My portable Raspberry Pi setup for mining

[Abiky]

I have managed to make portable Raspberry Pi 3 mining setup that runs on an external battery power bank of 10,000mAh and uses an Android tablet as its screen, mouse, and keyboard.



This setup will be mainly for on the go mining, but I can also use it for staking coins if I wish. Now, all I need is a mobile hotspot and I will be complete. Also, I was thinking of changing the external power bank to a solar one (which I could buy at ebay)

What do you think about it? 

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[gt_addict]

Can you elaborate on what it is you do with it? you mine bitcoins with it?

[Abiky]

Can you elaborate on what it is you do with it? you mine bitcoins with it?

At the moment, I mine a very minimal amount of Bitcoin with it using a block erupter that I've borrowed running at 330MH/s. It is not much but I only use it for fun and learning. The main use will be for staking coins while I get a decent miner enough to be able to use it alongside my RPi and mine on the go. There are several things on my list such as the following:

1. External Solar Power Bank
2. Mobile 4G LTE Hotspot
3. Anker 7 port USB Hub
4. x4 usb powered fans
5. Travel Bag

If I go towards the solar power bank, then it will be a very energy efficient portable mining setup. 

[gt_addict]

So this is just for the fun of it and because it's possible?

[Abiky]

So this is just for the fun of it and because it's possible?

At the moment, yes it is only for fun. But I plan to get serious as I complete my portable mining setup with at least an Antminer S5 and the other parts I've listed above. In the meantime, it is being used to stake coins on the go wherever there is a WIFI access point around. It is so small and portable that I can carry it anytime, anywhere.

But the most interesting thing here, is that I can use my Android tablet (and also any other devices such as a smartphone) as a screen, mouse and keyboard to control the Raspberry Pi from within it and its mining gear wherever I go. 

[alh]

If/When you get "serious" (your word), portability will not be in your vocabulary. There is no serious mining hardware that is the least bit portable. The power consumption is just way too high.

While I am a big fan of Raspberry Pi hardware, in terms of Bitcoin mining, it's only useful as a controller or monitor of much larger, and not portable, hardware.

[dx5]

Mining Bitcoin with that, might as well mine with your watch. But I understand it's for fun. I saw something with a solar panel for one of those Pos coins.

Found it, here it goes. https://twitter.com/AvdiuSazan/status/756816182632734720

[NorrisK]

What is the reason for wanting a portable setup? Wouldn't you want minimal disruptions in your mining and or staking time? Or am I missing something here?

It wouldn't be a problem to leave the raspberry pi at home running while you are away right? This would be much more stable in terms of staking and mining time.

You can easily make a remote desktop or something to restart the mining if something is wrong.

[Abiky]

What is the reason for wanting a portable setup? Wouldn't you want minimal disruptions in your mining and or staking time? Or am I missing something here?

It wouldn't be a problem to leave the raspberry pi at home running while you are away right? This would be much more stable in terms of staking and mining time.

You can easily make a remote desktop or something to restart the mining if something is wrong.

Yeah I could set up a remote desktop for that, but I wanted to setup a portable Raspberry Pi setup just for fun & learning about Bitcoin mining and coin staking.

Mining Bitcoin with that, might as well mine with your watch. But I understand it's for fun. I saw something with a solar panel for one of those Pos coins.

Found it, here it goes. https://twitter.com/AvdiuSazan/status/756816182632734720

Exactly. It is only for fun nothing serious to make profit out of it. When I'll get really serious, I will set it up at home plus 2 more additional Raspberry Pis to serve up as full nodes.

The solar NXT mining rig definitely looks awesome. 

If/When you get "serious" (your word), portability will not be in your vocabulary. There is no serious mining hardware that is the least bit portable. The power consumption is just way too high.

While I am a big fan of Raspberry Pi hardware, in terms of Bitcoin mining, it's only useful as a controller or monitor of much larger, and not portable, hardware.

Of course. While miners connected to the Raspberry Pi will have a high power consumption, this one would be best for coin staking which takes very minimal power usage.

[NorrisK]

What is the reason for wanting a portable setup? Wouldn't you want minimal disruptions in your mining and or staking time? Or am I missing something here?

It wouldn't be a problem to leave the raspberry pi at home running while you are away right? This would be much more stable in terms of staking and mining time.

You can easily make a remote desktop or something to restart the mining if something is wrong.

Yeah I could set up a remote desktop for that, but I wanted to setup a portable Raspberry Pi setup just for fun & learning about Bitcoin mining and coin staking.

That makes sense then. For learning and fun I think you created a very nice setup!

Something like this could also be very cool to show at bitcoin related events to explain people how mining or staking works. I can see a table at a conference where you put down this little portable miner.

