The Experiment: Is it possible to buy a shirt using only mining and free coins?

[CorruptDropbear]

Hey, my name is CorruptDropbear (you can call me Drop if you want). I live in Australia, I like pineapples and gaming, and currently studying Computing and Digital Media at Uni. You can follow me on twitter with @corruptdropbear

So I've been looking at bitcoins for a while now because of their no-location policy (being able to purchase stuff without having the Australian tax). Right now I've had another idea that I'm going to do just for fun, seeing if it's possible to actually make "something out of nothing", and see how long it will take for me to buy a shirt using only bitcoins that I'm pool mined or I won for free. I've got my laptop running at 4100khash/s (not very good, think I'm going to get 0.001BTC a day.), and I'm looking around for other ways to get bitcoins. There's also the problem of the exchange rate which will be either help or hinder me.

So, does anyone think what I'm doing is possible? I know that in the past bitcoins were easy to get, but now it'll be an interesting challenge.

[DrenDran]

Your generation rate is pretty bad.
I mean, not to be rude because it's not your fault, but you will get nowhere fast with that.
However, if you do get a decent rate (at least say, 10Mhash/sec, and even that is quite low) then eventually, yes.
Right now you're looking at a maximum of 3 or 4 cents a day, and after fees are taken off, possibly nothing.

[muyoso]

At that rate you are doing three things:

1)Wasting electricity
2)Shortening the life of your laptop
3)Losing money because of number 1

Bitcoin mining is not for you I am afraid. 

[1.21gigawatts]

you should provide a service, and offer that service with payment in bitcoins

[CorruptDropbear]

According to the site I have 0.00023484 BTC in rewards for around 4-5 hours of mucking around. I do realise that this is not a smart idea in terms of electricity, and I'm using a NVIDIA card (which is only 6 months old) to mine which is apparently the worst thing to mine with. In estimation, I could get around 0.03 a month. So useless.

Is there any other ways of mining?

@1.21gigawatts, that's another idea, although I'm trying to think of a service that I can offer in the first place. Selling TF2 hats, anyone?

[smashitduck]

Hey, my name is CorruptDropbear (you can call me Drop if you want). I live in Australia, I like pineapples and gaming, and currently studying Computing and Digital Media at Uni. You can follow me on twitter with @corruptdropbear

So I've been looking at bitcoins for a while now because of their no-location policy (being able to purchase stuff without having the Australian tax). Right now I've had another idea that I'm going to do just for fun, seeing if it's possible to actually make "something out of nothing", and see how long it will take for me to buy a shirt using only bitcoins that I'm pool mined or I won for free. I've got my laptop running at 4100khash/s (not very good, think I'm going to get 0.001BTC a day.), and I'm looking around for other ways to get bitcoins. There's also the problem of the exchange rate which will be either help or hinder me.

So, does anyone think what I'm doing is possible? I know that in the past bitcoins were easy to get, but now it'll be an interesting challenge.

I'll draw you a picture of shirt.
Someday, I want to see some variation of this question on a test. "If Johnny generates...."

[Gabriel Beal]

If you mined for a month and got .03 and then bitcoin hit $500, you'd be able to buy one of our shirts at SquareWear.  You'd still need .01 for shipping, but if all that happens, I'll just ship it for free.  That's a promise.

[Distribution]

Join Bitcoin Bonus and you'll get .005 BTC for signing up and then BTC in return for referred purchases.

[CorruptDropbear]

Shipping to Australia is as much as the shirt. XD So I'd have to get around 0.06 odd... if bitcoins went up to 500USD = 1BTC, which will only happen if I'm very lucky. 

And thanks for the Bitcoin Bonus link. I'll join that and see if I get anywhere. Hmm, might have to sell TF2 hats or something, maybe? What odd jobs is there to do?

[SomeoneWeird]

Hey, my name is CorruptDropbear (you can call me Drop if you want). I live in Australia, I like pineapples and gaming, and currently studying Computing and Digital Media at Uni. You can follow me on twitter with @corruptdropbear

So I've been looking at bitcoins for a while now because of their no-location policy (being able to purchase stuff without having the Australian tax). Right now I've had another idea that I'm going to do just for fun, seeing if it's possible to actually make "something out of nothing", and see how long it will take for me to buy a shirt using only bitcoins that I'm pool mined or I won for free. I've got my laptop running at 4100khash/s (not very good, think I'm going to get 0.001BTC a day.), and I'm looking around for other ways to get bitcoins. There's also the problem of the exchange rate which will be either help or hinder me.

So, does anyone think what I'm doing is possible? I know that in the past bitcoins were easy to get, but now it'll be an interesting challenge.

You should be getting more than 4mh/s even with a nVidia card, what miner are you using?

[CorruptDropbear]

I'm using the guiminer now, still getting only around 4.2. It's on my current laptop, using a GeForce GT 320M. Adding on the CPU gives me around 10mh/s. So pretty bad. Also the pool I joined is down again. 

[SomeoneWeird]

I'm using the guiminer now, still getting only around 4.2. It's on my current laptop, using a GeForce GT 320M. Adding on the CPU gives me around 10mh/s. So pretty bad. Also the pool I joined is down again. 

I get 25mh/s on my 330m

[CorruptDropbear]

I'm using the guiminer now, still getting only around 4.2. It's on my current laptop, using a GeForce GT 320M. Adding on the CPU gives me around 10mh/s. So pretty bad. Also the pool I joined is down again.  

I get 25mh/s on my 330m

Hmm, really? That is one "version" up, but I don't know why it's so bad in the first place. Bah.

EDIT: On the wiki, it says:
GT 320M (MacBook Air)    6.12
320M (Mac mini 2010)    7.0

I'm using an acer laptop, so I expect it to be slightly lower than that.

[SomeoneWeird]

I'm using the guiminer now, still getting only around 4.2. It's on my current laptop, using a GeForce GT 320M. Adding on the CPU gives me around 10mh/s. So pretty bad. Also the pool I joined is down again.  

I get 25mh/s on my 330m

Hmm, really? That is one "version" up, but I don't know why it's so bad in the first place. Bah.

EDIT: On the wiki, it says:
GT 320M (MacBook Air)    6.12
320M (Mac mini 2010)    7.0

I'm using an acer laptop, so I expect it to be slightly lower than that.

Wow. Bit of a difference. :S

[magixx]

Possible, yes. Feasible no.