My second ZEC + XMR+ ETH thread builds info links thoughts and photos.

[philipma1957]

ahhhh... ok... now it makes sense, thank you!  So basically, if I want to fit my rig into something like an ATX tower, this Mobo would not really be an option as I would imagine the risers would make it impossible for everything to fit?  Maybe this is another sign to opt for an open air design... like built on a platform as someone else posted in this thread previously.  Seems like it's gonna run at least $200-300 more to get into a large chassis for this. Will have to do some more thinking on that part but I think it's time to pull the trigger on those MSI 470's :-)

Here is an open rig case build

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OfE_QidD75M

I prefer the wire rack but have built various wood, pvc, and metal frames similar to the one in the video. I did it more for fun when I was bored and drunk on the weekends.

that video was pretty good.  and it shows why six card rigs have popularity .

that angle is about 10 bucks in lowes you need two  so 20 bucks  and the wood  screw  is under 8 dollars.

So if you have the right saw to cut the metal it is about 30 bucks to build it.

[rockyforever]

ahhhh... ok... now it makes sense, thank you!  So basically, if I want to fit my rig into something like an ATX tower, this Mobo would not really be an option as I would imagine the risers would make it impossible for everything to fit?  Maybe this is another sign to opt for an open air design... like built on a platform as someone else posted in this thread previously.  Seems like it's gonna run at least $200-300 more to get into a large chassis for this. Will have to do some more thinking on that part but I think it's time to pull the trigger on those MSI 470's :-)

Here is an open rig case build

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OfE_QidD75M

I prefer the wire rack but have built various wood, pvc, and metal frames similar to the one in the video. I did it more for fun when I was bored and drunk on the weekends.

that video was pretty good.  and it shows why six card rigs have popularity .

that angle is about 10 bucks in lowes you need two  so 20 bucks  and the wood  screw  is under 8 dollars.

So if you have the right saw to cut the metal it is about 30 bucks to build it.

Ya, definitely Phil. I usually search the free section of craiglist and have been able to acquire all the materials for free, just have to buy the screws. Even if you're unable too, 30$ is pretty sweet deal but the satisfaction of being a man and building something 

[QuintLeo]

cards
use a piece of wood to mount the board and hang the cards from a shelf
add a box fan or 2  and you can have a  lot of gear in one spot

 Why not just buy one of the wood-shelf type racks instead of having to use a seperate piece of wood (that adds cost)?

 Home Depot, Menards, and Lowes all sell low-cost ones, usually for the same OR LESS than those wire-rack things.

[philipma1957]

cards
use a piece of wood to mount the board and hang the cards from a shelf
add a box fan or 2  and you can have a  lot of gear in one spot

 Why not just buy one of the wood-shelf type racks instead of having to use a seperate piece of wood (that adds cost)?

 Home Depot, Menards, and Lowes all sell low-cost ones, usually for the same OR LESS than those wire-rack things.

wire racks are for bigger builds  say 3 or 4  maybe 5   six card rigs.

they roll easy   this rack can do  many rigs

 http://www.homedepot.com/p/HDX-48-in-W-x-72-in-H-x-18-in-D-Decorative-Wire-Chrome-Finish-Commercial-Shelving-Unit-6T60184872C/100655787


wood is cheap for mounting the mobos

http://www.homedepot.com/p/1-in-x-2-in-x-8-ft-Furring-Strip-Board-160954/100009348

89 for the rack  and 5 pieces of wood for 6 bucks  you are at 95 dollars a bag of zip ties for 8 more

http://www.homedepot.com/p/Commercial-Electric-8-in-Tie-Canister-Assorted-500-Pack-4in-8in-colors-500/203531932 

and it is 103 bucks


then  get a few fans

http://www.homedepot.com/p/Lasko-20-in-3-Speed-Box-Fan-3733/100405665

 say 3  for 48 you are at 151  maybe 160 with tax and you can be doing 18  to 30 gpus


this is a common way to do a dense setup   using maybe 5000 watts if you are doing 30 rx 480's.


A lot has to do with scaling your builds to the space/power/cooling/heat   you have .

My house can do 3kwatts in the summer  due to heat issues.

My house can do 6kwatts in the winter due to over  heating  issues. 

I can supply 10 kwatts in my house  as I have 2x 30 amp 240volt  mining circuits.

I have never done 10 kwatts of mining in my house.

