Good mining setup? New and looking for advise.

[jyrine]

First let me start by saying this is my first post, and I'm hoping to get into the mining world. I've been doing my research and believe I have come up with a viable option, but I figured I'd turn to the more
experienced before losing my ass. 

I am currently paying about $0.07 per kW/h in my area, and I'm hoping to make a steady $3000 a month from mining.
Now I realize that's quite a bit and possibly unrealistic, especially with the volatility of the market, which is why I asking these questions.

I used http://dustcoin.com/ to average my power consumption and hashrate. I used https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Mining_hardware_comparison
to find the highest MH/s miners and then narrowed them down to the ones that had the highest profit margin and were still produced.
Using that, I narrowed it down to this https://www.achilleslabs.com/product/4

It's promising somewhere around 6TH/s (5%+/-) at 3800watts. Using dustcoin to calculate that out with my power costing $0.07 and with it averaging the difficulty at 40,640,955,016
I would produce roughly $518.18 a month. Simply multiply that all by 6 and I come up with my desired amount and needing 6 machines. The results being.

6TH/s x 6 = 36TH/S
3800watts x 6 = 22,800Watts
$0.07kW/h
=
$3121.68 a month.

and with each machine costing me around $2,895.00 (lets say $3000 because taxes and whatnot), it would take
me a little shy of 6 months to recoup my initial payout of $17,370.00 (lets say $18,000 because taxes and whatnot).


My questions are this:
1. Is all of my math right? Am I completely forgetting something or ignoring a major factor?
2. Are there any major holes in my idea? Problems I'm overlooking such as hardware maintenance or difficulty increase in the future that would destroy this idea?
3. From your collective experience, would this be a fools errand where the initial payout is nice but will take too long to recoup the total cost, and later cost won't be so grand?
4. What could I do to improve my idea (IE have a larger profit margin) if questions 1-3 come back as "all good"?



I realize as someone new to this I am most likely unaware of a lot of factors, which is why I turned to all of you,
I am in fact very seriously, and do have the money to plop down on this kind of investment.
I look at $3000 a month and only see good things because, lets face it, that's a nice living wage, but I'm sure if
it were that simple everyone would be doing it, hence why I'm asking as much as I can, before I so much as even
set of a bitcoin wallet.



Thank you for taking the time to read this wall of text, and I appreciate all the (possible) feedback I receive.
Cheers,
jyrine

[ChuckBuck]

UGH, gross dude.  Is that even a real miner?  Looks extra scammy.  Never heard of Achilles Lab, you sure that they don't sell false promises and a bag of dust with that "miner"?

I'd stay far far far away from this bullshit.  I think some people poked around with them before, and they never got a clear answer from them:


https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=855856.0

If you're going to mine for a loss(you'll never mine $3,000/month no matter what you do), than at least mine with legitimate companies:

http://www.spondoolies-tech.com/products/holiday-special-sp20-jackson-shipping-from-stock

http://www.spondoolies-tech.com/products/sp35-yukon-power-shipping-from-stock

https://www.bitmaintech.com/productDetail.htm?pid=000201412231604153619o9X1obn0693

https://www.bitmaintech.com/productDetail.htm?pid=000201501041124158002SHesS4z0689


That said, you don't need to ask if you'll profit mining, you can read the hundreds of threads here that explain how you'll never profit.

Only way you're going to profit is if you have one of these:



I don't think you have the budget for that, so I'll say NOPE.

[BTCish]

If you really have that amount of money, go for it, after that you can write here what was your success. You can even start your cloud mining site.

[jyrine]

UGH, gross dude.  Is that even a real miner?  Looks extra scammy.  Never heard of Achilles Lab, you sure that they don't sell false promises and a bag of dust with that "miner"?

