[ANN]Bminer: a fast Equihash/Ethash/Cuckaroo29z miner for AMD/NVIDIA GPUs 16.4.9

[MagicSmoker]

To all who've been following the last couple of pages as the discussion between me and @cryptoyes turned nasty, I apologize both to you and @cryptoyes. In what will no doubt come as no surprise to @cryptoyes it was I who was in error and I actually took the proverb - and advice given - to heart by going back through the thread to try to find what I missed.

Turns out, the crux of the argument for using average hashrate reported by the pool rather than payout or even share count is that the average hashrate may not be trustworthy on an absolute basis - ie, the pool could be under-reporting it to skim a little extra for itself - but it should be trustworthy on an absolute relative* basis; that is, any doctoring of this value can be expected to apply equally to any given miner at any given time.

One only needs to know the time frame for the averaging function - ie, 24 hours - and make sure the length of the test is equal to or greater than that time.

Payout is /not/ a good metric because it is the sum of all shares found and that number can vary depending on luck as well as hashrate (assuming a fixed share difficulty is used; with vardiff share count is totally useless).

So, again, my apologies for cluttering up the thread and potentially misleading anyone with my flawed testing scheme. If there is any value in my repeating the test with my lowly dual 1080's I will in a few days.

* - oops, a really bad mistake here; fixed.

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[cryptoyes]

Apology accepted. But you're still not taking into account PPLNS, a reason why I suggested you do some reading (not all shares you submit are paid, not all blocks are equal in either length or difficulty, not all last N shares span a single block, etc).

it seems bminer was faster ... but as was pointed out earlier, @realbminer could have just watched this thread and tweaked with the fee to make it 2% faster by removing the fee for the duration of that test for all we know. It is the most untrustworthy and suspicious miner out there, hands down. Add that @realbminer didn't address the questions and you have an explanation why people are not trusting this miner and are sticking with dstm's. Remove the private connection if you want to be taken (more) seriously.

[realbminer]

Fully agreed on the private connection aspect. I said so myself, and specifically asked @realbminer about it. He didn't reply. He claims he cares about us though ...

My impression is that it has been explicitly addressed in the post:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2519271.msg29709934#msg29709934

Let me know if you have any more questions.

[realbminer]

Apology accepted. But you're still not taking into account PPLNS, a reason why I suggested you do some reading (not all shares you submit are paid, not all blocks are equal in either length or difficulty, not all last N shares span a single block, etc).

it seems bminer was faster ... but as was pointed out earlier, @realbminer could have just watched this thread and tweaked with the fee to make it 2% faster by removing the fee for the duration of that test for all we know. It is the most untrustworthy and suspicious miner out there, hands down. Add that @realbminer didn't address the questions and you have an explanation why people are not trusting this miner and are sticking with dstm's. Remove the private connection if you want to be taken (more) seriously.

Thanks for "gaining" me the ability to tweak devfees on-the-fly. Any evidences to back it up your claims?

The tests have been done multiple times by different people and the results and the results are pretty consistent.

[cryptoyes]

Fully agreed on the private connection aspect. I said so myself, and specifically asked @realbminer about it. He didn't reply. He claims he cares about us though ...

My impression is that it has been explicitly addressed in the post:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2519271.msg29709934#msg29709934

Let me know if you have any more questions.

You haven't answered a single actual question that matters. You insist on being vague like last few times you were called out on it

I explained a few times that bminer will request runtime and licensing information from time to time. It might be a better idea to add it explicitly to the LICENSE file, I'll try to do it in the next release.

As I pointed out already (, e.g. https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2519271.msg29351378#msg29351378): that's much too vague, unconvincing and suspicious, and it addresses nothing. We asked specific questions: why do you need it, what purpose does it serve, do you lose profits if you don't do it, will it work if we block it, etc ... rhetorical questions, really. None of it is necessary.

Bminer is a relatively new miner and I understand that it might not get the benefits of doubts. I can assure that there are no fraudulent behaviors in the miners, it is always difficult to claim or verify the statements given that it is close-source miners. The argument not only applies to bminer, but also any closed-source miners, including dstm, Claymore, and EWBF.