[QuintLeo]

 Why not just buy one of the wood-shelf type racks instead of having to use a seperate piece of wood (that adds cost)?

 Home Depot, Menards, and Lowes all sell low-cost ones, usually for the same OR LESS than those wire-rack things.

wire racks are for bigger builds  say 3 or 4  maybe 5   six card rigs.

they roll easy   this rack can do  many rigs

 http://www.homedepot.com/p/HDX-48-in-W-x-72-in-H-x-18-in-D-Decorative-Wire-Chrome-Finish-Commercial-Shelving-Unit-6T60184872C/100655787


wood is cheap for mounting the mobos

http://www.homedepot.com/p/1-in-x-2-in-x-8-ft-Furring-Strip-Board-160954/100009348

89 for the rack  and 5 pieces of wood for 6 bucks  you are at 95 dollars a bag of zip ties for 8 more

http://www.homedepot.com/p/Commercial-Electric-8-in-Tie-Canister-Assorted-500-Pack-4in-8in-colors-500/203531932 

and it is 103 bucks

 I paid $49 or something like that for a 5-shelf "Muscle Rack" wood-shelf unit from Home Depot a couple months back.
 It's rated to handle MORE load than any wire rack I've seen short of high-end commercial EXPEN$$IVE stuff.

 It's "only" 36" wide not 48" but less $$ on a per-unit basis - should be able to handle 2 6-card rigs per shelf with enough space between the cards for decent cooling.


 I've seen the 4-shelf varients on sale regularly for around $30.

[ps_jb]

 I paid $49 or something like that for a 5-shelf "Muscle Rack" wood-shelf unit from Home Depot a couple months back.

Plus you alway can buy a Home Depot gift card with 10-14% discount

[philipma1957]

 I paid $49 or something like that for a 5-shelf "Muscle Rack" wood-shelf unit from Home Depot a couple months back.

Plus you alway can buy a Home Depot gift card with 10-14% discount

yes and if you are a veteran you can get a 10% discount.

Nothing wrong  with wood rack   or muscle  racks

http://www.homedepot.com/b/N-5yc1vZccym/Ntt-muscle%20rack?NCNI-5


they don't have wheels  which depending on your builds may or not matter.

[xleejohnx]

lowes you can get 6 1x1x36 wood sticks for 10-12$ and make a nice 6 card rig

[HerbPean]

Hey Phil,

Thanks for this thread. I might mine with some GPU at home this winter

Question 1, is worth to pay more for a 470 vs 480 model and what about the 4G vs 8G ram ?

Thanks !

Herb

Hey Phil, I think you missed my post

Thanks ! 

[rockyforever]

lowes you can get 6 1x1x36 wood sticks for 10-12$ and make a nice 6 card rig

I built of those but it was a bit unstable. The weight of the psu and cards made it work but otherwise, seemed a bit fragile and I was afraid if I moved it around too much, it would fall apart. But they're definitely cheap and fun to build.

[rockyforever]

Hey Phil,

Thanks for this thread. I might mine with some GPU at home this winter

Question 1, is worth to pay more for a 470 vs 480 model and what about the 4G vs 8G ram ?

Thanks !

Herb

Hey Phil, I think you missed my post

Thanks ! 

I am not Phil but from my personal experience, I prefer the 470. The 480 when tweaking or anything, they're very unstable and inconsistent with hashrates. The 470 was easy to configure and stayed stable. I have both 8gb and 4bg, I found no difference in hashrate but resale value would be higher for 8gb but than again, 4gb is cheaper.

[xleejohnx]

I built of those but it was a bit unstable. The weight of the psu and cards made it work but otherwise, seemed a bit fragile and I was afraid if I moved it around too much, it would fall apart. But they're definitely cheap and fun to build.

i paid a little more for the 1x2x36 pieces in the picture to get a more stability.
the first one i used was fragile but it was dirt cheap..
it was easy and fun to build.

[philipma1957]

Hey Phil,

Thanks for this thread. I might mine with some GPU at home this winter

Question 1, is worth to pay more for a 470 vs 480 model and what about the 4G vs 8G ram ?

Thanks !

Herb

Hey Phil, I think you missed my post

Thanks !  