I'd stay far far far away from this bullshit.  I think some people poked around with them before, and they never got a clear answer from them:


https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=855856.0

If you're going to mine for a loss(you'll never mine $3,000/month no matter what you do), than at least mine with legitimate companies:

http://www.spondoolies-tech.com/products/holiday-special-sp20-jackson-shipping-from-stock

http://www.spondoolies-tech.com/products/sp35-yukon-power-shipping-from-stock

https://www.bitmaintech.com/productDetail.htm?pid=000201412231604153619o9X1obn0693

https://www.bitmaintech.com/productDetail.htm?pid=000201501041124158002SHesS4z0689


That said, you don't need to ask if you'll profit mining, you can read the hundreds of threads here that explain how you'll never profit.

Only way you're going to profit is if you have one of these:

http://www.logicoins.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/20140523_164302-e1404154208253.jpg

I don't think you have the budget for that, so I'll say NOPE.

Alright so I'll do more research on that miner, and if nothing comes up I'll look into the ones you suggested. However I do not, and will not mine at a loss, then there is no point.
Obviously there has to be profit to be made if people are still doing it, or do millions of people just want to throw their money away on bitcoins? Seems unlikely to me.

That's what I'm asking, how do I mine so I can get a ROI?

If you really have that amount of money, go for it, after that you can write here what was your success. You can even start your cloud mining site.

Why would I start a cloud mining site?

[mwizard]

Mining is generally not profitable for an individual, and has not been profitable for about a year in most countries.  At $0.07 kWh it could in theory still be economic but it will be a very high risk investment.

If you are serious about looking for a ROI, and for advice,  you need to also include in your costing:

1) Any electrical power setup.  Most houses/offices are not wired for the power needed for multiple miners.
2) Cooling and fans.  You will need to feed large amounts of air to the miners as they each put out the equivalent of an electrical heater.
3) Noise.  Miners can be very noisy - imagine a rack of vacuum cleaners all running 24 by 7.  So mining at home raises some interesting marital issues.
4) Your Time: The initial learning and set up is not trivial.  

As mentioned by others Spondoolies and Bitmain/Antminers are the only manufactures selling direct to the public that are worth considering.   There are other major miner manufactures but they no longer sell to the general public (Bitfury, KNC ...).

Most Bitcoin mining is done in large industrial operations in places with very low electrical costs, in particular Iceland (geothermal) and Washington state (hydro).  Generally these mining farms are run in conjunction with the miner manufactures making it very hard to match their costs.  See the photo above for a typical mining farm.  

If really wish to try mining I suggest you first buy a small miner to see what is involved, for example Antminer S5 or SP20.

[BTCish]

Mining is generally not profitable for an individual, and has not been profitable for about a year in most countries.  At $0.07 kWh it could in theory still be economic but it will be a very high risk investment.

If you are serious about looking for a ROI, and for advice,  you need to also include in your costing:

1) Any electrical power setup.  Most houses/offices are not wired for the power needed for multiple miners.
2) Cooling and fans.  You will need to feed large amounts of air to the miners as they each put out the equivalent of an electrical heater.
3) Noise.  Miners can be very noisy - imagine a rack of vacuum cleaners all running 24 by 7.  So mining at home raises some interesting marital issues.
4) Your Time: The initial learning and set up is not trivial.  

As mentioned by others Spondoolies and Bitmain/Antminers are the only manufactures selling direct to the public that are worth considering.   There are other major miner manufactures but they no longer sell to the general public (Bitfury, KNC ...).

Most Bitcoin mining is done in large industrial operations in places with very low electrical costs, in particular Iceland (geothermal) and Washington state (hydro).  Generally these mining farms are run in conjunction with the miner manufactures making it very hard to match their costs.  See the photo above for a typical mining farm.  

If really wish to try mining I suggest you first buy a small miner to see what is involved, for example Antminer S5 or SP20.

totaly agreed to this.

[ChuckBuck]

UGH, gross dude.  Is that even a real miner?  Looks extra scammy.  Never heard of Achilles Lab, you sure that they don't sell false promises and a bag of dust with that "miner"?

