Beginner needs help.

[MeSarah]

Hello. I have built a mining rig. So far it has 1 5870. I have 2 more ready to install once I have things working and space for a 4th vc. I have installed Centos 5.6 and have followed the guide for Centos 5.5 found on the forum. But now that I have completed that process I am unsure what to do next. I tried to run the BitcoinMiner.py file. The first time gave me a permissions error. This confused me as I was logged in as root. So I made them executable. This just gave a different set of 'import' errors.

So here is where I am stuck. I dont understand how to setup and run the miner. Could some kind person instruct me how to complete this last leg of the mining rig build process or maybe direct me to the correct url which will provide me these vital last steps? Any advice would be appreciated as well.

Thanks. I'll keep y'all informed on my progress.

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[SomeoneWeird]

Download LinuxCoin, works as soon as you boot.

[MeSarah]

Ok, I dumped Centos and used Ubuntu following the tutorials on the forum. I wont use LinuxCoin because there might be some legal issues with proprietary divers being included. I dont know so I wont take the chance of infringing on someone elses intellectual  properties. Ethics, their a funny thing, right? Not to mention its a 'no name' linux without effective linux community vetting and is only alpha quality. Hell as far as I know there is a bitcoin stealing script hidden somewhere. Plus using LinuxCoin keeps people ignorant. I am trying to learn. I maybe new to Bitcoin but Im not new to linux. But my training was from Radhat at Durhan, NC.  so Im only comfortable using Redhat based distros. Im no guru but Im no linux noob.

Ok, so Im at a new crux. The tutorials I have found so far only refer to pool mining. Im not sure Im going to do any pool mining. But before I do any pool mining, if I do, Im am going to have a functional solo mining rig. With recent DDOS attacks on some mining pools Im paranoid. Not to mention the new anonymous threat ( <-- lol )..

So my crux is I dont understand how to start the miner for solo mining. If someone could provide me a 'string' to get the miner started that would be helpful, or a url to a solo mining howto would be great too. I might even write a formal solo mining howto once I understand what is needed to be done, if one doesnt already exists.

I thank you for your time and patients. I look forward to trying your solutions. And may the next block be with you.

[wigsgiw]

I wouldn't be sure that solo mining is the way to go, unless you are an extremely patient person.

Put your expected numbers in here: http://www.alloscomp.com/bitcoin/old_calculator.php - note that this also doesn't take inevitable increases in difficulty into account.

If you are set on solo mining, you'll want to run bitcoind with the -server flag (`./bitcoind -server`). Then you'll be able to set the host in your miner to localhost. Then once you have set your rpcuser and rpcpassword in ~/.bitcoin/bitcoin.conf you should be able to connect to your local bitcoin server. I'd give you some wiki links, but the wiki is throwing a 403 at the moment (https://bitcoin.it/).

Good luck!

[pwnyboy]

And may the next block be with you.

loooool

First to what you said about CentOS, I covered this in the CentOS 5.5 Mining Guide thread.  Lately I've been building/rebuilding my mining rigs around FC14 though, for the sheer simplicity of kickstarted (scripted) installs which are much simpler to get going than the CentOS variety.  FC14 also plays nice with diskless PXE/nfsroot, and aren't plagued by the problem of jackass developers as Cent is.  *shakes fist at kbsingh*

Regarding linuxcoin, lol @ drivers.  I think what you're referring to is the fact that the ATI drivers "taint" the Linux kernel.  That's not a bad thing, it just means that the ATI folks don't play nice with Linus and crew.

As for solo mining, I *highly* recommend joining a pool with only 4 cards.  The chance of you finding a block is roughly one per 25 to 60 days, based on how powerful the four are.  You can solve the unreachability problem with scripting (there have been several posted to these forums already which restart and/or jump your miners to working pools).  But if you insist on solo:

Code:

./bitcoind -rpcallowip=192.168.*.* -rpcuser=lolz -rpcpassword=lolz

[MeSarah]

Thank you for your quick replies. So I tried to use
./bitcoind -rpcallowip=192.168.*.* -rpcuser=lolz -rpcpassword=lolz &
That started the server and was verified with ps aux | grep bitcoind .. I even tried ./bitcoind -deamon  and that seamed to start the deamon as well. I used
http://lolz:lolz@localhost:8333/ -k poclbm DEVICE=0 VECTORS BFI_INT AGGRESSION=7
to connect but got a failure message. I even tried the eth0 address checked with ifconfig. I hope that someone can give me some advice as to what I am doing wrong.

