noobie requesting help

[kiowarory]

Greetings and Salutations,

I've been doing quite a bit of reading, and have decided to give bitcoin mining a shot. Primarily as a way to put my computer to work when I'm away, and make me some money. Yes, I am aware that its not the greatest, most efficient way of bitcoin mining, I just dont have the cash to spare on a dedicated rig. Anyway, with all my reading I've gotten a little confused and bamboozled, the only thing I know for sure is that I need mining software, I'm starting with easy miner, and a bitcoin wallet, starting with multibitHD. I'm new to bitcoin, but not computers, and would greatly appreciate some help with starting this process with definite information, and I would prefer a video to a wall of text, if possible.

EDIT: " it was possible to mine with your computer CPU or high speed video processor card. Today that's no longer possible. " - bitcoinmining.com, Sorry answered my own question     

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[philipma1957]

one question  what does your power cost?


and a suggestion read my thread.


https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1086011.0


these usb sticks will be the cheapest way to mine.

most likely you will lose money.

but if you want to get started 1 of these sticks is about 20-25 usd and will be available  sometime this summer.

[Bizmark13]

one question  what does your power cost?


and a suggestion read my thread.


https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1086011.0


these usb sticks will be the cheapest way to mine.

most likely you will lose money.

but if you want to get started 1 of these sticks is about 20-25 usd and will be available  sometime this summer.

Although cheap, that's not actually the cheapest way to mine.

The cheapest way to mine would be to head over to eBay and buy something like a Block Erupter/Ice Fury/Antminer U-series or any other obsolete stick miner for $5 and mine with that. It wouldn't be profitable of course and you might not be able to reach the pool's minimum payout threshold (you could always opt to solo mine instead however) but at least you would still get the full mining experience, if that's what you're after.

Anyway OP, if you're still interested in mining with your computer then you could try mining altcoins and converting these to bitcoins using an altcoin exchange like Cryptsy. There are many altcoins out there which can still be mined using CPUs or GPUs. The only ones which have ASICs built for them are SHA-256 based coins like Bitcoin and Peercoin, and scrypt-based coins like Litecoin and Dogecoin.

Here is a list of CPU-mineable coins:

http://www.cpucoinlist.com/

(Note: It hasn't been updated in a while though so some coins might have transitioned over to GPU mining since the list was written. To the best of my knowledge, no ASICs have been developed for any other algorithm besides SHA-256 or scrypt however.)

[jacktheking]

Anyway OP, if you're still interested in mining with your computer then you could try mining altcoins and converting these to bitcoins using an altcoin exchange like Cryptsy. There are many altcoins out there which can still be mined using CPUs or GPUs. The only ones which have ASICs built for them are SHA-256 based coins like Bitcoin and Peercoin, and scrypt-based coins like Litecoin and Dogecoin.

Agree. In most country, the electricity cost will never make you profit mining Bitcoin. However, mining altcoin might give you a little profit. Well, most altcoin difficulty is lower compared to Bitcoin. Also, instead of mining by yourself, joining a pool might speed it up. If you intend to mine Altcoin and join a pool.. Choose a pool which will automatically mine profitable altcoin and exchange it into Bitcoin for you.

[Bizmark13]

Anyway OP, if you're still interested in mining with your computer then you could try mining altcoins and converting these to bitcoins using an altcoin exchange like Cryptsy. There are many altcoins out there which can still be mined using CPUs or GPUs. The only ones which have ASICs built for them are SHA-256 based coins like Bitcoin and Peercoin, and scrypt-based coins like Litecoin and Dogecoin.

Agree. In most country, the electricity cost will never make you profit mining Bitcoin. However, mining altcoin might give you a little profit. Well, most altcoin difficulty is lower compared to Bitcoin. Also, instead of mining by yourself, joining a pool might speed it up. If you intend to mine Altcoin and join a pool.. Choose a pool which will automatically mine profitable altcoin and exchange it into Bitcoin for you.