I'd stay far far far away from this bullshit.  I think some people poked around with them before, and they never got a clear answer from them:


https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=855856.0

If you're going to mine for a loss(you'll never mine $3,000/month no matter what you do), than at least mine with legitimate companies:

http://www.spondoolies-tech.com/products/holiday-special-sp20-jackson-shipping-from-stock

http://www.spondoolies-tech.com/products/sp35-yukon-power-shipping-from-stock

https://www.bitmaintech.com/productDetail.htm?pid=000201412231604153619o9X1obn0693

https://www.bitmaintech.com/productDetail.htm?pid=000201501041124158002SHesS4z0689


That said, you don't need to ask if you'll profit mining, you can read the hundreds of threads here that explain how you'll never profit.

Only way you're going to profit is if you have one of these:

-snip-

I don't think you have the budget for that, so I'll say NOPE.

Alright so I'll do more research on that miner, and if nothing comes up I'll look into the ones you suggested. However I do not, and will not mine at a loss, then there is no point.
Obviously there has to be profit to be made if people are still doing it, or do millions of people just want to throw their money away on bitcoins? Seems unlikely to me.

That's what I'm asking, how do I mine so I can get a ROI?

If you really have that amount of money, go for it, after that you can write here what was your success. You can even start your cloud mining site.

Why would I start a cloud mining site?

There is no profit for the home to mid size mining operation.  Even with your 36 TH/s and $0.07 kw/H costs, you're competing with the big boys that mine at "true scale".  The Chinese that deploy multi-Pentahash at will, the miners in Washington state, the miners in Iceland that have natural cooling...

It's been an arms race for awhile, and you're simply a pea shooter against tanks and fighter jets.  What's exacerbates this is the extremely low BTC price, so you don't mine enough to even cover the electrical and cooling costs a month.

Ignore what that user said above, there's no cloud mining operation that's profitable for the consumer or the provider.  All cloud mining sites are ponzi schemes.

[5ick3uffalo]

 gridseed  and mining via cointellect pays 1.50 Euro /day, best

Posted From bitcointalk.org Android App

[nwfella]

UGH, gross dude.  Is that even a real miner?  Looks extra scammy.  Never heard of Achilles Lab, you sure that they don't sell false promises and a bag of dust with that "miner"?

I'd stay far far far away from this bullshit.  I think some people poked around with them before, and they never got a clear answer from them:


https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=855856.0

If you're going to mine for a loss(you'll never mine $3,000/month no matter what you do), than at least mine with legitimate companies:

http://www.spondoolies-tech.com/products/holiday-special-sp20-jackson-shipping-from-stock

http://www.spondoolies-tech.com/products/sp35-yukon-power-shipping-from-stock

https://www.bitmaintech.com/productDetail.htm?pid=000201412231604153619o9X1obn0693

https://www.bitmaintech.com/productDetail.htm?pid=000201501041124158002SHesS4z0689


That said, you don't need to ask if you'll profit mining, you can read the hundreds of threads here that explain how you'll never profit.

Only way you're going to profit is if you have one of these:

-snip-

I don't think you have the budget for that, so I'll say NOPE.

Alright so I'll do more research on that miner, and if nothing comes up I'll look into the ones you suggested. However I do not, and will not mine at a loss, then there is no point.
Obviously there has to be profit to be made if people are still doing it, or do millions of people just want to throw their money away on bitcoins? Seems unlikely to me.

That's what I'm asking, how do I mine so I can get a ROI?

If you really have that amount of money, go for it, after that you can write here what was your success. You can even start your cloud mining site.

Why would I start a cloud mining site?

There is no profit for the home to mid size mining operation.  Even with your 36 TH/s and $0.07 kw/H costs, you're competing with the big boys that mine at "true scale".  The Chinese that deploy multi-Pentahash at will, the miners in Washington state, the miners in Iceland that have natural cooling...

It's been an arms race for awhile, and you're simply a pea shooter against tanks and fighter jets.  What's exacerbates this is the extremely low BTC price, so you don't mine enough to even cover the electrical and cooling costs a month.

Ignore what that user said above, there's no cloud mining operation that's profitable for the consumer or the provider.  All cloud mining sites are ponzi schemes.