Sorry but that's total bullshit, and those developers should call you out on it. You're the _only_ developer who makes a private connection to their own server and apparently condition the miner on it. This gives you the ability to do whatever you want, including increasing the fee randomly or deterministically, collect addresses or system info, etc.

At best what you are doing is disappointing and highly suspicious, and TOTALLY unnecessary. Stop it. You want to continue to mine using our hardware and get 2% of all our earnings, then you should play nice and honest like the other devs. But something tells me you won't, and that says a lot about you (sorry). Prove us wrong: remove the private connection.

Also, the more you say "stop using this miner if you don't like it" the more you confirm people's suspicions. Well done.

Any evidences to back it up your claims?

Isn't that cute. In case you haven't realized it, the burden of proof is on you, not on us. You're the one who closed the source and engaged in suspicious activity. Well done x2.

p.s. You asked about tech findings. I reported a "bug" earlier that you might want to look into. I like the miner because iot's light on the CPU, but people need to call you out on this charade you implemented.

[MagicSmoker]

Apology accepted. But you're still not taking into account PPLNS, a reason why I suggested you do some reading (not all shares you submit are paid, not all blocks are equal in either length or difficulty, not all last N shares span a single block, etc).

Yes, I've actually just started learning about PPLNS, mostly the hard way... I was mining VTC on give-me-coins for awhile but the time to find a block was really long and quite random - ranging from 20 to 100 hours... Needless to say, if the PPLNS window was set for 30 hours, as this was the average ttf reported by the pool at the time, then if it takes 100 hours a whole bunch of your shares will get tossed out.

it seems bminer was faster ... but as was pointed out earlier, @realbminer could have just watched this thread and tweaked with the fee to make it 2% faster by removing the fee for the duration of that test for all we know. It is the most untrustworthy and suspicious miner out there, hands down. Add that @realbminer didn't address the questions and you have an explanation why people are not trusting this miner and are sticking with dstm's. Remove the private connection if you want to be taken (more) seriously.

  I think we'll file this under, "Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean your miners aren't out to get you."

[resiva]

Apology accepted. But you're still not taking into account PPLNS, a reason why I suggested you do some reading (not all shares you submit are paid, not all blocks are equal in either length or difficulty, not all last N shares span a single block, etc).

it seems bminer was faster ... but as was pointed out earlier, @realbminer could have just watched this thread and tweaked with the fee to make it 2% faster by removing the fee for the duration of that test for all we know. It is the most untrustworthy and suspicious miner out there, hands down. Add that @realbminer didn't address the questions and you have an explanation why people are not trusting this miner and are sticking with dstm's. Remove the private connection if you want to be taken (more) seriously.

Thanks for "gaining" me the ability to tweak devfees on-the-fly. Any evidences to back it up your claims?

The tests have been done multiple times by different people and the results and the results are pretty consistent.

This is simply not true.
Most of the previous reports, which were done without publishing the pool-test account, clearly state that bminers hash rate is lower on pool side but is reported localy higher. Everyone is able to read it on this thread.

[gettilee]

Fully agreed on the private connection aspect. I said so myself, and specifically asked @realbminer about it. He didn't reply. He claims he cares about us though ...

My impression is that it has been explicitly addressed in the post:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2519271.msg29709934#msg29709934

Let me know if you have any more questions.

"bminer will request runtime and licensing information from time to time."


this is the primary reason i'm not using bminer on my rigs. you have a connection that you refuse to explain what it is beyond some vague explanation of "runtime and licensing information."

i mean the post you linked as a reply to our concerns sounds like a politician's talking points and platitudes. you don't answer the questions with any level of technical detail and just tell us how much you love us and the community. if that was the case there would be no dev fee at all.

you're shooting yourself in the foot here being deceptive with the private connection and over reporting of hashrates. deduct your dev fee visably in the miner's UI and address the questions we keep having to ask you over and over again.

people are fed up from many of the 2% miner dev fees for shitty support, rare updates, and minimal if ANY performance increase. theres already people working on no dev fee tools to remove them from other popular miner like claymore and dstm. people aren't going to use your miner if you can't be more transparent.

