[4+ EH] Slush Pool (slushpool.com); Overt AsicBoost; World First Mining Pool

[RogMiner]

Could someone give me the plain English version of what it is EXACTLY that we are "mining" for ?
I understand we are processing " transactions" but what is it that we find that " solves " a block and finishes it. ?

That is the part of this I dont understand.

People talk about the  " height " of the blockchain, what the hell is that supposed to mean.

I've watch Antonopolis or what ever his name is and he just throws out all these fancy terms that most people dont understand but they
all sit there and nod as he babbles on.

I would like to know what we are looking for ?

Bob

I think you will find a reasonable explanation here http://www.coindesk.com/information/how-bitcoin-mining-works/ . However the short answer is that we are coding a block into a hash (a string of letters and numbers), once we have coded the entire block into a hash the pool gets a reward and we get a share of that reward. A block is a list of bitcoin transactions over a period of time.

So in a sense we are not looking for anything (as we are just coding); but you could say we are looking for unsolved blocks and as these unsolved blocks represent 25 bitcoins you could say we are looking for bitcoins.

Unless you want to get really technical I would suggest that you consider that we are digging in the earth looking for little clumps of bitcoins, in just the same way as some people dig in the earth and pan for gold. This isn't at all accurate but it does paint a nice picture in your mind, just imagine all your little asics with pick axes digging through the ground.

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[andyjjones]

I understand we are processing " transactions" but what is it that we find that " solves " a block and finishes it. ?

I'm a newbie but I understand it this way.  When we solve a block, we solve a math equation whose difficulty is artificially inflated.
It's artificially inflated so that blocks are not solved too quickly, and hence maintains the systems integrity.

[KNK]

Could someone give me the plain English version of what it is EXACTLY that we are "mining" for ?
I understand we are processing " transactions" but what is it that we find that " solves " a block and finishes it. ?

Consider every transaction as the text "I from my wallet with address XXXX am sending to person with wallet YYYY the amount of ZZZZ BTC, which I am signing with my electronic signature for that wallet"
Now we all put a list of such transactions in a list and each one of us is signing that list with his own electronic signature by adding a transaction that states: "I confirm that I have checked all the transactions listed at date DDDD and there are no double spends - for which I will be rewarded 25 BTC" ... the one who is lucky that by applying his signature produces a result that starts with more zeroes than required from the network difficulty is the winner to 'solve' the block and is rewarded for that.

We are 'mining' the reward for 'solving' a block by signing it with our signature and the time we did that

[kcal63]

The 11 hour 20 minute block was an invalid orphan, the 2 minute 37 second block was valid. Sometimes the universe makes no sense  -- unless it is intentionally laughing at us.

[arturro73]

Hi need some opinion.
Seems like the pool is changing the difficulty ad hoc, why? Is that correct behavior?
Hardware is Bitfurry 45GH/s and I get difficulty 1024? Is this something I need to worry?
http://i59.tinypic.com/2nkjswp.png

[RogMiner]

Your output seems to be similar to mine, At the top the Diff is set to 19.7G this is the current difficulty, then each item in the list shows a different Diff such as 15/10 (I have no idea what this means), the difficulty changed to 1024 is I think a message showing that for some reason the difficulty of the work sent to you has been reset, this does not happen very often for me but it may be a sign that your internet connection is not responding quickly enough so the pool is sending you easier work so you can catch up (but this is just a guess).

Hopefully someone with more experience will confirm the reason for this.

[seamusgalla]

https://i.imgur.com/w6Dv22h.png

I mine at a very slow rate. I have the privilege of free electricity and bought some mining hardware months ago. This privilege is running out and I wanted to get my last payout and leave the mining world. I got a mining contract of 3.3TH for 3hrs so that I could reach the threshold for a payout and then I was going to pack my bags and go. The block solved in this time was invalid which is just shit luck, but what I can't understand is why my BTC reward was so low while I had a (relative to my usual) massive share count.

Is there anyone who could clear up the reason for this?

Best,
Seamus

[Skydaddy]

https://i.imgur.com/w6Dv22h.png

I mine at a very slow rate. I have the privilege of free electricity and bought some mining hardware months ago. This privilege is running out and I wanted to get my last payout and leave the mining world. I got a mining contract of 3.3TH for 3hrs so that I could reach the threshold for a payout and then I was going to pack my bags and go. The block solved in this time was invalid which is just shit luck, but what I can't understand is why my BTC reward was so low while I had a (relative to my usual) massive share count.

Is there anyone who could clear up the reason for this?