Gotta agree with ChuckBuck on this one.  The few legitimate cloud mining operations that are around (ie cex.io) are literally shutting down because electricity/maintenance costs literally exceed what their gear can generate.  If it's a cloud mining operation, and still claims to be running, there is an 95+% chance it is a ponzi.

[jyrine]

Thanks for all the feedback.

I'll definitely avoid cloud mining, its sucks that everything is a Ponzi lately.


As far as mining for a ROI, I actually am going to be moving back to Washington soon, so I might still be able to get into this, maybe.
You've all mentioned these bigger companies running huge setups, how did they get there? Simply having a ton of money to begin with?

In a perfect world where I can get all my power for almost nothing (because hydro), what would I need to spend and do to accomplish my 3k/month idea?
Obviously its obtainable, but at what cost?

[xstr8guy]

Thanks for all the feedback.

I'll definitely avoid cloud mining, its sucks that everything is a Ponzi lately.


As far as mining for a ROI, I actually am going to be moving back to Washington soon, so I might still be able to get into this, maybe.
You've all mentioned these bigger companies running huge setups, how did they get there? Simply having a ton of money to begin with?

In a perfect world where I can get all my power for almost nothing (because hydro), what would I need to spend and do to accomplish my 3k/month idea?
Obviously its obtainable, but at what cost?

Most of the big mining operations are owned in partnership with or wholly owned by ASIC manufacturers... Bitmain, KNC, Bitfury, etc.

So if you don't have tens of millions of dollars to develop your own ASIC miner, you're pretty much screwed.

[notlist3d]

Look at SP or Antminers.  That miner has never been confirmed.  It's been advertised but no reviews.

[ChuckBuck]

Thanks for all the feedback.

I'll definitely avoid cloud mining, its sucks that everything is a Ponzi lately.


As far as mining for a ROI, I actually am going to be moving back to Washington soon, so I might still be able to get into this, maybe.
You've all mentioned these bigger companies running huge setups, how did they get there? Simply having a ton of money to begin with?

In a perfect world where I can get all my power for almost nothing (because hydro), what would I need to spend and do to accomplish my 3k/month idea?
Obviously its obtainable, but at what cost?

Most of the big mining operations are owned in partnership with or wholly owned by ASIC manufacturers... Bitmain, KNC, Bitfury, etc.

So if you don't have tens of millions of dollars to develop your own ASIC miner, you're pretty much screwed.

Just like xstr8guy says, if you don't have multi million capital to play with, don't have multi mW/Hr industrial complex, not dealing with an exclusive partnership with one of the major manufacturers to get miners at costs and not retail pricing....

Just don't do it man!   

Price dipped below to like $152 on BitStamp, that should tell you all you need to know.

Bitcoin just isn't profitable  AT ALL RIGHT NOW!  Avoid sinking big sums of money into it, you won't get it back.  If you want to dabble, fine, get a few miners and put it in your garage for tinkering and hobby.

Forget your pipe dreams of $3000/month, it's not happening.  Sorry if I'm coming off curt, but trust me you don't want to sink your tens of thousands of dollars chasing a pipe dream.

If you're investing in a mining operation thinking BTC price will rise to $1000 and beyond, just buy them out right.  You won't have to worry operational costs taking away your any chance at profit.

[stonerider]

I've been mining since Oct'2014. I just bought a couple of  brand new Lexuses. With profit from mining. Don't listen to any of the comments above. You can make $3k/mo easily. Just buy miners and let them print money!!! PM me with your name, date of birth, social #, bank account and I will get back to you with details on how to do it!!!

[/sarcasm]

[alh]

When I went to the dustcoin calculator and plugged in 3800 watts, 6TH, and $.07 for electricity, it came back with $216 for "profit" for a month. I assume that is based on some Bitcoin price (unknown), and some difficulty (presumably current). That puts your "miner payoff" at least 15 months out, and that assumes no increase in difficulty during those 15 months. That's really not going to happen. That just further extends you payout to well over 2 years or more, quite possible "never". For those months, you are just paying off the miner, and nothing more.

