Antminer L3+ viable?

[Oonej]

Hey guys,

I'm new to the mining scene. I was planning a gpu build but now I'm leaning towards a antminer L3+. I know the scene isn't 100% when it comes to predictability, but curious how much risk I'll be jumping into. I'd like to buy 4.

With some of the calculators, I'm seeing from ltcwisdom.org I see that by March time frame I'll have a return of 350-400/mo based on my current kwh cost and pool fees etc. I could also do nicehash for a little more.

What are your thoughts on the ASICs? Would really appreciate some in my same boat or has been in my boat. The big deal for me is the 4 month wait...

Thanks guys!
Oonej

[coldstorage]

Anyone's guess, but yeah, 4 mo is terrifying.  L3+ may well be nearing the end of its lifecycle before the next big thing, and committing that far in advance at this stage of life to one is a huge leap.

That said, I think Litecoin is fantastic, undervalued, Charlie Lee is a genius (for not trying to be better than BTC but charting a course to be a support mechanism for it), and Scrypt alts to back up litecoin are plentiful.  If it were me, I might wait for the next big leap in scrypt mining, and focus on buying coins or maybe get into mining something where the hardware risk is lower (GPU) while keeping my eye out for a better hardware entry point for scrypt.  But what do I know?

[Oonej]

Thanks coldstorage.

Yeah litecoin is a nice one and i've had my eyes on it.

[Oonej]

Looking at ltcwisdom.net calculator, i see these results for March 2018++ .. What other things should I consider besides this ? before buying the miner.. If I chose to go this route

Code:

Date		Difficulty			Profits
6 Mar		2066319				$-1,285.93
13 Mar		2118203				$-1,174.64
20 Mar		2170087				$-1,066.02
27 Mar		2221971				$-959.94
3 Apr		2273855				$-856.28		
10 Apr		2325739				$-754.93		
17 Apr		2377623				$-655.79		
24 Apr		2429507				$-558.77
1 May		2481391				$-463.77		
8 May		2533275				$-370.73		
15 May		2585159				$-279.55		
22 May		2637043				$-190.16
29 May		2688927				$-102.50		
5 Jun		2740811				$-16.50		
12 Jun		2792695				$67.91		
19 Jun		2844579				$150.77
26 Jun		2896463				$232.15		
3 Jul		2948347				$312.10		
10 Jul		3000231				$390.66		
17 Jul		3052115				$467.89
24 Jul		3103999				$543.83		
31 Jul		3155883				$618.52		
7 Aug		3207767				$692.01		
14 Aug		3259651				$764.32
21 Aug		3311535				$835.50
28 Aug		3363419				$905.58

                                                                                    

[greyday]

Looking at ltcwisdom.net calculator, i see these results for March 2018++ .. What other things should I consider besides this ? before buying the miner.. If I chose to go this route

Code:

Date		Difficulty			Profits
6 Mar		2066319				$-1,285.93
13 Mar		2118203				$-1,174.64
20 Mar		2170087				$-1,066.02
27 Mar		2221971				$-959.94
3 Apr		2273855				$-856.28		
10 Apr		2325739				$-754.93		
17 Apr		2377623				$-655.79		
24 Apr		2429507				$-558.77
1 May		2481391				$-463.77		
8 May		2533275				$-370.73		
15 May		2585159				$-279.55		
22 May		2637043				$-190.16
29 May		2688927				$-102.50		
5 Jun		2740811				$-16.50		
12 Jun		2792695				$67.91		
19 Jun		2844579				$150.77
26 Jun		2896463				$232.15		
3 Jul		2948347				$312.10		
10 Jul		3000231				$390.66		
17 Jul		3052115				$467.89
24 Jul		3103999				$543.83		
31 Jul		3155883				$618.52		
7 Aug		3207767				$692.01		
14 Aug		3259651				$764.32
21 Aug		3311535				$835.50
28 Aug		3363419				$905.58

                                                                                    

This is a good bit of info, but it can't account for the volatility of the altcoin market or the volume of new Scrypt miners that will be online by the time you get yours.