It's not because of electricity costs that mining Bitcoin using general purpose hardware is a bad idea. It's because of ASICs. A single ASIC is equivalent to an entire warehouse full of computers. If a coin has ASICs developed for it, then these ASICs are competing with your single computer for the same block reward and because of this, your single computer always inevitably loses. Even tiny SHA-256 coins like Betacoin and Terracoin can't really be mined using CPUs or GPUs anymore in any reasonable sense because the existence of a single ASIC mining on the network is enough to outclass hundreds of CPU and GPU miners.

[ranochigo]

Anyway OP, if you're still interested in mining with your computer then you could try mining altcoins and converting these to bitcoins using an altcoin exchange like Cryptsy. There are many altcoins out there which can still be mined using CPUs or GPUs. The only ones which have ASICs built for them are SHA-256 based coins like Bitcoin and Peercoin, and scrypt-based coins like Litecoin and Dogecoin.

Agree. In most country, the electricity cost will never make you profit mining Bitcoin. However, mining altcoin might give you a little profit. Well, most altcoin difficulty is lower compared to Bitcoin. Also, instead of mining by yourself, joining a pool might speed it up. If you intend to mine Altcoin and join a pool.. Choose a pool which will automatically mine profitable altcoin and exchange it into Bitcoin for you.

The reason for the lower difficulty is also the lower price and the lower profitability. If the coin is profitable, ASIC miners would be rushing to mine it for sha256 and scrypt. The main problem with multipool is that they may only exchange your coin at x time per day and if the coin crashes before the time reaches, you're doomed.

[manselr]

Anyway OP, if you're still interested in mining with your computer then you could try mining altcoins and converting these to bitcoins using an altcoin exchange like Cryptsy. There are many altcoins out there which can still be mined using CPUs or GPUs. The only ones which have ASICs built for them are SHA-256 based coins like Bitcoin and Peercoin, and scrypt-based coins like Litecoin and Dogecoin.

Agree. In most country, the electricity cost will never make you profit mining Bitcoin. However, mining altcoin might give you a little profit. Well, most altcoin difficulty is lower compared to Bitcoin. Also, instead of mining by yourself, joining a pool might speed it up. If you intend to mine Altcoin and join a pool.. Choose a pool which will automatically mine profitable altcoin and exchange it into Bitcoin for you.

It's not because of electricity costs that mining Bitcoin using general purpose hardware is a bad idea. It's because of ASICs. A single ASIC is equivalent to an entire warehouse full of computers. If a coin has ASICs developed for it, then these ASICs are competing with your single computer for the same block reward and because of this, your single computer always inevitably loses. Even tiny SHA-256 coins like Betacoin and Terracoin can't really be mined using CPUs or GPUs anymore in any reasonable sense because the existence of a single ASIC mining on the network is enough to outclass hundreds of CPU and GPU miners.

But the electricity cost is always a main factor no matter what. You may have in your power a ton of hashing power, but maybe you live in California or something where rates are sky high, and you never find a return of investment because the cost of electricity is always higher than what you get.
But this is not a problem since there are always people that will benefit elsewhere.

[jonnybravo0311]

Anyway OP, if you're still interested in mining with your computer then you could try mining altcoins and converting these to bitcoins using an altcoin exchange like Cryptsy. There are many altcoins out there which can still be mined using CPUs or GPUs. The only ones which have ASICs built for them are SHA-256 based coins like Bitcoin and Peercoin, and scrypt-based coins like Litecoin and Dogecoin.

Agree. In most country, the electricity cost will never make you profit mining Bitcoin. However, mining altcoin might give you a little profit. Well, most altcoin difficulty is lower compared to Bitcoin. Also, instead of mining by yourself, joining a pool might speed it up. If you intend to mine Altcoin and join a pool.. Choose a pool which will automatically mine profitable altcoin and exchange it into Bitcoin for you.

It's not because of electricity costs that mining Bitcoin using general purpose hardware is a bad idea. It's because of ASICs. A single ASIC is equivalent to an entire warehouse full of computers. If a coin has ASICs developed for it, then these ASICs are competing with your single computer for the same block reward and because of this, your single computer always inevitably loses. Even tiny SHA-256 coins like Betacoin and Terracoin can't really be mined using CPUs or GPUs anymore in any reasonable sense because the existence of a single ASIC mining on the network is enough to outclass hundreds of CPU and GPU miners.