This kind of math just really discourages mining as a way to make money with Bitcoin, certainly nothing like the $3000 per month you hoped. Sorry to be such a downer.

[ChuckBuck]

When I went to the dustcoin calculator and plugged in 3800 watts, 6TH, and $.07 for electricity, it came back with $216 for "profit" for a month. I assume that is based on some Bitcoin price (unknown), and some difficulty (presumably current). That puts your "miner payoff" at least 15 months out, and that assumes no increase in difficulty during those 15 months. That's really not going to happen. That just further extends you payout to well over 2 years or more, quite possible "never". For those months, you are just paying off the miner, and nothing more.

This kind of math just really discourages mining as a way to make money with Bitcoin, certainly nothing like the $3000 per month you hoped. Sorry to be such a downer.

He obviously didn't use the right calculator.  When I was mining in 2013-2014 (I "retired" in mid 2014 due to costs and difficulty), I only used the following 2 sites to help determine miner purchasing and when to sell the miner to best ROI.  Resale was the only way to profit properly:

https://bitcoinwisdom.com/bitcoin/calculator

http://www.vnbitcoin.org/bitcoincalculator.php

I always looked at the Allsocomp, Dustcoin, and BTCInvest as noob calculators that gave newbies false hope that they'd actually have a chance mining for like a year to recoup costs.

Back when I was actively mining, I used http://www.coinwarz.com/cryptocurrency when I was feeling froggy and wanted mine hundreds of blocks of Alts to trade back to BTC on Cryptsy.

Those were the days...

[jyrine]

Alright all, thanks for your help.

I can see now that even trying to get miners second hand (something I was pursuing due to so many getting turned off and sold due to the dip, and because used typically is a lot cheaper)
isn't even going to work. As many have mentioned my calculation don't work out and trying them recently it's now $500 less then before, so obviously this drop is getting worse by the day.

You all have saved me from wasting a good deal of money so I thank you. lol.



As far as buying bitcoin outright as some have mentioned, is that still too big a gamble? I won't consider it until I see bitcoins drop below $200, but even then, is that too much of a gamble?

[ChuckBuck]

Alright all, thanks for your help.

I can see now that even trying to get miners second hand (something I was pursuing due to so many getting turned off and sold due to the dip, and because used typically is a lot cheaper)
isn't even going to work. As many have mentioned my calculation don't work out and trying them recently it's now $500 less then before, so obviously this drop is getting worse by the day.

You all have saved me from wasting a good deal of money so I thank you. lol.



As far as buying bitcoin outright as some have mentioned, is that still too big a gamble? I won't consider it until I see bitcoins drop below $200, but even then, is that too much of a gamble?

Every "investment" is considered risky.  If you want to play it safe, only buy a few coins and stick them in cold storage like a paper or hardware wallet, put them in a fireproof safe, then forget you ever even heard of Bitcoin, and go about your day. 

Then in like 5-10 years, when you realized you still had a paper wallet, if Bitcoin's not worth anything or "dead", rip up the paper wallet and say "Man what an Idiot I was for thinking Bitcoin was for real".  But in the rare case that Bitcoin actually makes it, and Bitcoin is worth say $1000, $2000, $5000, or $10000...you'll say "FUCKING A I SHOULD'VE INVESTED MORE!".

It's either A or B, basically a coin flip, just like anything in life.

[GigaBit]

Start at the power source, not the hardware.

Let's be honest, $0.07 isn't really that good power prices for today's mining.

Start by building a solar farm of about 5KW/h, then fill it with cheap miners like even S1's would get your started for real cheap.

Even at that, you're not covered overnight and batteries can take months to fully charge.

Then buy new hardware as you go to replace the decrepit machines.

Then it don't matter the cost of power or how inefficient your mining hardware is.

I got 5TH/s with 100% in my pocket profits; I make more coin than most miners on a power bill and 10 times my hash power.

Size doesn't equate profits in Bitcoin... smarts does.