Best,
Seamus

My first guess would be that your mining contract expired at some point before that block was resolved and that at that point you went back to your regular mining pace. when the reward was computed on the massive loss of your mining power that those shares were not considered, and that the reward that you would have recieved (if the block had not gone invalid) was based on your lesser hashing rate that would have been brought back online when your contract expired. But this is only my opinion, and there are many more experienced miners on this thread that will surely chime in to correct me if necessary.

[Billbags]

^That sounds about right. This is a Score based pool that has vardiff. This is also another great example of why pool hopping doesn't work. When u come and go, you don't get fully invested for a full payout, if any at all. I feel for your loss on that contract.

[organofcorti]

^That sounds about right. This is a PPLNS pool that has vardiff. This is also a great example of why pool hopping doesn't work. When u come and go, you don't get fully invested for a full payout, if any at all.

Finally! When did Slush's pool change to PPLNS?

[Billbags]

My bad, Score based. Been on Guild threads all morning.

[jterry211]

Been mining for almost a year and using a desktop wallet. Finally getting some new equipment and more bitcoins (hopefully).  Wondering what yall think about online wallets like Xapo or Coinbase etc?

Thanks,
JT

[kkurtmann]

Been mining for almost a year and using a desktop wallet. Finally getting some new equipment and more bitcoins (hopefully).  Wondering what yall think about online wallets like Xapo or Coinbase etc?

Thanks,
JT

 if you don't like to own your own coins this should be fine

[bozo333]

Upcoming difficulty increase to suck big time.

we were lucky with the last puny increaseS, prepare for a big cut in revenue  

must be those pesky SP30's coming online....


                        25,000,000,000 PREDICTED
Aug 08 2014   19,729,645,941   5.30%   141,230,307 GH/s
Jul 25 2014   18,736,441,558   8.08%   134,120,673 GH/s
Jul 12 2014   17,336,316,979   3.08%   124,098,191 GH/s

[kkurtmann]

Upcoming difficulty increase to suck big time.

we were lucky with the last puny increaseS, prepare for a big cut in revenue  

must be those pesky SP30's coming online....


                        25,000,000,000 PREDICTED
Aug 08 2014   19,729,645,941   5.30%   141,230,307 GH/s
Jul 25 2014   18,736,441,558   8.08%   134,120,673 GH/s
Jul 12 2014   17,336,316,979   3.08%   124,098,191 GH/s

 

plus the never-ending supply of S3's

[Billbags]

One thing is that when the new asics come out, a lot of the old ones get unplugged. I have a room full of unplugged cubes, Klondikes, little singles and s1's. I unplugged as I got the new generation miners. Some of the old ghs does disappear, so that helps a little. But it will eventually get to the point where my mining will not make a profit.

[Devonian]

  anyone notice that there is a 10% discrepancy between the number of shares their miner gets accepted and the % of BTC allocated?

In particular block 315196 : I mined 0.0030% (big woooo!) of the total shares for that block but only got 0.0027% of the BTC for it!  And I've checked that I was mining for full amount of time so I don't think the back ended loading can account for it!!!

. . . . and another thing - if all us pool miners set our payout trigger to the minimum will that increase the number of Bitcoin transactions, and therefore increase the number of blocks being processed and therefore ultimately increase the reward we get for mining!!!!!!!

[mstrongbow]

anyone notice that there is a 10% discrepancy between the number of shares their miner gets accepted and the % of BTC allocated?

In particular block 315196 : I mined 0.0030% (big woooo!) of the total shares for that block but only got 0.0027% of the BTC for it!  And I've checked that I was mining for full amount of time so I don't think the back ended loading can account for it!!!

. . . . and another thing - if all us pool miners set our payout trigger to the minimum will that increase the number of Bitcoin transactions, and therefore increase the number of blocks being processed and therefore ultimately increase the reward we get for mining!!!!!!!

could that be the 2% pool fee you see missing?

[Devonian]

anyone notice that there is a 10% discrepancy between the number of shares their miner gets accepted and the % of BTC allocated?

In particular block 315196 : I mined 0.0030% (big woooo!) of the total shares for that block but only got 0.0027% of the BTC for it!  And I've checked that I was mining for full amount of time so I don't think the back ended loading can account for it!!!

. . . . and another thing - if all us pool miners set our payout trigger to the minimum will that increase the number of Bitcoin transactions, and therefore increase the number of blocks being processed and therefore ultimately increase the reward we get for mining!!!!!!!

could that be the 2% pool fee you see missing?

block 315196 difference was more like 10%!!!!

When does Slush take his share?  I thought it was when payment is made into my wallet.

[bozo333]

At/under $550 is really no good since many won't be making money then...

And if that breaks then there is no technical support until way down at $440.... sux big time if that happens.

That being said nobody knows the future...