...not when you arent familiar with the OS


Thank you.

the market cap seems totally arbitrary. It really doesnt seem to be based on anything at all. Or at least nothing that can be soundly represented.

So...cgminer and sgminer will never fully start up and display the program in my terminal window. I can get sgminer to start mining (x11) and I am getting almost 100% invalid shares.

I guess I need an walkthrough on how to install and run these miners. Not sure what Im doing wrong. Even trying to run an out-of-the-box mining OS is not working. And I had previously run that one before. Anyone have a sttep-by-step for someone with close to no experience with Windows?


did you just install sgminer/cgminer, change your BAT file, and then start mining? Ive set every possible thread-concurrency, intensity, powertune, etc.

Running with Catalyst 14.12 but I went through the 13 Drivers as well with the same results. If no one has a link to an idiot's walkthrough or any suggestions I'll probably just go back to Linux. Ive never had a miner not work on Linux. But since Ive had to spend most of my time sitting in front of a Windows rig lately I really wanted to get this working.

I have some stupid questions. I havent mined anything in a long time. However, I wanted to fire up a rig to see how it does...

But I have seem to gone full retard. I cant get sgminer to 1) show the mining console once it starts and 2) get valid shares. Right now my invalid shares (using LTCRabbit as a test) are hovering around 90%. Something is very wrong

Both rigs that Im testing are Windows (and I literally know almost nothing about Windows). But here are the specs:

Rig 1# - Windows 8.1

2x R9 290x
Catalyst 13.12
SGMiner v5
and BFGMiner

Rig 2 - Windows 7
2x MSI 7950
SGMiner v5

Is there a breakdown for people like me who dont know how to use Windows to get one of these running? I dont care which one. Just want to get it working properly so I can make adjustments, add cards, etc...you know, all the fun stuff that I [can] handle on Linux without help

Check link in my signature

Thanks wolf. Actually, I saw your post on Reddit about the modded bins and thought I should get back into this. Im just trying to figure out why SGminer doesnt display when its running. Im also getting extremely high invalid shares. BTW, this is without your bins. IM just trying to get myself running again first; completely vanilla. Then I guess I will make adjustments and add mods

Is everyone still using SGminer or BFGminer? I'd like to start mining alts again. Its been a long time

Matter of fact, I bet you could find one that would do it very cheap or even free. As long as they are a BTC believer like us.


The only upside to Bitpay is that it is fast. Other than that I never liked the idea. I was really hoping that everyone who started to accept BTC would create a script(s) to work with their website; create unique address, when invoice amount matches, and address matches, issue invoice and send email to customer. Its really not that difficult. Bitpay gained momentum at the exact right time and jsut sort of rested on their laurels...if thats what you could call them.

I hate coinbase. The other day I tried to purchase when the price was down into the $240's and the order wouldnt fill for 10 days. Lame. Thats why I use my old trusty way of instantly buying BTC with Paypal...with instant delivery. And if you dont know how to do it, too bad. I dont want that option to go away...so I wouldnt be divulging the details. But anyone whos been around long enough knows how to do this.

When they say "Our system is designed with safety and security as the highest priorities" and use that as a justification for cancelling your order, it really means that the exact opposite of their speculation has happened, and there is only so many orders they can fill before they lose money...and your order is past the cut-off point.

Do you know why I keep a Coinbase account? Its to mess with them. To get them to invest BTC that I deposit and then instantly pull it out. I'll deposit 2 or 3 BTC, let it sit for a little over 24 hours during a business week, and then just move it back into my Blockchain wallet. I just want to upset their balance sheet. Myself and a handful of other people do this regularly. I suggest everyone do this

Yep, they are gone!

The only good thing about that is that they cannot take anyone elses money.

I actually broke even, so Im not all that concerned.

What really pisses me off is that just like the original Ponzi scheme, the idea itself can actually make $$. But its the laziness of the fraudsters that leads them to scam. When I started crunching the numbers (early on), and created a fictional fund that traded on BTC price volatility, and different Forex currencies (which is what they claimed they were doing), it looked very possible to pay out at least 1% daily. They were advertising almost double that. So, I thought that either knew a lot more than I did about trading currencies and price volatility, or its a total scam.

The best scams are the ones that dont make huge promises; ones that have [apparently] legit fees and penalties for early withdrawals. All other BTC Ponzi schemes Ive seen made huge promises and not a single one penalized you for withdrawing early. Here, the penalties matched the payouts. So, it took you 6-7 days to earn enough to cover the withdrawal fee. It seemed to make sense. You leave the BTC with them for a week and you've broke even. Everything after that is earnings.

And heck, they even responded to all my questions in the beginning. Unlike the other scams that I ran into where usually didnt get a response to any inquiry.

The scammers are getting better. I wonder how much they got away with?!?

Thanks pal. But I wasnt ready for an accusation yet. Since they paid out every day for months and months I wanted to give them the benefit of the doubt...But now Im getting closer to accusing them of a scam.

Hey folks,

Since Im always interested in new ventures in lending BTC I took a gamble with ourbeks.com. I wont get into the specifics here, all info is available on their website.

However, they originally allowed withdrawals at any time. So what I would do is make daily withdrawals (because I didnt trust them). Well, two weeks back I had a message pop up telling me "Only 3 withdraws per month allowed". Fine. But there was no warning that they were changing the policy. It was done in the middle of the night on a weekend.

So, did this mean that I would have to wait 30 days from my last withdrawal or would it reset with the next calendar month? I tried again today, 3/1, and I am still blocked.

They do not answer emails (4 sent now over two weeks). The only option is to keep trying.

Anyone looking to deposit BTC with them I would advise you to wait until I update this thread. Luckily, I did not send them anymore than I could afford to lose (1.02 BTC), and I think I just about broke even. All in all, if they never allow me to withdraw that deposit, along with interest earned recently, then its not like I bet the farm...and of course I never would anyway.

Just a heads up. And if this in the wrong section I hope the mods can relocate it.

Thanks everyone...so far, BTC Jam may be the only legit way to lend, get a return with interest, and not have to worry [as much] about losing your BTC

-DMS

This is a great idea. You know, I had just said in another post that I hadnt ever made the switch over from GPU to ASIC, and that I was considering looking into Cloud Mining but just couldnt find a decent, honest write-up on the topic. But mostly, I couldnt figure out if they were legit or even worth my time or money. And then I ran into your post 5 mins later. Not only was it wildly helpful but now I have a good post to pass along to everyone that asks me about Cloud Mining. I always knew most of them sounded very Ponzi-like. But because I never put any time into researching it early on it has now become nearly impossible to accurately research Cloud Mining; too much salesmanship has filled teh internets.

Anyway, Im in for the club, And a tip is coming your way. Wish it was more. Ive been pretty BTC-Broke lately

https://blockchain.info/tx/76c175f538f2163536dce6cadb767fd38bd6e3e55bb820bbd759f5555b44a7fd

Thanks for the original post and for this club.

PS: I cant wait to see how much my hashrate grows while being a member. I hope to get into trillions of TH's

I almost made the move over to ASIC but decided not to do it. Now I cant seem to figure out if any of the cloud mining services are even worth it or not. I cant seem to find an non-skewed assessment of cloud mining anywhere. Everyone I have read anything from seems to have a dog in the race.

How can you tell its a scam? I started looking at the pics and thought "Well, big deal. How hard can it be to liquid cool a chip?" After all, my gaming rig is fully water cooled (cpu, gpu, full cover mobo, RAM) Only thing I dont water cool is my HDD. Still, Im curious to know how you knew (or know) its a scam. All of the senior members on here are always very good at sniffing these things out (I wouldnt be able to do it)