I am not Phil but from my personal experience, I prefer the 470. The 480 when tweaking or anything, they're very unstable and inconsistent with hashrates. The 470 was easy to configure and stayed stable. I have both 8gb and 4bg, I found no difference in hashrate but resale value would be higher for 8gb but than again, 4gb is cheaper.

yeah I agree with you rocky

@ Herb

 I know you are in Canada   but  this is a good card cheap price in the USA

and it is short length

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01JM2DF2G/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o03_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I get 21.9 mh and I like that it is a shorter card.

It suits some of my case builds.

It would be very good for a six card wood build

[HerbPean]

Hey Phil,

Thanks for this thread. I might mine with some GPU at home this winter

Question 1, is worth to pay more for a 470 vs 480 model and what about the 4G vs 8G ram ?

Thanks !

Herb

Hey Phil, I think you missed my post

Thanks !  

I am not Phil but from my personal experience, I prefer the 470. The 480 when tweaking or anything, they're very unstable and inconsistent with hashrates. The 470 was easy to configure and stayed stable. I have both 8gb and 4bg, I found no difference in hashrate but resale value would be higher for 8gb but than again, 4gb is cheaper.

yeah I agree with you rocky

@ Herb

 I know you are in Canada   but  this is a good card cheap price in the USA

and it is short length

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01JM2DF2G/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o03_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I get 21.9 mh and I like that it is a shorter card.

It suits some of my case builds.

It would be very good for a six card wood build

Thanks guys ! appreciated  

EDIT: I need to find a deal like that in Canada.

[GabryRox]

Really cool how you guys are able to build your own platforms for these rigs. It just wouldn't be worth it for me as I don't have that natural aptitude. It would take me so long to even try to build something like that it's just more worthwhile for me to purchase something outright, but I admire that skill-set... just something I've never had.

I finally pulled the trigger on my first 2 GPU's... went with the MSI RX 470 4GB at $200 each.  Actually ended up getting them from Amazon as they had the same price as NewEgg but I have Prime so I will get them quicker through Amazon.

I'm now really leaning towards an open build on 1 of the sub-$100 ASRock Mobo's. What I am grappling with now is whether to go LGA1150 or 1151, socket-wise.  I'm assuming that both RAM and PSU will be relatively similar in cost & performance no matter which I go with (correct me if I'm wrong), so it's really down to which Intel processor I want to go with... between the 5820K & 6800K... (price difference for me is only $21)

I have looked at a few benchmarking sites and there doesn't seem to be a dramatic difference in overall performance.  Wondering if anyone here has experience with either.  I know a lot of people build with the cheapest possible CPU, but since I will be mining a lot of XMR with this rig, my impression is that a higher-end chip should add a decent amount (maybe 500-700) to my hash-rate. Trying to figure out if there would be any real advantage hash-wise to getting the 6800 over the 5820.

[vapourminer]

question for you folks

i see lots of 470s vs 480, also 380s vs 390s here and there.

now my 2 390s do 30 mhs so 60 mhs on eth. 3 380 at 20 mhs will also do 60 mhs.

so why build with lesser cards when you can use less cards for same hash rate. plus go to 6 cards like 390s at say 180 mhz vs 6 cards, like 380s, for 120 mhs. thats an extra 70 mhz per rig. so less power wasted on mobos which would be what 40-50 watts? EDIT: not to mention more mobos, cpu, memory, drives.

used 390s vs 380s as i have 2 390s and 1 380 so know their rates.

[GabryRox]

question for you folks

i see lots of 470s vs 480, also 380s vs 390s here and there.

now my 2 390s do 30 mhs so 60 mhs on eth. 3 380 at 20 mhs will also do 60 mhs.

so why build with lesser cards when you can use less cards for same hash rate. plus go to 6 cards like 390s at say 180 mhz vs 6 cards, like 380s, for 120 mhs. thats an extra 70 mhz per rig. so less power wasted on mobos which would be what 40-50 watts?

used 390s vs 380s as i have 2 390s and 1 380 so know their rates.

So, I get what you're saying about maximizing profit-per-rig. Indeed, if you are able to afford them, rigs with 4-6 cards in general should be more profitable than say 2 or 3 2-cards rigs because for every rig you build, you have a bunch of fixed costs, such as MoBo, PSU, RAM, casing, etc.

Also, your further argument makes a ton of sense as well, at least on the surface. If 390's really do get 50% more hash rate than 380's, and their total cost (including power draw) is less than 50% more than a 380, then certainly your best ROI (all else being equal) would be to load your rig with 390's vs 380's.