I thank you for your time and patients. I look forward to trying your solutions. And may the next block be with you.

[SomeoneWeird]

Thank you for your quick replies. So I tried to use
./bitcoind -rpcallowip=192.168.*.* -rpcuser=lolz -rpcpassword=lolz &
That started the server and was verified with ps aux | grep bitcoind .. I even tried ./bitcoind -deamon  and that seamed to start the deamon as well. I used
http://lolz:lolz@localhost:8333/ -k poclbm DEVICE=0 VECTORS BFI_INT AGGRESSION=7
to connect but got a failure message. I even tried the eth0 address checked with ifconfig. I hope that someone can give me some advice as to what I am doing wrong.

I thank you for your time and patients. I look forward to trying your solutions. And may the next block be with you.

Code:

./bitcoind -daemon

Add rpcuser and rpcpassword to the bitcoin.conf file, then connect to 127.0.0.1;

[pwnyboy]

I hope that someone can give me some advice as to what I am doing wrong.

Start by verifying that the daemon is running:

Code:

'ps aux|grep bitcoin'

If so, make sure it's listening:

Code:

(07:58:48)[root@shellx2(~)]: netstat -nl|grep 833
tcp        0      0 0.0.0.0:8332            0.0.0.0:*               LISTEN
tcp        0      0 0.0.0.0:8333            0.0.0.0:*               LISTEN
(07:58:51)[root@shellx2(~)]:

Verify that your iptables (firewall) is empty:

Code:

(07:56:56)[root@shellx2(~)]: iptables -nxvL
Chain INPUT (policy ACCEPT 0 packets, 0 bytes)
    pkts      bytes target     prot opt in     out     source               destination

Chain FORWARD (policy ACCEPT 0 packets, 0 bytes)
    pkts      bytes target     prot opt in     out     source               destination

Chain OUTPUT (policy ACCEPT 0 packets, 0 bytes)
    pkts      bytes target     prot opt in     out     source               destination
(07:56:59)[root@shellx2(~)]:

If you see entries in there, flush it with 'iptables -F'.

[pwnyboy]

Also, I believe you should be hitting the daemon on port 8332.

[MeSarah]

Thanks for the replies. So now i have some free time Im back to working on my rig. Im getting closer but am still having troubles. Ive dumped Ubuntu for Fedora14. I am now getting 'Wrong username or password' message when trying to start poclbm. I have tried changing the bitcoin.conf file and still get the error. Ok... So this is what my bitcoin.conf file looks like:

rpcuser=a
rpcpassword=a

I have tried to start the daemon these two ways: ./bitcoind -daemon  and  ./bitcoind -daemon -rpcuser=a -rpcpassword=a

I have tried to connect these two ways: ./poclbm.py http://a:a@127.0.0.1:8332 -d 0  and ./poclbm.py --user=a --pass=a -o 127.0.0.1 -p 8332 -d 0
With the later I get this message: Bitcoin is not connected!

I have made sure the daemon is running and listening on ports 8333 and 8332. I have also shut down iptables with service iptables stop. Finally Ive made sure that pocblm does find my gpu. I am unsure what to do next.

I await your wisdom and advice. And I thank you for taking the time to help me.

[SomeoneWeird]

Thanks for the replies. So now i have some free time Im back to working on my rig. Im getting closer but am still having troubles. Ive dumped Ubuntu for Fedora14. I am now getting 'Wrong username or password' message when trying to start poclbm. I have tried changing the bitcoin.conf file and still get the error. Ok... So this is what my bitcoin.conf file looks like:

rpcuser=a
rpcpassword=a

I have tried to start the daemon these two ways: ./bitcoind -daemon  and  ./bitcoind -daemon -rpcuser=a -rpcpassword=a

I have tried to connect these two ways: ./poclbm.py http://a:a@127.0.0.1:8332 -d 0  and ./poclbm.py --user=a --pass=a -o 127.0.0.1 -p 8332 -d 0
With the later I get this message: Bitcoin is not connected!

