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

[rsbriggs]

OK - I'm really not getting how these blocks are being scored.

For two similar blocks - on this block, I got in 115 shares in 2:18 and got .00032359 for it.

17770   2013-04-30 17:34:10   2:18:03   15697265   115   0.00032359

But on this block, I got in more shares (132) in less time (2:03) and there were fewer total shares, but I got 0.000 ??

17774   2013-04-30 20:25:35   2:03:23   14233698   132   0.00000000

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[PuertoLibre]

OK - I'm really not getting how these blocks are being scored.

For two similar blocks - on this block, I got in 115 shares in 2:18 and got .00032359 for it.

17770   2013-04-30 17:34:10   2:18:03   15697265   115   0.00032359

But on this block, I got in more shares (132) in less time (2:03) and there were fewer total shares, but I got 0.000 ??

17774   2013-04-30 20:25:35   2:03:23   14233698   132   0.00000000

17770   2013-04-30 17:34:10   2:18:03   15697265   137406   0.21643078   233933   25.58070000

17774   2013-04-30 20:25:35   2:03:23   14233698   123224   0.21076722   233955   25.34648117

[rsbriggs]

Yes, how nice for you - you get 20 days of what I mine in each and every single block you mine.

But that doesn't answer my question.  Why, when I'm mining consistently (albeit slowly), did I get zero on block 17774 where I did better than on block 17770, which I did get paid something for?  If this is "variance" then why have I never seen this magnitude of variability when mining in other pools?

[PuertoLibre]

Yes, how nice for you - you get 20 days of what I mine in each and every single block you mine.

But that doesn't answer my question.  Why, when I'm mining consistently (albeit slowly), did I get zero on block 17774 where I did better than on block 17770, which I did get paid something for?  If this is "variance" then why have I never seen this magnitude of variability when mining in other pools?

I don't know if your miner produces logs, but it seems the scoring system will eliminate your shares worth if you get disconnected or take too long to send the next share. (I think) (I am still reading up on the scoring system.)

This may have happened to you.

Another possibility is that your calculated rewards may not have finished processing yet, hence it is all zeros.

[Lucko]

Yes, how nice for you - you get 20 days of what I mine in each and every single block you mine.

But that doesn't answer my question.  Why, when I'm mining consistently (albeit slowly), did I get zero on block 17774 where I did better than on block 17770, which I did get paid something for?  If this is "variance" then why have I never seen this magnitude of variability when mining in other pools?

I got this for the last block:

17775   2013-04-30 23:59:52   3:34:17   24772020   3376   0.00000052   none   233974   25.23872222    98 confirmations left

But I know why. Internet went out at the end... About 10 seconds into the new run I got it back... So you might have something like that at the start of one and end of one...

About the "variance"... Depends on a pool payout system...

[Lucko]

Another possibility is that your calculated rewards may not have finished processing yet, hence it is all zeros.

In that case he wouldn't see shares jet...

[Entropy-uc]

Yes, how nice for you - you get 20 days of what I mine in each and every single block you mine.

But that doesn't answer my question.  Why, when I'm mining consistently (albeit slowly), did I get zero on block 17774 where I did better than on block 17770, which I did get paid something for?  If this is "variance" then why have I never seen this magnitude of variability when mining in other pools?

I don't know if your miner produces logs, but it seems the scoring system will eliminate your shares worth if you get disconnected or take too long to send the next share. (I think) (I am still reading up on the scoring system.)

This may have happened to you.

Another possibility is that your calculated rewards may not have finished processing yet, hence it is all zeros.

I have definitely seen cases where I was doing hardware maintenance and 15s of downtime has resulted in huge penalties from slush.

If you have to restart something, it's probably better to solo mine until the next block starts given the way he penalizes you right now.

[nybbler905]

OK - I'm really not getting how these blocks are being scored.

For two similar blocks - on this block, I got in 115 shares in 2:18 and got .00032359 for it.

17770   2013-04-30 17:34:10   2:18:03   15697265   115   0.00032359

But on this block, I got in more shares (132) in less time (2:03) and there were fewer total shares, but I got 0.000 ??

17774   2013-04-30 20:25:35   2:03:23   14233698   132   0.00000000

it's all timing. here is from a CPU miner and 1 share on 2 different blocks ( mine )

#      Block found at           Duration     Total shares    Your shares  Your BTC reward   Block #   Block value
17775  2013-04-30 23:59:52      3:34:17      24772020       1           0.00000369        233974    25.23872222
17774  2013-04-30 20:25:35      2:03:23      14233698       1           0.00000000        233955    25.34648117

I happened to be home to watch as the 2nd share was Near The End of the round ( 80+ in Current shares CDF: )
so, i'll take it and as far as the getting 0E-8 goes, I'm waiting on some 86ooGT cards to hopefully get out of CPU mining and get a higher hash rate.
this is a ' typical ' block for me when sooo many are connected and getting shares.....

