Free Amazon Instance

[cntrlsquare]

Someone had pointed out that you can get a free year of Amazon cloud computing - which could be used to set up a miner.  Does anyone have a good step by step guide on how I would go about setting that up?

Thanks!

[genpayne]

If you know you're way round a linux terminal then you should be able to work it out yourself easy enough.
If you don't then I doubt its worth the time it would take you to sort it out.

I have not tried and tested this on a free instance but I expect -

Code:

echo >> $HOME/.bash_profile
echo 'export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=$LD_LIBRARY_PATH:$HOME/tools/lib' >> $HOME/.bash_profile
echo 'export PATH=$PATH:$HOME/tools/bin' >> $HOME/.bash_profile
export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=$LD_LIBRARY_PATH:$HOME/tools/lib
export PATH=$PATH:$HOME/tools/bin
cpus=$(cat /proc/cpuinfo | grep ^processor | wc -l)

# initial package config
sudo yum -y groupinstall "Development Tools"
sudo yum -y install git libcurl-devel python-devel screen rsync

# install yasm
git clone git://github.com/yasm/yasm.git
cd yasm
./autogen.sh
./configure --prefix=$HOME/tools 
make -j $cpus
make install
cd -

# install and start cpuminer
git clone https://github.com/jgarzik/cpuminer.git
cd cpuminer
./autogen.sh
./configure
make -j $cpus
screen -d -m ./minerd --threads $cpus --algo sse2_64 --url http://deepbit.net:8332/ --userpass YOUR_EMAIL:YOUR_PASSWORD

would work on a rpm based instance.

[DivineOmega]

I believe the free Amazon instance is very low power and certainly doesn't come with a GPU of any significant power that you would actually need for mining.

[genpayne]

You Don't NEED a GPU. And it doesn't have one.
But it is pretty low power yes, but at the end of the day its free.

So as long as you are happy putting in the time investment then it is free mining.

As said, if you haven't any experience with ssh / Linux then that amount of time would be significant. Hence probably not worth it.

[boosblock]

thanks

[Chrithu]

Hehe, I know linux. I am interested in learning how to get that free year of amazon cloud computing.

[DivineOmega]

You Don't NEED a GPU. And it doesn't have one.
But it is pretty low power yes, but at the end of the day its free.

So as long as you are happy putting in the time investment then it is free mining.

As said, if you haven't any experience with ssh / Linux then that amount of time would be significant. Hence probably not worth it.

Okay, my apologies. You do not need a GPU, but CPU mining is very limited in terms of the hash rate you can achieve.

[CRkfx1]

Amazon does offer a GPU instance, not free by any means.  I did some rough calculations awhile back, LTCwould need to be trading around $25 to show a profit, and BTC would need to be around $500.  (this was about a year ago, I'm sure things have changed since)

I use the AWS EC2 platform for all my clients' websites, and yes, it is free for super low traffic/low power instances.  I tell new clients to create their own account, then give me access via the IAM service.  Works very nicely, and I highly recommend it.

[cntrlsquare]

Thanks all,

I bought a book on Linux and will dig in here.

[genpayne]

I had to guide a friend through setting up EC2 yesterday as he has a $500 voucher. Can confirm the following does work. cpuminer is getwork based, installing stratum proxy is recommended.
 This also has my miner login details in. Don't change them and it is me not you who benefits!
Once you have an AWS account set up and working go.
I can also set this up for you for BTC0.1 (You will need to set up an EC2 account and send me the .pem, your miner worker username and password, and the machine address). It may take months for the free miner to make you a return on that!


EC2 -> Launch Instance -> Ubuntu Server 12.10 ->T1.Micro (For Free) -> Continue -> Continue -> Continue ->
[Up to you if you want to give it a name ] -> Continue ->Create a new Key Pair and download it
-> Continue -> Default should do, if you go custom make sure to add a rule for ssh -> Launch

If you want to waste you're money the best instance for mining is CG1 (use Ubuntu Server 12.10 for Cluster Instances)
But you will need to set up the GPU drivers and a GPU miner. The best which you could still follow this is CC2 (Again Cluster OS). IT WILL COST MORE THAN YOU EARN! Side note, CC2 is a fairly cheap way of generating a vanity address (See my sig). You can ususally get a 6 character one in an hour if you're fast setting it up.

Give it a couple minutes to boot then you need to ssh in. Click the instance and under EC2... it will say something like
ec2-54-224-182-88.compute-1.amazonaws.com
If you can be assed to google it set up an elastic IP. If not -
If your on linux open a terminal and assuming you're key is saved in downloads and called myawskey

Code:

cd ~/Downloads/
chmod 400 myawskey.pem
ssh -i myawskey.pem ubuntu@ec2-54-224-182-88.compute-1.amazonaws.com

On windows you will need an ssh client like putty. Google it.