 

[Abiky]

That makes sense then. For learning and fun I think you created a very nice setup!

Something like this could also be very cool to show at bitcoin related events to explain people how mining or staking works. I can see a table at a conference where you put down this little portable miner.

 

That's right! The main purpose for this would be to attract people into learning more about what Bitcoin is, how it works, etc. By enabling them to see a very small computing setup which you can take anywhere (with a couple of block erupters in it), makes it a great way to help spread the awareness of Bitcoin and blockchain technology.   

[jackg]

Unless you get a really expensive solar panel or there's some new technology. You won't ROI on this.
However, if you did do it just for fun and were able to power a U3 or something with the solar panel as well or get a new BF 16nm asic configuration that runs on a low amount of power ten this will deinitely quickly reach it's ROI.
And hobbyistic mining is still quite fun.

(Just a note: connecting to a hotspot at a place like a hotel or cafe may be against their AUP and may be too slow, however, SIM cards are quite cheap for unlimited data, like $20 a month maximum).

I'm curious to know why you didn't just install ubuntu.com on the tablet, however, the rasperry pi is definitley more powerful and versitile.

[Abiky]

Unless you get a really expensive solar panel or there's some new technology. You won't ROI on this.
However, if you did do it just for fun and were able to power a U3 or something with the solar panel as well or get a new BF 16nm asic configuration that runs on a low amount of power ten this will deinitely quickly reach it's ROI.
And hobbyistic mining is still quite fun.

(Just a note: connecting to a hotspot at a place like a hotel or cafe may be against their AUP and may be too slow, however, SIM cards are quite cheap for unlimited data, like $20 a month maximum).

I'm curious to know why you didn't just install ubuntu.com on the tablet, however, the rasperry pi is definitley more powerful and versitile.

Thanks for your reply. I'm planning to get unlimited data for $20 a month in order to get internet access for the Pi and be able to experiment with mining and Bitcoin wherever I go. Ubuntu would've been great on my tablet, but it appears that I'm facing some issues trying to get it to run properly on it using Linux Deploy app. Anyways, the Raspberry Pi 3 is much more powerful and in the meantime I will just use it alongside the tablet to separate processes from both the tablet and the Pi (instead of running Ubuntu on the tablet and having the load of the Android OS + the Ubuntu).

I was looking lately into a water powered power bank. Most recently, I saw one that claims to generate electricity from water and salt. Check it out: http://www.myfcpower.com/

[jackg]

Unless you get a really expensive solar panel or there's some new technology. You won't ROI on this.
However, if you did do it just for fun and were able to power a U3 or something with the solar panel as well or get a new BF 16nm asic configuration that runs on a low amount of power ten this will deinitely quickly reach it's ROI.
And hobbyistic mining is still quite fun.

(Just a note: connecting to a hotspot at a place like a hotel or cafe may be against their AUP and may be too slow, however, SIM cards are quite cheap for unlimited data, like $20 a month maximum).

I'm curious to know why you didn't just install ubuntu.com on the tablet, however, the rasperry pi is definitley more powerful and versitile.

Thanks for your reply. I'm planning to get unlimited data for $20 a month in order to get internet access for the Pi and be able to experiment with mining and Bitcoin wherever I go. Ubuntu would've been great on my tablet, but it appears that I'm facing some issues trying to get it to run properly on it using Linux Deploy app. Anyways, the Raspberry Pi 3 is much more powerful and in the meantime I will just use it alongside the tablet to separate processes from both the tablet and the Pi (instead of running Ubuntu on the tablet and having the load of the Android OS + the Ubuntu).

I was looking lately into a water powered power bank. Most recently, I saw one that claims to generate electricity from water and salt. Check it out: http://www.myfcpower.com/

Hmm, what does that produce?
H₂O + NaCl → H₂ + Na₃OCl?
It must be something like that to produce a solution. They are correct that hydrogen gs can be produced and it's probably ignited to produce the charge so that is quite a good idea (Once hydrogen is ignited, it reacts with oxygen in the air and produces water)! Meaning that was is left in the container is an base solution (which is probably harmless).

Let me know if it works if you get one as it looks an interesting and good buy!

On the ubuntu idea, you can easily get into tablets and change the SD card, but it's probably not worth it!

[electronicash]

Is there a way to make this portable set up to be also profitable?

Maybe i can also set mine, not portable though. i still have my raspberry pi b that i can use an old monitor. i was thinking of mining ETH but it requires gpu so maybe just another coin. still if it could mine, i will make use of it.