17759    2013-04-30 01:20:57     5:01:48         34198356       3           0.00000000       233836    25.46175733

Not detered, more resolved and liking it 

[rsbriggs]

No - there is definitely something wrong here.  I'm not being paid for any blocks anymore

17774   2013-04-30 20:25:35   2:03:23   14233698   132   0.00000000
17775   2013-04-30 23:59:52   3:34:17   24772020   145   0.00000000
17776   2013-05-01 02:25:35   2:25:43   16453036    13   0.00000000

I have moved over to another pool, and I'm not having problems there with zero returns per block, even if my share counts are low.

41  DGM  0 PPS   0.00108057
136 DGM 0 PPS   0.00110942
464 DGM 0 PPS   0.00132832
6    DGM 0 PPS   0.00068256

[killingtime]

No - there is definitely something wrong here.  I'm not being paid for any blocks anymore

17774   2013-04-30 20:25:35   2:03:23   14233698   132   0.00000000
17775   2013-04-30 23:59:52   3:34:17   24772020   145   0.00000000
17776   2013-05-01 02:25:35   2:25:43   16453036    13   0.00000000

I have moved over to another pool, and I'm not having problems there with zero returns per block, even if my share counts are low.

The problem here is that these are fairly long blocks, and the scoring system works in such a way that shares done towards the end count more than at the beginning, but the flip to this is that with slow share submission at the end it could look like you were not sending anything and your score would be decaying faster than you were adding shares.  Even if this was done with the simple calc of (your shares / total shares) * 25 * 0.98, you only be looking at 0.0002.  And and average submission rate of a bit more than 1 share per minute.  While slush's pool is pretty nice for most people, I don't think it is a great solution for such a low hash rate.  You're just getting unlucky with score decay and too steep of a curve at the end.

[Lanidarc]

No - there is definitely something wrong here.  I'm not being paid for any blocks anymore

17774   2013-04-30 20:25:35   2:03:23   14233698   132   0.00000000
17775   2013-04-30 23:59:52   3:34:17   24772020   145   0.00000000
17776   2013-05-01 02:25:35   2:25:43   16453036    13   0.00000000

I have moved over to another pool, and I'm not having problems there with zero returns per block, even if my share counts are low.

The problem here is that these are fairly long blocks, and the scoring system works in such a way that shares done towards the end count more than at the beginning, but the flip to this is that with slow share submission at the end it could look like you were not sending anything and your score would be decaying faster than you were adding shares.  Even if this was done with the simple calc of (your shares / total shares) * 25 * 0.98, you only be looking at 0.0002.  And and average submission rate of a bit more than 1 share per minute.  While slush's pool is pretty nice for most people, I don't think it is a great solution for such a low hash rate.  You're just getting unlucky with score decay and too steep of a curve at the end.

Hmmm, if this is indeed the case, I would expect it to be fairly straightforward to have the decay rate depend on the average hash rate...? Actually expected this would be the case.

If this isn't easy to do though, I don't think Slush would put a huge effort in for tiny miners.

[rsbriggs]

Well, OK.  

Regrettably, it seems that I need to move over to another pool.
  
I can't see much point in cranking away here with my current tiny 184 Mh/s for hours and hours without reward.  From the looks of things after mining on EclipseMC for a few hours, I can still pull down about .016 BTC per day there.

I do have a box coming with a pair of HD7990's which should be here early next week.  That ought to fix up my hash rate at least a little - maybe I'll try back here after I get it going...

[rsbriggs]

No - there is definitely something wrong here.  I'm not being paid for any blocks anymore

17774   2013-04-30 20:25:35   2:03:23   14233698   132   0.00000000
17775   2013-04-30 23:59:52   3:34:17   24772020   145   0.00000000
17776   2013-05-01 02:25:35   2:25:43   16453036    13   0.00000000

I have moved over to another pool, and I'm not having problems there with zero returns per block, even if my share counts are low.

The problem here is that these are fairly long blocks, and the scoring system works in such a way that shares done towards the end count more than at the beginning, but the flip to this is that with slow share submission at the end it could look like you were not sending anything and your score would be decaying faster than you were adding shares.  Even if this was done with the simple calc of (your shares / total shares) * 25 * 0.98, you only be looking at 0.0002.  And and average submission rate of a bit more than 1 share per minute.  While slush's pool is pretty nice for most people, I don't think it is a great solution for such a low hash rate.  You're just getting unlucky with score decay and too steep of a curve at the end.

But this didn't start happening until the change in difficulty.  I haven't encountered this problem here before now, even if I just got a few dozen shares in on a two hour block I'd end up with at least something around 1/2 the PPS rate for that number of shares.  Then today, 4 blocks in a row, no payout...

[johnyj]

No - there is definitely something wrong here.  I'm not being paid for any blocks anymore

17774   2013-04-30 20:25:35   2:03:23   14233698   132   0.00000000
17775   2013-04-30 23:59:52   3:34:17   24772020   145   0.00000000
17776   2013-05-01 02:25:35   2:25:43   16453036    13   0.00000000

I have moved over to another pool, and I'm not having problems there with zero returns per block, even if my share counts are low.