I have not researched any of the 300-series cards so can't say much about the other factors, but speaking for the 480 vs 470 issue, it does not seem to be nearly as significant difference in HR as you describe for the 300's.  best I have been able to tell is that a decent average for a 470 is mid 20's untweaked, and maybe pushing 30-ish if tweaked.  But, the 480's only seem to get nominally higher hash rates... maybe a couple Mh and that's it (from what I have read).  AND... here's the other thing to consider... at least for the 400's, the 480's run around $50 higher cost per unit vs 470's.  BUT, in addition, they also pull 150W vs 110W on the 470.  So, they cost 20% more initially and cost 36% more to run... meaning, they would really have to be somewhere in the neighborhood of providing 25-30% more effective HR vs a 470 to make any sense financially, and I don't think they are more than +10% at this point... especially given the fact that the 470s seems to be a lot easier to overclock than the 480s.  And, this is not even considering that you would also need to get a larger PSU to support 6x150 (900) vs 6x110 (660), which would further reduce ROI.

Now, if the 480's were providing the 50% bump over 470s as in your 300 example, it would of course be a much difference story because providing mid-to-high 30's HR would indeed give you a better ROI, even accounting for the extra initial costs and electricity.

[xleejohnx]

question for you folks

i see lots of 470s vs 480, also 380s vs 390s here and there.

now my 2 390s do 30 mhs so 60 mhs on eth. 3 380 at 20 mhs will also do 60 mhs.

so why build with lesser cards when you can use less cards for same hash rate. plus go to 6 cards like 390s at say 180 mhz vs 6 cards, like 380s, for 120 mhs. thats an extra 70 mhz per rig. so less power wasted on mobos which would be what 40-50 watts?

used 390s vs 380s as i have 2 390s and 1 380 so know their rates.

I'm doing 23-25 mhs with a 470 at 120 watts of power so let's just say 20 for good numbers
So that's 6watts per mhs
390 is doing 30 mhs at 300 watts of power
That's 10 watts per mhs
I'm paying .13 cents in power per kilowatt
1800 watts in 6 390s 170$ for 180mhs 218$ profit after power bill
720 watts in 6 470s 70$ for 120mhs 210$ profit after power bill
I can run only two 390 rigs in my house so that's 440$ profit at 3600 watts of total power
I can run 5 470 rigs in my house making 1275$ Profit at 3600 watts of total power
Then if you calculate the re-sale of the 470s vs the 390s I come out ahead
I can sale 470s close to 150$ used

[vapourminer]

question for you folks

i see lots of 470s vs 480, also 380s vs 390s here and there.
[..]
used 390s vs 380s as i have 2 390s and 1 380 so know their rates.

I'm doing 23-25 mhs with a 470 at 120 watts of power so let's just say 20 for good numbers
So that's 6watts per mhs
390 is doing 30 mhs at 300 watts of power
That's 10 watts per mhs
I'm paying .13 cents in power per kilowatt
1800 watts in 6 390s 170$ for 180mhs 218$ profit after power bill
720 watts in 6 470s 70$ for 120mhs 210$ profit after power bill
I can run only two 390 rigs in my house so that's 440$ profit at 3600 watts of total power
I can run 5 470 rigs in my house making 1275$ Profit at 3600 watts of total power
Then if you calculate the re-sale of the 470s vs the 390s I come out ahead
I can sale 470s close to 150$ used

no doubt on power efficiency with 3xx vs 4xx. im comparing same generation tech however. 390 vs 380/370s and 480s vs 470/460s.

gabryrocks, i had seen some 480 vs 470 numbers and they were in line with what you said. wasnt sure however if the 480s had been tweaked with miner software since i had seen those numbers. looks like the answer is no.

[philipma1957]

if you can get a rx 470 or 480 for 200 usd it is  a good deal.

4gb for now seems to be the better choice but 8gb could be better as the dag grows.

I am pretty much heat capped for now.

I have 1 more card coming on monday.  It  will be maxed in my garage until weather drops in temps.

My total will be

 4+4+3+2+2+2+2+2+2 = 23 gpus and 9 rigs

I have a 10th rig it is a linux build  It runs 11 compac sticks on cgminers.

I could fit 1 more card in it.  That would give me 24 gpus and 10 rigs it would also allow me to learn linux better.

I am pretty much capped now. 

But I will tweak and I may sell a small turn key build in the market place.