I'm using 2.4 right now -- it works well on all my rigs.

However, I'd like to install something newer on my workstation/rig, because otherwise I can't use modern Linux desktops like Cinnamon and MATE.

Is there going to be a major problem if I install 2.6 instead of 2.4?

Just wondering if anyone else has experience with the 2.6 drivers on a mining rig running Linux Mint 12.

There's just a single 5850 on this machine anyhow, so I suppose even a 10% drop in hashrate isn't a big deal...

It looks like the 7970 is going to be garbage, unless there's something I'm missing.

The 5970 has 3200 stream processors, for a cost of $500.
The 7970 has 2048 stream processors, for a cost of

I should point out that stream processors are EVERYTHING when it comes to mining. If that weren't the case, we'd all be happily mining on nVidia hardware.

So the card better be cheap, like around $330, to be an equivalent value.

If the card is $600 or $700 you can forget it.

Great transaction -- everything went smoothly. I bought one of the larger denomination codes.
I paid first, and in a few hours I had my gift code!

Would definitely do business again.

I have (1) PCI card that allows you to plug in a PCI-E video card.

It sounded great to have one on hand, but my setup has long since stabilized and I didn't end up having a need for it.
I hate to have $40 in hardware just sitting there.

It's been stored in a safe place (smoke-free, pet-free) and never been used.

It cost me $40 -- asking $35 or best offer.

Will accept BTC, Dwolla, Mt. Gox codes, etc.

I can provide a pic if needed.

United States

It's been a while since I've looked at the marketplace for this kind of product/service.

I glanced over the first page of topics in this forum, and didn't see anything.

What I'm looking for: A reputable, safe dealer (preferably large) with plenty of positive feedback who I can transfer my dwolla balance to (or BTC as a 2nd choice) and receive a postal money order or gift cards. Obviously I'm willing to pay a small commission for this transaction -- but nothing exorbitant.

I'm in the US, using US currency -- nothing fancy.

I was wondering if there is still a way -- I know a few people offered this service back in June.

Sounds great if you live WAY up north, but in Texas no one has a heated bathroom. Maybe because it's only cold for 1 month out of the year? The rest of the time, the bathroom is naturally hot.

According to some members, even jumping through the hoops won't solve the problem.

I object to the idea that a "few million bucks" would place a person in control of mining capacity large enough to be 51% of the network.
Between video cards, computer hardware, networking equipment, furniture (server racks, etc.), cooling, OFFICE SPACE, labor, advertising to get that much labor, electricity, etc. it would have to be quite a chunk of change. A few million probably wouldn't do it.

Just take one of the items, "labor" for example -- we're not talking the kind of labor you can pick up outside Home Depot    PC techs make more than minimum wage, and the guy who can design and manage something of that scale (layout, cooling, connectivity, Linux expertise, etc.) is certainly going to make more than $10/hour.

That's my point -- the Bitcoin network is HUGE at this point, and to get 51% would take an operation of insane magnitude.

Besides, when NewEgg and everyone else is all the sudden "sold out" of 6XXX series cards, many Bitcoin advocates and miners would know something is up

Help bread dough to rise.
Pipe the heat into an adjoining room, and add moisture to create a sauna.
Put rigs in a greenhouse and grow tomatoes year-round.

Not a lot of realistic uses, sorry.

More difficult and impossible than when 100 BTC was worth $1000? Mt. Gox didn't seem to hold that position back when BTC were $10 each, and the withdrawal limits were at parity (1 to 1).

You act as if they always considered BTC withdrawals more risky than USD withdrawals. If that were so, they wouldn't have EVER set a similar withdrawal limit for BTC & USD. But they did.

So, to clarify --

If someone hacked my account, they couldn't withdraw more than 100 BTC or $250 per day. (Yay!)
But they could just sell my few hundred BTC -- which requires no special verification -- and withdraw the whole USD amount of $1000 in one day (Oops!)

So how is restricting BTC to $250/day helping with security?

That's like putting 5 deadbolts on one door, while having another door (leading to the same room) standing wide open.

In conclusion, there's NOTHING Mt. Gox could say that would excuse this ridiculous policy.

Yes, whoever hacked Mt. Gox TRULY SUCCEEDED in destroying Bitcoin, it would seem. They forced Mt. Gox to become paranoid, to the point that most businesses wouldn't be able to put up with the hoops and restrictions -- like I said, they destroyed Bitcoin.

Just like 9/11 -- if we become a freaking police state, with no personal freedoms, checkpoints everywhere, super-inconvenient air travel, constant monitoring of the populace -- sure, those "camel jockeys" won't be crashing another plane any time soon, but then you have to ask yourself WHO WON? They did, obviously. If America has to destroy herself to be safe, then the so-called terrorists have won. Who doesn't realize that? (Of course, the whole "Muslims did it" theory is a bunch of hogwash, but I digress)

Destroying Bitcoin as a viable currency is much, much worse than what the hackers did to Mt. Gox several months ago. That only affected a few people, and the financial effect of their hack has long since passed. But forcing Mt. Gox to become full-fledged paranoid? THAT is killing Bitcoin, affecting ALL users, on a DAILY basis.