[Abiky]

Hmm, what does that produce?
H₂O + NaCl → H₂ + Na₃OCl?
It must be something like that to produce a solution. They are correct that hydrogen gs can be produced and it's probably ignited to produce the charge so that is quite a good idea (Once hydrogen is ignited, it reacts with oxygen in the air and produces water)! Meaning that was is left in the container is an base solution (which is probably harmless).

Let me know if it works if you get one as it looks an interesting and good buy!

On the ubuntu idea, you can easily get into tablets and change the SD card, but it's probably not worth it!

Yes. This battery is definitely even cooler than solar ones, making it a very clean form of energy to use on smartphones, tablets and more. Since this one is available for preorder, I might buy one ahead for when it starts shipping I could get a taste of this whole new experience. Imagine the Raspberry Pi 3 + Water and Salt power bank. It will be a very convenient and portable setup!  

[jackg]

Is there a way to make this portable set up to be also profitable?

Maybe i can also set mine, not portable though. i still have my raspberry pi b that i can use an old monitor. i was thinking of mining ETH but it requires gpu so maybe just another coin. still if it could mine, i will make use of it.

The PIs are really versitile so connecting a gou to it shouldn't be too difficult.

Hmm, what does that produce?
H₂O + NaCl → H₂ + Na₃OCl?
It must be something like that to produce a solution. They are correct that hydrogen gs can be produced and it's probably ignited to produce the charge so that is quite a good idea (Once hydrogen is ignited, it reacts with oxygen in the air and produces water)! Meaning that was is left in the container is an base solution (which is probably harmless).

Let me know if it works if you get one as it looks an interesting and good buy!

On the ubuntu idea, you can easily get into tablets and change the SD card, but it's probably not worth it!

Yes. This battery is definitely even cooler than solar ones, making it a very clean form of energy to use on smartphones, tablets and more. Since this one is available for preorder, I might buy one ahead for when it starts shipping I could get a taste of this whole new experience. Imagine the Raspberry Pi 3 + Water and Salt power bank. It will be a very convenient and portable setup! 

The only problem is that you're not warned as to when it's going to run out of power. You could use the battery and charger that in order for it to work but that may shorten the battery life. Maybe having two batteries (one oncharge and one in operation to maximise the battery life).

[Abiky]

The only problem is that you're not warned as to when it's going to run out of power. You could use the battery and charger that in order for it to work but that may shorten the battery life. Maybe having two batteries (one oncharge and one in operation to maximise the battery life).

Yeah that is the only flaw. They should've made sort of like a battery power indicator from within Raspbian so that it is easier to know how much power will be left before the Pi turns off unexpectedly. I have seen linux distros on PC having this feature, but I wonder why Raspbian lacks it since it is based on Debian. Anyways, a good thing of my 10,000mAh power bank is that it has a built in power meter but not all power banks have this feature which is very disappointing.

Now, I'm trying to run geth to build up my own ETC full node. 

[jackg]

The only problem is that you're not warned as to when it's going to run out of power. You could use the battery and charger that in order for it to work but that may shorten the battery life. Maybe having two batteries (one oncharge and one in operation to maximise the battery life).

Yeah that is the only flaw. They should've made sort of like a battery power indicator from within Raspbian so that it is easier to know how much power will be left before the Pi turns off unexpectedly. I have seen linux distros on PC having this feature, but I wonder why Raspbian lacks it since it is based on Debian. Anyways, a good thing of my 10,000mAh power bank is that it has a built in power meter but not all power banks have this feature which is very disappointing.

Now, I'm trying to run geth to build up my own ETC full node. 

It's probably not too good an idea to keep your battery always chargingas it drains the cells of teir power.
The raspberry pi doesn't have that feature in it's operating systems as they don't come with a battery.
It's a shame there isn't an opeating system dedicated to mining either, maybe one should be built for maimising the use of this. (can you not also get a battery monitor from the pi store built in to the raspberry pi os)?

[Abiky]

It's probably not too good an idea to keep your battery always charging as it drains the cells of teir power.
The raspberry pi doesn't have that feature in it's operating systems as they don't come with a battery.
It's a shame there isn't an opeating system dedicated to mining either, maybe one should be built for maimising the use of this. (can you not also get a battery monitor from the pi store built in to the raspberry pi os)?

Yeah. I'm not leaving it charging by the way, but the battery has a built in monitor in which I could see current charge level. Still, it is a feature that should be implemented on future versions of Raspbian, unless there is an app already for that. In the meantime, I have no problem with this as my battery has a monitor, but when I make the switch to the water and salt powered battery then that will be an issue in which I would need to solve.

By the way, the reason that I chose to run an ETC full node on it, it's because I've always been fascinated with smart contracts. It will be very interesting to learn how to make my own dapps on the blockchain with it, and thus be able to use them on either ETH or ETC platforms.