41  DGM  0 PPS   0.00108057
136 DGM 0 PPS   0.00110942
464 DGM 0 PPS   0.00132832
6    DGM 0 PPS   0.00068256

I also discovered some very low payout on long blocks, and I moved over to other pool

[Lucko]

I can't see much point in cranking away here with my current tiny 184 Mh/s for hours and hours without reward.  From the looks of things after mining on EclipseMC for a few hours, I can still pull down about .016 BTC per day there.

184 is fast enough for luck not to be such big factor... But then again if you are saying you have 184 there should be much more shares in in this time. There must be something wrong. But there are more possibility.

1. You stop mining
2. Internet went out for you
3. Counting shares on Slush side fail

EDIT: but there agen I also noticed that I'm getting paid less for long blocks. It was usuly other way around since pool hoppers take part of the earnings... So Slush might take a look at the system....

[organofcorti]

There's no point guessing how the score method works. You'll just get confused - the score method seems simple enough, but it really isn't.

I posted this a few pages back and not.you did a great job summarising, but I guess you missed it:

Here's some reading for you both:

http://organofcorti.blogspot.com/2012/04/41-slushs-pool.html
http://organofcorti.blogspot.com/2012/08/42-slushs-score-method-and-miner.html
http://organofcorti.blogspot.com/2012/09/43-slushs-score-method-and-miner.html

Probably shouldn't comment since I haven't had a chance to read those yet, but I did mention above about how I thought the system was outdated.
Judging by the hash rates in the top of those they aren't very recent.
If im wrong, please dont hang me! I'll apologise for my ignorance once I have had time to look at things properly.

4.2 and 4.3 are the important ones - 4.1 is just background. They are from last year, but the score method is the same now as it was then.

Very good read indeed. I wonder how many of the forum members will take the time to read & understand (!) it. I see a rather wide spectrum of skills and attitude and many reoccurring questions that makes me assume the majority will just skip anything longer than a few paragraphs. Anyway, congratulations, I really recognize the full worth of these quality articles.

Cheers,
   T

Yes I found those the other day and thought they were excellent as well.  (When is the next one coming out?)

I kept seeing blocks that had under-calculated (by a lot) and it was bugging me until I found those.

The TL;DR version is that in order to prevent pool hopping Slush's scoring mechanism rewards shares found later in the round more than shares found earlier in the round.  This mechanism as implemented also introduces variance in the pay out.  Sometimes you get more than expected for a block and sometimes you get less as compared to a purely proportional payout system.  To check, look at your highest and lowest rewards over time and you should find some lower and some higher than the value calculated by this formula: (Block Value * 0.98 * your shares) / total shares

If you are a full-time miner however, the long term effect of the variance will disappear and your long term reward will look almost identical to what it would if that formula above were actually being used.  The end result is that pool hopping from Slush's pool is only profitable to a very, very tiny degree and full time miners are not losing much reward to pool hoppers. 

Slush could lower that pool hopping profitability even more but it would raise the payout variance even more which would make some blocks look even worse.

[vs3]

OVH CEO confirms the security flaw by which slush's pool was compromised:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5632479

they even say it in plain text:

We have found 3 active ids which had a password reset done by brute-force. These three occurences were targeted attacks against a part of the "bitcoin" community that uses ovh

Really? Just 3 clients? And ALL of them bitcoin-related? Wow, what a coincidence!
And I'm pretty sure the hacker randomly guessed the emails and usernames of those very specific 3 users. Yup, no inside info necessary. At all.

[klotzenhotz]

Hi,

just filled in a NMC wallet address yesterday, but so far nothing happened there in my slush account. Are NMC still mined? Or did I do something wrong? Just typed a walled address from my coin exchange - or do I really need the NMC server tool running?

[KNK]

I can't see much point in cranking away here with my current tiny 184 Mh/s for hours and hours without reward.  From the looks of things after mining on EclipseMC for a few hours, I can still pull down about .016 BTC per day there.

184 is fast enough for luck not to be such big factor... But then again if you are saying you have 184 there should be much more shares in in this time. There must be something wrong. But there are more possibility.

1. You stop mining
2. Internet went out for you
3. Counting shares on Slush side fail

EDIT: but there agen I also noticed that I'm getting paid less for long blocks. It was usuly other way around since pool hoppers take part of the earnings... So Slush might take a look at the system....

Yes, it seems to be some problem at your side, because for the same blocks i have ~300 shares and 0.00032 reward on average with just 150MH/s

[KNK]

Hi,

just filled in a NMC wallet address yesterday, but so far nothing happened there in my slush account. Are NMC still mined? Or did I do something wrong? Just typed a walled address from my coin exchange - or do I really need the NMC server tool running?

You'll find the answer by reading the last few pages