Actually it is indeed about the cost of electricity.  The presence of ASICs drives up the difficulty, but at the end of the day it comes down to the cost of producing X units of a coin.  An ASIC, as you correctly point out is considerably more efficient at hashing than a CPU, GPU or FPGA.  The most efficient ASICs out right now are hashing at between 0.4 and 0.5 Watts per GH/s.  Even more efficient gear is on the horizon (and likely already being tested/mined).

Sure, back 3 and 4 years ago mining Bitcoin with a CPU was indeed a viable option.  Then people figured out that using a GPU was more efficient - you got more bang for your electricity dollar.  Then along came FPGA, which were even better.  Finally came the ASICs, which are even better still.

Why would you use your 450W Radeon R9 295X to mine BTC, getting speeds measured in MH/s, when you could spend that same 450W on two ancient overclocked S1s getting 400GH/s (or newer gear for greater hash speed and less power draw)?  It's all about the cost of that precious fuel (i.e. electricity) powering your devices.  Right now, with the exchange rate of BTC, even relatively new gear struggles to earn you anything above and beyond the cost of operating it.  For example, assuming you've got power costs of $0.10 per kWh, an S5 would only expect to bring in $1.47 a day.  An S3 would only expect to make $0.29 a day.

As you can see, it isn't even worth thinking about firing up that CPU/GPU to mine BTC because all you're going to do is burn electricity for no reward.

[jeannemadrigal2]

Be careful, I have heard stories form people who burn out their computer from mining too much.  I don't think that computers, or at least the consumer computers, were really meant to be run at 100% processor for 24/7.  You can look into minergate, they let you choose how much cpu power to mine with.  I only tried it briefly so I can't say if it makes money, but you might have fun with it.  You might also want to look at grid coin, a really interesting way to mine and contribute at the same time.

[Acidyo]

Buying any type of miner and attempting to mine on your own will prob be unprofitable. If anything, take a look at some Cloud Mining Sites, yea they have fees, but the fees end up being cheaper than the power costs you would pay long term.

[jeannemadrigal2]

Buying any type of miner and attempting to mine on your own will prob be unprofitable. If anything, take a look at some Cloud Mining Sites, yea they have fees, but the fees end up being cheaper than the power costs you would pay long term.

Some of these are ponzis.  Recently BCS took the money and ran away.  There are some things to look for for a scam, here is a good summary: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=878387.msg9697654#msg9697654

So hashnest is the one I like, but there are others.  Just be careful, and make sure you understand what you are getting.  I like hashnest because you can sell back the hash at any time, you are not locked into a contract.  The returns are really good imo, and they have a top reputation in the community.  It is run by bitmain, one of the big makers of asics, so I am pretty sure it is legit.

Have fun, don't get lost in the rabbit hole.

[Amph]

Be careful, I have heard stories form people who burn out their computer from mining too much.  I don't think that computers, or at least the consumer computers, were really meant to be run at 100% processor for 24/7.  You can look into minergate, they let you choose how much cpu power to mine with.  I only tried it briefly so I can't say if it makes money, but you might have fun with it.  You might also want to look at grid coin, a really interesting way to mine and contribute at the same time.

this could happen with a laptop or netbook, because they have a bad air flow, and when the dust accumulate their fan practically stop working, still the cpu will turn off automatically, so the damage will be done to the motherboard or the integrated vga, in most cases

[scarsbergholden]

I would say if you want to mine maybe just an experience to learn more about the bitcoin environment, mining to make money is only for those big multi millon dollar farms, maybe you feel like is a safe way to generate bitcoin i would say try it if your light bill is free or you have a solar plant already to power the miner.

