Japanese Tech Firm GMO Releases ‘Free’ Zcash Mining SoftwareJapanese tech firm GMO is expanding its nascent cryptocurrency mining operation beyond bitcoin through the release of a software client designed to mine zcash and other Equihash-based cryptocurrencies using general-purpose GPU chips.
Japanese Firm Releases Zcash Mining Software
Dubbed Cryptoknocker, the software has specifically been developed for mining rigs composed of Nvidia graphics cards (GeForce 8 or later).
While the software itself is free, GMO wants a cut of the proceeds generated through it, namely, two percent of the coins users mine while running the client. GMO says that this fee is offset by a two percent efficiency improvement over other Equihash mining clients.
Though used by a variety of cryptocurrencies, Equihash is most often associated with the privacy-centric zcash, currently the 21st-largest coin by market cap. Like several other mining algorithms, it was developed to be ASIC-resistant, ensuring that it could be mined without specialized hardware only available from a small group of manufacturers.
However, China-based mining giant Bitmain recently announced a zcash ASIC, signaling that — unless zcash hard forks to alter its instance of Equihash — the era of mining ZEC with general-purpose hardware will soon come to an end.
Faced with a similar plight following the release of a Cryptonight ASIC, monero’s community decided to activate a hard fork and “brick” those new mining rigs. Zcash, though, has chosen not to make maintaining ASIC resistance a developmental priority.
https://www.ccn.com/japanese-tech-firm-gmo-releases-free-zcash-mining-software/