[eewww]

Thanks for "private connection" explained before i launched it. Maybe this "license connection" is done for those users who run miner on machine with some cold wallets without encryption on them...

[cisternocefal]

What is this and how i can fix this shit?

https://i.imgur.com/p5EX7jW.png

[LoraineLY]

Regarding the priviate connection of bminer. I recall one people in this thread finds out that the private connection is to fetch devfee address. Now I guess I understand why bminer encrypts this connection. Otherwise, even with my limited hacking skill, I would be able to remove/hijack the devfee. I only run miners on mining rigs so I do not care. I think it is stupid to run any miner on a computer with sensitive data.

That's just the sad situation in the mining world. Open source projects on large coins do not get enough support, they just got beat by close source miners. All those miners are greedy. Claymore, bminer, dstm, and ewbf charge crazy amount of fees. Some people are greedy too, trying to hijack/remove fees (I recall there was a dstm fee remover recently). Simply no one plays fairly. Then miners start to use encrypted connections and we cannot monitor what they are doing. This is the reason why all miners are behaving like virus and marked as virus by most anti-virus software.

My main complaint to bminer and all other miners is that the devfee is too high. But I don't think they will change it.

BTW, Some people in this thread is very strange and suspicious. For example, if you check the history posts of @resiva, all of his past 4 posts are in this thread. Just like the sole purpose of this account is to say negative things about bminer. There are also a few newbie accounts only saying positive things about bminer. It is fun to watch those marketing accounts fighting back forth lol.

I have done my own testing: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2519271.msg29780550#msg29780550

For me, bminer is slightly better than dstm. I suggest other people should do their own testing because the difference is small. Maybe in your machines, the results will flip. You can follow @cryptoyes instructions to do that.

[gettilee]

My main complaint to bminer and all other miners is that the devfee is too high. But I don't think they will change it.

you're right of course, theres a reason why its so high...not enough alternatives. people will continue to use these high dev fee miners for the minimal profit increase over miners with a no devfee option. they don't deserve the free money for every hash, i mean 400K a month and not doing any updates for 2-3 months with really no performance increase. its free money for devs at this point.

BTW, Some people in this thread is very strange and suspicious. For example, if you check the history posts of @resiva, all of his past 4 posts are in this thread. Just like the sole purpose of this account is to say negative things about bminer. There are also a few newbie accounts only saying positive things about bminer. It is fun to watch those marketing accounts fighting back forth lol.

bminer was banned from another forum because he was making sock puppets to promote his equihash miner, it wouldn't surprise me that he would make alt accounts here to get more users.

i can't agree with your look on greedy miners vs authors tho. i'm fine with paying a monthly fee for something that is benefiting me in terms of them actually working/improving the product. miner authors do not do this, they go months without updates and they do not increase performance by any meaningful amounts. since theres so few choices for mining programs, they know they own the market and can charge whatever they want. so that leaves us with the simple decision to either pay the ridiculously high 2% fee (which sucks for serious miners) or look for alternative methods of removing the fee. the choice is yours of course but i'm fine with it. i've already donated more than enough to dstm to cover his 4 updates in the last 6+ months that i've used his miner. hes not made any performance increases, so can you justify the fee?

bminer is worse at this point. he won't even tell us why needs the private connection or why he won't change the UI reporting the total hashrate but won't report his dev hashrate when its collected.

transparency is the answer here, and these closed source dev miners are just here to make money (like us of course) but if they aren't earning it i'll give my money to someone that will. (even if thats a person that shares a way to avoid the dev fee for an older build)

[LoraineLY]

miner authors do not do this, they go months without updates and they do not increase performance by any meaningful amounts. since theres so few choices for mining programs, they know they own the market and can charge whatever they want. so that leaves us with the simple decision to either pay the ridiculously high 2% fee (which sucks for serious miners) or look for alternative methods of removing the fee. the choice is yours of course but i'm fine with it. i've already donated more than enough to dstm to cover his 4 updates in the last 6+ months that i've used his miner. hes not made any performance increases, so can you justify the fee?