My L3+ (which I overpaid for via third party a few months ago) is still earning quite well. I personally think that it will reach ROI well before March (especially if bitcoin doesn't drop significantly). That said, I do not think I would buy another at this point (I WAS debating it a week ago or so). I'd put that money into a rig, because they're more versatile, have (IMO) longer profitability lifespans, and better resale (in theory, anyway; yes, people will always need GPUs for computers, but if, say, all 1060s became obsolete for mining at the same time, no way demand could meet the supply). Realistically it's 6 of 1, maybe around 7 of another. I wouldn't say it's at all stupid to get an L3+ right now, but I wouldn't be excited about one either.

If you DO decide to pull the trigger on one, PM me if you'd like to buy a discount coupon code. $125 coupon for $100.

[Oonej]

Hey greyday

What would you recommend for a good / short term ROI rig ?

I might consider this instead.

Thanks,
Oonej

[greyday]

In response to the part about mining rigs from your PM (so that others can chime in; also I know all of this info is available numerous times over on the board and the web in general, but since you asked):

It all depends on what you want to mine. I have some decent experience with 1060s, 1070s, and AMD 580s using Ethos. Currently, for price and ROI, the 580s were the best investment, they were all well under $300 and are currently outperforming everything. But that's because I am currently mining electroneum, and my 580s AT STOCK do about 770-800sols. They can be tweaked to get over 1000 I've read (though I haven't messed with flashing ATI cards yet). For longer term, more stable coins, I personally think Nvidia is king, and the 1060 (6gb models, the 3gb will be obsolete before long IMO) is the best buy. At about $300/card they outperform my 1070s significantly in Ethereum and other Ethash coins (dollar for dollar, watt for watt; in strict hashing of COURSE the 1070s perform better). For a starter rig, I would suggest either maxing out your rig with 1060s or 580s, or buying as many 1070s as your budget allows and adding more later with returns (keep in mind the 580s and 1070s are also power hogs, the 1060s are extremely reasonable on draw; none of this matters with Electroneum or other cryptonight coins, though, as the power usage is ridiculously small).

For the rest of your build: cheaper is better. NOT quality, price, so the least bells and whistles for the absolute most stable is going to be your best bet. Basically I add the price of an extra card onto the cost and it usually comes close to covering it:

Motherboard is the trick. You want something simple, stable, and with the number of PCIe ports you're going to want. I tend to stick to 6x or 8x boards; they make mining specific boards with as many as 23 (I think? Maybe it was 21?) pcie slots, but personally I like controlling my rigs on a smaller scale, they're easier to diagnose problems, power continuously (both in PSUs and individual lines, since you're going to need a different circuit for every 12-15 cards depending on settings and your circuit amperage), and control. Plus if one goes down, the other two are still running, so less loss of income. YMMV, plenty of people I know love those crazy farming boards...

Get the cheapest processor that fits the board you pick, it does NOT matter at all (unless you plan to do CPU mining as well, but I don't suggest that).

You don't need much ram, so whatever your OS requires as a minimum will work.

Buy as many risers as you will need (1 per card) PLUS 1 extra per 6. They have a high failure rate, and if you buy the extras individually somewhere like Amazon, they are free to return (but my two cents: keep them around just in case, they're cheap).

PSU: this is the other most important bit. Buy an 80+ gold or platinum PSU. You will be glad you did eventually; many will argue the reliability or safety issues, and I don't buy them for a second, but the real difference is going to be power loss, and remember, rigs run 24/7 so you want the most efficient PSU you can get for your money. Don't skimp here (also be sure it has enough GPU lines for your cards, you'll need one per card, and one SATA line per 2 cards). You will want to figure out the max wattage of each card and get a psu that equals that x number of cards + 50-100W for the system (WAYYY overkill if you shopped right, just being safe) +10-20% depending on how conservative you want to be. Add that total wattage up and find an 80+ g or p PSU that is that number or higher.

All in all, if you're patient (or you can find some lingering post cyber monday sales), you should be able to set up a pretty solid 6 card rig for well under $2K (unless you go 1070s, of course). If you just want to dip your toe in, save some cash and use a computer you already have and just get a couple cards, test them out, and see if you want to expand. That's how I started.

As for ROI, right now the 580s, but I honestly think the 1060s are just a better investment, I think they'll ROI in around the same time, maybe a couple weeks more, but they'll last longer...

[BaNgTHai]

I personally wouldnt buy L3+'s anymore. There is going to be some new thing that will come out and the l3's will be useless. Save your money and wait. Patience is the key!

