gtx 1060 3GB vs gtx 1060 6GB

[Arek]

Hi,
I have few rigs running RX470 cards and now I'm looking to build rig based on nvidia cards. My question is should I go with gtx 1060 3GB or 6GB version?
The prices difference is 19% betweeen 3GB and 6GB and looking at mining hash rate the difference is much smaller, but what about coins that use a lot of memory like ethereum.
Although eth is suppose to go POS in near future there are other coins based on same algo. At this point memory usage while mining eth is around 2.2GB and question is how much memory can be allocated on 3GB version?

[TheRider]

Bump.

Would like to hear the community's thoughts on this questions.
Thanks in advance.

[Charloz24]

I have not tested it, but my searching about that was that there is no difference.

[dbc23]

6gb will have a slightly better resale market, and is DAG size resistant if you were to use it for ETH for some ungodly reason.  Otherwise they're almost identical.

[Arek]

I got 1 3gb and few 6gb versions and there are some differences. When mining ethash they mine almost the same but for equihash I get 300 on 6GB vs 275 on 3GB with same clocks and tdp, on skein its 316 vs 280 and on lbry 3GB is also around 10% slower. I didn't configure them for max performance but more for optimal power to performance.

[pacers101]

I have a question also, is the single fan 1060 adequate or will it get too hot. obviously 2 fan is ideal. I'm actually going to put this in a computer, and also mine,  not for a rig which I would go with 2 fan but size of that card is too big for this computer.

[Vann]

With 3GB you're not going to be able to dual ETH effectively. Go with the 6GB, it's a better card and will have better future resale value too.

[Seyana]

bump

Im going to use 1060 3gb.
Difference of 3gb and 6gb is only efficiency of ETH?

I want to know situation just NOW.

[flip4flop]

They are the same only real difference is resale value of the 6gb is higher and can mine ETH longer, but you shouldnt be mining ETH with NVIDIA cards anyway.

[sic57005]

I prefer 3Gb versions cause they are cheaper and have smaller ROI time. The hashrate difference is about 5-10% on Equihash, and I'm not sure mining Ethereum on Nvidia is good idea at all.

[mediaboy]

Anyone care to state why Ethereum on Nvidia is such a bad idea? Several have parroted that sentiment on this thread but no reasons as to why.  I see lots of folks mining ethash coins on Nvidia. 

[block2chain]

@mediaboy I'm with you, what is it that makes NVIDIA not good for mining ETH? I'm getting 31Mhs stable in a windows 10 rig with 5 EVGA gtx 1070 OC and on unbuntu I have 8 EVGA gtx 1070 OCs pulling 29.9-30.2 Mhs, Linix is slower b/c of the drivers as far as I can figure it out...

I don't figure what the beef is...

I have 10 RX 580s AUSU-dual and Gigabyte- Aurorus with mod BIOS running at 28-29Mhs
These cards run way hotter, use more wattage and are less stable

They are better on the dual coin of decred by a factor of 2.. is that the issue?

[timbereagle]

I got many 6gb and 3gb of Nvidia.

For Zcash performance difference is around %3-4
For ETH preformance difference is around %5 if same memory is used. But usually 6gb comes with Samsung and 3 gb comes with Hynix therefore %15 performance difference on ETH.


If I would buy new, I would buy 6gb because of resale value. 

[shibob]

I got many 6gb and 3gb of Nvidia.

For Zcash performance difference is around %3-4
For ETH preformance difference is around %5 if same memory is used. But usually 6gb comes with Samsung and 3 gb comes with Hynix therefore %15 performance difference on ETH.


If I would buy new, I would buy 6gb because of resale value. 

Agree with you. I just bought some MSI 1060 3Gb (Samsung memory) and I totally satisfied.
25.5 Mh/s for ETH, 292 sol/s for ZEC, both tested with power limit 82%.

[klintistwood]

I have only 3Gb model and performance is really fine. Some of them are single fan but by using a power limit, temperature remains comfortably below 55°C, some are around 45°.

[Earl_Vadim]

version:   zm 0.5.8    ZEC

0   GeForce GTX 1060 6GB   57   351.39   2.82   124.80   789 / 5   144
1   GeForce GTX 1060 3GB   51   328.03   2.77   118.40   704 / 2   125
2   GeForce GTX 1060 3GB   46   329.00   2.86   114.87   731 / 3   188
3   GeForce GTX 1060 3GB   54   328.61   2.68   122.50   730 / 4   172
Total   -                                         1337.03   2.78   480.58   2954 / 14   1570

For Dagger-Hashimoto  HERE https://investoon.com/tools/dag_size 

[fanatic26]

With 3GB you're not going to be able to dual ETH effectively. Go with the 6GB, it's a better card and will have better future resale value too.

you shouldnt be mining ETH with this anyway

[giveen1]

My argument with why I was going with the 3GB 1060's was that the ETH code is already in testing for PoS. Its estimated that by Nov 2018, the DAG size will be 3GB+ and these cards would no longer work by then. My opinion (and thats all it is), is that PoS will be will be out by then and it won't matter.

Either way, I'm doing NeoScrypt.

[bigjee]

My argument with why I was going with the 3GB 1060's was that the ETH code is already in testing for PoS. Its estimated that by Nov 2018, the DAG size will be 3GB+ and these cards would no longer work by then. My opinion (and thats all it is), is that PoS will be will be out by then and it won't matter.

Either way, I'm doing NeoScrypt.

There will be a hybrid phase where POS will verify POW from miners (orphan blocks etc).
Its not like POW will stop as soon as POS kicks in. But I do agree 1060s are better served on other algos than ethash.

[klintistwood]

My argument with why I was going with the 3GB 1060's was that the ETH code is already in testing for PoS. Its estimated that by Nov 2018, the DAG size will be 3GB+ and these cards would no longer work by then. My opinion (and thats all it is), is that PoS will be will be out by then and it won't matter.

Either way, I'm doing NeoScrypt.

There will be a hybrid phase where POS will verify POW from miners (orphan blocks etc).
Its not like POW will stop as soon as POS kicks in. But I do agree 1060s are better served on other algos than ethash.

if you look purely at current profit, ETH is still among the most profitable coins for this type of card. It's usually a struggle between ETH, PIRL and ZCL. Today it's ETH. GTX 1060 may be less interesting for ETH than a RX type of card but it's still a good performer. With my rig today, PIRL comes first with 41.94$ then comes ETH with 41.32$, then ELLA above 39$ and then all other coins around 33$ and below. I know the theory says that ETH is not the best coin to mine but in my case it's best one of the best for a while. By the way, I simply use whattomine.com.