Cannot agree for more! This is the very first reason why I stop using ewbf. Ewbf collects fees without any update for months.

transparency is the answer here, and these closed source dev miners are just here to make money (like us of course) but if they aren't earning it i'll give my money to someone that will. (even if thats a person that shares a way to avoid the dev fee for an older build)

Yes. I would love to see bminer to give more transparency, e.g., showing the devfee shares like ewbf did. The thing I miss in bminer or dstm is that they both do not show devfee shares.

BTW, a little bit off the topic. Anyone know how to run ethminer on P104-100 in Linux. I am pretty frustrated right now. See my original post: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2898322.0

[tipztek]

Apology accepted. But you're still not taking into account PPLNS, a reason why I suggested you do some reading (not all shares you submit are paid, not all blocks are equal in either length or difficulty, not all last N shares span a single block, etc).

it seems bminer was faster ... but as was pointed out earlier, @realbminer could have just watched this thread and tweaked with the fee to make it 2% faster by removing the fee for the duration of that test for all we know. It is the most untrustworthy and suspicious miner out there, hands down. Add that @realbminer didn't address the questions and you have an explanation why people are not trusting this miner and are sticking with dstm's. Remove the private connection if you want to be taken (more) seriously.

Thanks for "gaining" me the ability to tweak devfees on-the-fly. Any evidences to back it up your claims?

The tests have been done multiple times by different people and the results and the results are pretty consistent.

The evidence is your unwillingness to let requests to api.bminer.me happen in the clear.

[jackbox]

Is there a way to tell it to use only certain GPUs? I have a bad card in the machine and I cannot get there now to remove it. EWBF has an option to select which cards to mine. Is there a similar flag to set in this miner to select which cards to mine?

[tipztek]

Hi all, here is a partial request for his "licensing and runtime" to api.bminer.me every 10-15 minutes.

POST https://api.bminer.me/v1/stats/zec/520 HTTP/1.1
Host: api.bminer.me
User-Agent: Go-http-client/1.1
Content-Length: 727
Content-Type: application/octet-stream
Accept-Encoding: gzip
Connection: close
Linux*
GenuineIntel
GeForce GTX 10XX XGB
(GPU-00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000
0000:00:00.0
GeForce GTX 10XX XGB
(GPU-00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000
0000:00:00.0
GeForce GTX 10XX XGB
(GPU-00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000
0000:00:00.0
GeForce GTX 10XX XGB
(GPU-00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000
0000:00:00.0
GeForce GTX 10XX XGB
(GPU-00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000
0000:00:00.0
GeForce GTX 10XX XGB
(GPU-00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000
0000:00:00.0

Replace all the zeroes with your GPU's UUID and PCI position, replace X's with your model.

I believe there was also speed in there, but I'm not sure. It's difficult to reconstruct this shit.

[CryptoSnow]

I'm trying to disable the watchdog with the command i found at https://www.bminer.me/references/ and with bminer -help

i've tried -watchdog false and -watchdog 0, and even -watchdog true

these all give return "illegal arguments" error. What is the correct syntax for this feature?

[jackbox]

I tried to run it but it said vb runtime was missing. Also, is it safe to run? It seems like many people are worried about stuff the program does that it should not be doing.

[LoraineLY]

I tried to run it but it said vb runtime was missing. Also, is it safe to run? It seems like many people are worried about stuff the program does that it should not be doing.

I have been running this on my rigs for 2 days. It seems totally fine.

But of course, you should never run any closed source mining software on a computer with critical information you care (like your wallet file).

[jackbox]

I tried to run it but it said vb runtime was missing. Also, is it safe to run? It seems like many people are worried about stuff the program does that it should not be doing.

I have been running this on my rigs for 2 days. It seems totally fine.

But of course, you should never run any closed source mining software on a computer with critical information you care (like your wallet file).

My mining rigs are at another location. They have nothing critical on them. How much more speed are you getting as compared to EWBF? Which VB runtime do I need to install for this program to work?