[ranochigo]

Be careful, I have heard stories form people who burn out their computer from mining too much.  I don't think that computers, or at least the consumer computers, were really meant to be run at 100% processor for 24/7.  You can look into minergate, they let you choose how much cpu power to mine with.  I only tried it briefly so I can't say if it makes money, but you might have fun with it.  You might also want to look at grid coin, a really interesting way to mine and contribute at the same time.

this could happen with a laptop or netbook, because they have a bad air flow, and when the dust accumulate their fan practically stop working, still the cpu will turn off automatically, so the damage will be done to the motherboard or the integrated vga, in most cases

Laptop or netbook typically have lower TDP and would automatically throttle back when the temperature is too high, if I'm not wrong. This could happen with a desktop computer too. Some desktop computer would have very bad cooling aka. intel stock cooler.

Buying any type of miner and attempting to mine on your own will prob be unprofitable. If anything, take a look at some Cloud Mining Sites, yea they have fees, but the fees end up being cheaper than the power costs you would pay long term.

That's not fully correct in all the cases. Cloudmining are mostly scam. They include management fees which is included in the fees they would charge. It isn't recommended to cloudmine as you have more risk of losing money with an anonymous company than buying a miner from someone in the forum or reputable manufacturers.

[CryptoTrout]

its generally cheaper to just buy btc

[kuroman]

Greetings and Salutations,

I've been doing quite a bit of reading, and have decided to give bitcoin mining a shot. Primarily as a way to put my computer to work when I'm away, and make me some money. Yes, I am aware that its not the greatest, most efficient way of bitcoin mining, I just dont have the cash to spare on a dedicated rig. Anyway, with all my reading I've gotten a little confused and bamboozled, the only thing I know for sure is that I need mining software, I'm starting with easy miner, and a bitcoin wallet, starting with multibitHD. I'm new to bitcoin, but not computers, and would greatly appreciate some help with starting this process with definite information, and I would prefer a video to a wall of text, if possible.

EDIT: " it was possible to mine with your computer CPU or high speed video processor card. Today that's no longer possible. " - bitcoinmining.com, Sorry answered my own question     

mining bitcoin is a no as you've found out even with dedicated ASIC hardware is not what I can call viable nowadays as bitcoin mining is quickly moving on to centralized mining, but if you have free electricity, what you can mine is alternative currencies with your PC, for example with your CPU you can mine something like Monero, ect

[kiowarory]

Greetings and salutations,

Big thanks to all of you. After making that post I got in contact with a friend who had done some crypto mining in the past, and together we got my PC running a litecoin miner temporarily. Then I had a better idea then started this forum (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1095124.0) and now it's my current pursuit. So once again, thanks for the replies and good luck in all your mining adventures. 

[techgeek]

Buying any type of miner and attempting to mine on your own will prob be unprofitable. If anything, take a look at some Cloud Mining Sites, yea they have fees, but the fees end up being cheaper than the power costs you would pay long term.

Some of these are ponzis.  Recently BCS took the money and ran away.  There are some things to look for for a scam, here is a good summary: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=878387.msg9697654#msg9697654

So hashnest is the one I like, but there are others.  Just be careful, and make sure you understand what you are getting.  I like hashnest because you can sell back the hash at any time, you are not locked into a contract.  The returns are really good imo, and they have a top reputation in the community.  It is run by bitmain, one of the big makers of asics, so I am pretty sure it is legit.

Have fun, don't get lost in the rabbit hole.

I say just avoid the rabbit hole all together and dont bother with it.

Most operators even legit ones go bust at a certain point, so just stick with buying it.

[meganburke]

From my experience bitcoin mining is unprofitable. It needs huge investing cost and maintaining cost to continue of your electricity bill is not cheap.

[Amph]

this could happen with a laptop or netbook, because they have a bad air flow, and when the dust accumulate their fan practically stop working, still the cpu will turn off automatically, so the damage will be done to the motherboard or the integrated vga, in most cases

Laptop or netbook typically have lower TDP and would automatically throttle back when the temperature is too high, if I'm not wrong. This could happen with a desktop computer too. Some desktop computer would have very bad cooling aka. intel stock cooler.

the difference is the air flow usually a desktop computer has a better case thus a better air flow, it is much harder for a cpu to turn off because it go in protection, for example

i experienced plenty of netbook that after two year died because of this