I have made sure the daemon is running and listening on ports 8333 and 8332. I have also shut down iptables with service iptables stop. Finally Ive made sure that pocblm does find my gpu. I am unsure what to do next.

I await your wisdom and advice. And I thank you for taking the time to help me.

Code:

poclbm.exe -d0 --host=127.0.0.1 --port=8332 --user=a --pass=a -v -f 1

[MeSarah]

I tried that and get: Bitcoin is not connected! But I replaced .exe with .py..
Wow, That was a quick reply. Thanks!!

[SomeoneWeird]

I tried that and get: Bitcoin is not connected! But I replaced .exe with .py..
Wow, That was a quick reply. Thanks!!

Make sure your running "bitcoin -daemon", check it with "ps aux | grep bitcoin" and it should be running (also netstat it if you want)
then try that again.

[MeSarah]

Im sure its running:

[me@btc 64]$ ps aux | grep bitcoin
me        2718  0.0  0.2 641284  9688 ?        Ssl  07:11   0:03 ./bitcoind -daemon
me        3007  0.0  0.0 103376   824 pts/1    S+   08:13   0:00 grep --color=auto bitcoin

Is there a way test that the daemon is responding other than trying to start a miner?

[MeSarah]

Oh, ther is also this: 

[root@btc ~]# netstat -nl|grep 833
tcp        0      0 127.0.0.1:8332              0.0.0.0:*                   LISTEN     
tcp        0      0 0.0.0.0:8333                0.0.0.0:*                   LISTEN 

[SomeoneWeird]

Is there a way test that the daemon is responding other than trying to start a miner?

yes, there is:

bitcoind getblockcount

or better

bitcoind getwork

Remember to background the daemon while doing those, or just open a new terminal and run them.

[MeSarah]

I think we are getting somewhere.
[me@btc 64]$ ./bitcoind getblockcount
0
[me@btc 64]$ ./bitcoind getwork
error: {"code":-9,"message":"Bitcoin is not connected!"}

is this a problem with my upstream firewall? I wouldnt think so sense Im connecting to the forum on the same box.

[SomeoneWeird]

I think we are getting somewhere.
[me@btc 64]$ ./bitcoind getblockcount
0
[me@btc 64]$ ./bitcoind getwork
error: {"code":-9,"message":"Bitcoin is not connected!"}

is this a problem with my upstream firewall? I wouldnt think so sense Im connecting to the forum on the same box.

Ah, I think that the daemon can't download the blockchain, that would make sense. Open port 8332 on your firewall and wait a while, running getblockcount periodically

[MeSarah]

I just did it before you made that posting. I forwarded both ports 8333 and 8332 to the btc box. I'll update ya in 30 minutes. Will be 08:39 at the bell.. Ding! 

Thank you all for such fast replies.

[MeSarah]

I just finish downloading the block chain. It took a bit more than 3 hours. I can now say Im hashing at 347000 kh. Woohoo. Thank you to all that have helped me... One concern. I get this message:

05/06/2011 13:14:05, warning: job finished, miner is idle

Im going to assume that is normal.

Now for some goodness. SomeoneWeird, pwnyboy, Monoquark please message me with your addresses. That way it will be easy to find your addresses later. I will pay you a bounty based on your level of help when I mine my first block. So I guess somewhere between 10-60 days. As a measure of good faith I will send you a token amount, as I only have a token amount of bitcoins at this point. Ok, truth be told, I only have .05. And that was from a donation to M.A.R.S. Radio.

My next task is to get the other two 5870s installed and mining.. I know I need to make some kind of null connector for the video cards without a monitor connected. I think it uses 68 ohm resistors. If you know the pins to use or a url that has that info would you post it here?

Finally in the coming days I will write some kind of wiki entry that walks others through a diagnostic process from the info gathered in this thread.

Any last words of wisdom is also appreciated. Once again I think you for such quick responses to my posting.

May the next block solved be with you.