Once connected to the server these into the terminal one by one (waiting for each to complete before the next)

Code:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade

echo >> $HOME/.bash_profile
echo 'export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=$LD_LIBRARY_PATH:$HOME/tools/lib' >> $HOME/.bash_profile
echo 'export PATH=$PATH:$HOME/tools/bin' >> $HOME/.bash_profile
export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=$LD_LIBRARY_PATH:$HOME/tools/lib
export PATH=$PATH:$HOME/tools/bin
cpus=$(cat /proc/cpuinfo | grep ^processor | wc -l)

sudo apt-get install build-essential libcurl4-gnutls-dev python-dev libjansson-dev autoconf automake git libtool

git clone git://github.com/yasm/yasm.git
cd yasm
./autogen.sh
./configure --prefix=$HOME/tools 
make -j $cpus
make install
cd ~

git clone https://github.com/jgarzik/cpuminer.git
cd cpuminer
./autogen.sh
./configure
make -j $cpus
screen -d -m ./minerd --threads $cpus --algo sse2_64 --url http://api.bitcoin.cz:8332 --userpass hectorgrebbell.bitcointalk:password

To see what its doing type
screen -r
To close the connection but leave it running

Code:

[If the screen is showing] Hold Ctrl, press A then D
exit

[scurvy]

That's a cool tactic. Good idea!

[lazerpenguin]

Do you think they will try and stop this sort of thing, or is this completely fine under their terms of service? Would suck to put in the time and effort just to have them block it next week.

[ensophic]

Here's a good detailed outline of how to do it: http://alexcollins.org/blog/2013/bitcoin-mining-amazon-ec2-gpu-hpc

[genpayne]

The free instances are pretty pathetic. Its not really worth the effort of setting it up which means very few people will do it.

Paid instance, you're going to lost money.

So blocking it would be a pain in the ass for amazon to set up for little gain.

[xavier83]

isn't mining over cpu ineffiecient?

[genpayne]

Yes. Inefficient. As in less efficient than something else.
The crucial point is that generally it costs more in electricity than you will make in bitcoins.

But here it is not you paying for the electricity. It is Amazon! They let you have a tiny computer in the cloud on them!

You are going to make absolutely minute amounts of bitcoins from it. Probably not worth the effort of setting it up even after its been running a year!
The question was asked, I answered it.
*Edit* I worked it out. Its so slow that you'd be lucky to get a couple of pool shares a day. Really not worth the effort*

Really the only time when CPU mining can be of any use is when you have a lot of machines.
Usually that means botnet, but there are also the fair share of school admins etc that leave the school network mining away over night.

Not technically illegal unless their contracts prohibit using the machines for self gain, but I doubt you would keep your job if the boss found out!

[cntrlsquare]

thanks all!

[Mdk754]

Not technically illegal unless their contracts prohibit using the machines for self gain, but I doubt you would keep your job if the boss found out!

Yeah i can't see too many bosses being happy with that one. Night time power draw could get nuts

[bitwaster]

Yes. Inefficient. As in less efficient than something else.
The crucial point is that generally it costs more in electricity than you will make in bitcoins.

But here it is not you paying for the electricity. It is Amazon! They let you have a tiny computer in the cloud on them!

You are going to make absolutely minute amounts of bitcoins from it. Probably not worth the effort of setting it up even after its been running a year!
The question was asked, I answered it.
*Edit* I worked it out. Its so slow that you'd be lucky to get a couple of pool shares a day. Really not worth the effort*

Really the only time when CPU mining can be of any use is when you have a lot of machines.
Usually that means botnet, but there are also the fair share of school admins etc that leave the school network mining away over night.

Not technically illegal unless their contracts prohibit using the machines for self gain, but I doubt you would keep your job if the boss found out!

the real question is the rate at which you can mine vs the instance cost. have you considered spot pricing?

[ranlo]

Amazon does offer a GPU instance, not free by any means.  I did some rough calculations awhile back, LTCwould need to be trading around $25 to show a profit, and BTC would need to be around $500.  (this was about a year ago, I'm sure things have changed since)

I use the AWS EC2 platform for all my clients' websites, and yes, it is free for super low traffic/low power instances.  I tell new clients to create their own account, then give me access via the IAM service.  Works very nicely, and I highly recommend it.

Does it work the same as a VPS? Like just install an OS and run things like normally? I've been thinking about moving to it for hosting but haven't yet as I don't really know enough about it, :p.