Completely new to all this and need a little help

[hooliganism]

So as he title states I'm completely new to mining. I've read a few FAQs and walk throughs about how to get started and what is the best pool to join and all that. I've registered at deepbit and I'm trying to use GUIminer as i can't really figure out how to use the CMD line miners. So here is my problem:

On my laptop (HD5870) this is what happens - I click start mining and it says "Shares 0 accepted 1 Stale/invalid" then after a couple seconds it says "Value error too many values to unpack" and just stays like that. I downloaded and installed OpenCL 2.8 64bit (apparently 2.1 works best for my card? i just couldnt find it) before i started as well. I've been on Google for the past 2 hours almost and really cant find a solution for this.

My desktop (GTX 560 Ti SLi - and i know nVidia isn't preferred for mining im just trying to get it working) is even worse - I hit start mining and it does absolutely nothing.

On my desktop and laptop I've tried making new miners and everything and doing what i can understand but i still have no luck. Does anyone have any ideas?

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[jwzguy]

There is a decent learning curve to mining, and I mean this in the nicest way possible, you're better off not bothering investing that time at this point.

[casascius]

There is a decent learning curve to mining, and I mean this in the nicest way possible, you're better off not bothering investing that time at this point.

+1

Once you spend the time, you'll discover you'll spend 10 cents in electricity for every 1 cent worth of bitcoins you mine.

[Anon136]

Unfortunately you came in a little late for casual mining but i really hope this will not lead to the end of your interest in bitcoin. Post an address here for donations and ill send you a few cents worth of btc to get started with.

[Andynerd]

Unfortunately you came in a little late for casual mining but i really hope this will not lead to the end of your interest in bitcoin. Post an address here for donations and ill send you a few cents worth of btc to get started with.

+1 People like you make this community awesome!

[ThickAsThieves]

Unfortunately you came in a little late for casual mining but i really hope this will not lead to the end of your interest in bitcoin. Post an address here for donations and ill send you a few cents worth of btc to get started with.

Should someone interested in mining learn to use the current mining software ins and outs if they want to get into mining with BFL's upcoming ASIC products? Or will those products be easy to use?

[hooliganism]

Well first of all thanks for all the replies and info, and yes the more I continue to read the more i realize that there is way more to this than i originally thought.

Unfortunately you came in a little late for casual mining but i really hope this will not lead to the end of your interest in bitcoin. Post an address here for donations and ill send you a few cents worth of btc to get started with.

Wow thats pretty cool and very generous of you, it looks like I have stumbled across a great community (sadly thats getting rarer on the internet these days). My address is 15xMw3iZbvCzAPGzg76Nf7RnF5FFjucT9b but I'm just curious as to what I would do with it if you donate? like is there a way for me to make it grow? I'm just really keen on this concept as I'm a student living on campus and everyone knows that age old SOB story lol. So ultimately I'm looking for ways to scrape up what ever I can whenever I can.

[Anon136]

Well first of all thanks for all the replies and info, and yes the more I continue to read the more i realize that there is way more to this than i originally thought.

Unfortunately you came in a little late for casual mining but i really hope this will not lead to the end of your interest in bitcoin. Post an address here for donations and ill send you a few cents worth of btc to get started with.

Wow thats pretty cool and very generous of you, it looks like I have stumbled across a great community (sadly thats getting rarer on the internet these days). My address is 15xMw3iZbvCzAPGzg76Nf7RnF5FFjucT9b but I'm just curious as to what I would do with it if you donate? like is there a way for me to make it grow? I'm just really keen on this concept as I'm a student living on campus and everyone knows that age old SOB story lol. So ultimately I'm looking for ways to scrape up what ever I can whenever I can.

When i first started with bitcoins the bitcoin faucet gave me like $0.10 worth of btc but when i checked up on that $0.10 like a year later it was worth like $8.00 so dont underestimate the power of bitcoins. Alternatively you could gamble with it at http://satoshidice.com/ and see if you have enough luck to turn it into enough money to actually buy something with.

[EngMan]

You could also look at litecoin mining. My GPUs are mostly doing that now while my FPGAs are on BTC. If you need a little help with that, pm me with your OS info (Win 7?) And i could get you started.

I may take  couple of days to respond due to outside issues but don't mind helping some. Sometimes it can be more profitable to mine LTC and then exchange for BTC.

[rpgman1]

So there are alternative forms of mining currency besides bitcoins? I heard of namecoin, but not litecoin.

[nobbynobbynoob]

Welcome, hooliganism. 5 BTM gratuity from me.

The other posters are right, mining is serious business now, with CPU and non-AMD-GPU mining not being worth the trouble, or barely worth it.

[hooliganism]

To Anon and Nobby thank you guys for you generosity, very much appreciated. And to EngMan I'll definitely be messaging you for more info. Thanks for all the help guys