I understand Mt. Gox is mindful of security these days, and that a "verified" account (one where the owner has sent in a utility bill, etc.) carries less risk than an unverified one.

The verified account should have higher withdrawal limits. Fine. No problem there.

But for the unverified accounts, why does Mt. Gox allow only 1/4 as much withdrawal in BTC as they allow in US dollars?
For the unverified, risky, "could be a hacker for all we know" accounts, they could pull out $1000 in USD per day -- which is apparently a balance between convenience and risk.

SO WHY CAN THEY WITHDRAW ONLY $250 worth of BTC every day?  

The actual amount is 100 BTC -- but Helllloooo McFly, BTC aren't 10 bucks anymore! Try $2.50, and they've been around $3 for a long, long time.

I'm not saying Mt. Gox needs to update their withdrawal amount on a daily basis -- but come on!  How about whenever there's a major sea change in the price of Bitcoin? Maybe once a month?

I don't think I'm nitpicking here. $250 is not enough to buy much in BTC. Who wants to spend 3 days withdrawing BTC so they can buy something with it? Is Mt. Gox TRYING to kill Bitcoin? It doesn't even make sense.

I understand you're argument; you bought most of your hardware recently and are in it for "the long haul".
But the same argument could be applied to FPGAs -- why not go all out and be king of efficiency?
It's basically your strategy on steroids. Spend even MORE money for an even MORE sure-fire ability to beat the competition.

I haven't bought any new hardware in months. That's why I don't own any 5970s. And I'm too old (with a family, kids, job, etc.) to mess with selling all my rigs and starting over with "more efficient" ones. The price of BTC just doesn't justify the time I'd spend.

I'll admit -- I spent some time back in May/June learning about BTC, setting up rigs, researching cards, etc. but back then there was good money to be made. I would never spend that kind of time now just to earn a few bucks a day (assuming 6 GH/s worth of rigs). Fortunately, I learned about BTC & set up my rigs when BTC were worth much, much more.

I'm actually big into efficiency. I just have to balance it with my other requirements (time, money, etc.)
Before Bitcoin, my whole household used about 13 KW/h of electricity a day. I know all the tricks to save electricity.

Believe me, if it were easy, I'd upgrade all my rigs to be more efficient. But I can't spend any time "tinkering" in my Bitcoin room these days; the $3 or $4/day just doesn't justify much time spent.

I'm running an average of 3 GPUs per system, all Linux (except one machine which has to be Windows XP).
One thumb drive; the rest are hard drives. All but 2 systems (used for other things) have a single 2 GB RAM stick.
A couple 80+silver PSUs, the rest are 80+ bronze.
All of them have the extra mobo crap turned off; that's easy stuff.
I'm using AMD Athlon II CPUs. Yes, a Sempron uses even less, but it is also (even more) worthless when it comes to resale time. An Athlon II doesn't exactly suck electricity -- especially when it's not running 100%. I'm not CPU mining.

When I built these systems, MH/W efficiency was NOT my only concern. I was also quite concerned with MH/$ at the time. And motherboards with more than 3 PCI-E slots were much more expensive than the $50 and $70 mobos I could get with 3 slots. I was concerned with payoff time. Same for PSUs. Most of my PSUs are 750W, which can handle 3 cards. A 1200W, which can handle 66% more cards, costs about 100% more. Didn't seem worth it to me.

I'm still a bit glad that my most expensive card is a 5870 -- worth around $230 new. Those 5970's are going to be *extremely* hard to sell used, considering they're worth $500. Any gamer with $500 for a new video card is *going* to buy a new card. End of story.

I would like to point out, that most people are getting MUCH, much less than 2.5 MH/W.

I'm getting 1.75 MH/W on average, including the cost of fans (though I haven't calculated it perfectly yet) and all my cards are 58XX series! All the people using 6XXX cards are going to get much less. (And let's face it -- 58XX cards aren't exactly available at Best Buy these days...) Though it's possible most of the 6XXX crowd were among those who quit in the last couple months...I'd be willing to believe that.

2.5 MH/W is what a couple (?) guys are getting, who sold their previous rigs and bought 5970's to create "maximum efficient rigs". But most of us did NOT sell our rigs and buy 5970's when they became available recently.

But SOMEONE is paying around $200 a month for your mining operation. Not all of us can (or will) steal that much electricity, especially without raising eyebrows/getting caught.

You must be in a college dorm or something. $200 a month is a lot, even for a business.

Obviously a *lot* of games were being played this evening, possibly by several parties at once. Someone had some serious money to play with, too. Bid walls of 50,000?

That having been said, I doubt BTC will be $2.60 a week from now. It's most logical that after this washing-machine spin cycle (or stomach-churning roller coaster ride), the price will be...what it's been for a couple weeks now. $3, plus or minus.

Assuming the US Gov't doesn't make possession of BTC a felony