[Oonej]

I personally wouldnt buy L3+'s anymore. There is going to be some new thing that will come out and the l3's will be useless. Save your money and wait. Patience is the key!

Thanks for your input.

I might go towards a GPU mining rig again...

Any tips on shopping locations? Anything that caters towards miners?

[RfBTC]

Looking at ltcwisdom.net calculator, i see these results for March 2018++ .. What other things should I consider besides this ? before buying the miner.. If I chose to go this route

Code:

Date		Difficulty			Profits
6 Mar		2066319				$-1,285.93
13 Mar		2118203				$-1,174.64
20 Mar		2170087				$-1,066.02
27 Mar		2221971				$-959.94
3 Apr		2273855				$-856.28		
10 Apr		2325739				$-754.93		
17 Apr		2377623				$-655.79		
24 Apr		2429507				$-558.77
1 May		2481391				$-463.77		
8 May		2533275				$-370.73		
15 May		2585159				$-279.55		
22 May		2637043				$-190.16
29 May		2688927				$-102.50		
5 Jun		2740811				$-16.50		
12 Jun		2792695				$67.91		
19 Jun		2844579				$150.77
26 Jun		2896463				$232.15		
3 Jul		        2948347				$312.10		
10 Jul		3000231				$390.66		
17 Jul		3052115				$467.89
24 Jul		3103999				$543.83		
31 Jul		3155883				$618.52		
7 Aug		3207767				$692.01		
14 Aug		3259651				$764.32
21 Aug		3311535				$835.50
28 Aug		3363419				$905.58

                                                                                    

This table has no sense.............

[Oonej]

It shows ROI time table. with an increasing difficulty.

I didn't want to list all the data as it was a lot of data... but here you go:

Code:

Date	Difficulty	LTC mined	LTC cumulative	LTC 28-day total	USD value	Cumulative USD	28-day total	Profits
6 Mar	2066319	Ł0.852	Ł0.852		$87.05	$87.05		$-1,512.95
13 Mar	2118203	Ł0.831	Ł1.683		$84.92	$171.97		$-1,428.03
20 Mar	2170087	Ł0.811	Ł2.494		$82.89	$254.87		$-1,345.13
27 Mar	2221971	Ł0.792	Ł3.286	Ł3.29	$80.96	$335.82	$335.82	$-1,264.18
3 Apr	2273855	Ł0.774	Ł4.060		$79.11	$414.93		$-1,185.07
10 Apr	2325739	Ł0.757	Ł4.817		$77.34	$492.27		$-1,107.73
17 Apr	2377623	Ł0.740	Ł5.558		$75.66	$567.93		$-1,032.07
24 Apr	2429507	Ł0.725	Ł6.282	Ł3.00	$74.04	$641.97	$306.15	$-958.03
1 May	2481391	Ł0.709	Ł6.991		$72.49	$714.46		$-885.54
8 May	2533275	Ł0.695	Ł7.686		$71.01	$785.46		$-814.54
15 May	2585159	Ł0.681	Ł8.367		$69.58	$855.05		$-744.95
22 May	2637043	Ł0.668	Ł9.035	Ł2.75	$68.21	$923.26	$281.29	$-676.74
29 May	2688927	Ł0.655	Ł9.689		$66.90	$990.16		$-609.84
5 Jun	2740811	Ł0.642	Ł10.332		$65.63	$1,055.79		$-544.21
12 Jun	2792695	Ł0.630	Ł10.962		$64.41	$1,120.20		$-479.80
19 Jun	2844579	Ł0.619	Ł11.581	Ł2.55	$63.24	$1,183.43	$260.17	$-416.57
26 Jun	2896463	Ł0.608	Ł12.188		$62.10	$1,245.54		$-354.46
3 Jul	2948347	Ł0.597	Ł12.785		$61.01	$1,306.55		$-293.45
10 Jul	3000231	Ł0.587	Ł13.372		$59.96	$1,366.50		$-233.50
17 Jul	3052115	Ł0.577	Ł13.949	Ł2.37	$58.94	$1,425.44	$242.01	$-174.56
24 Jul	3103999	Ł0.567	Ł14.516		$57.95	$1,483.39		$-116.61
31 Jul	3155883	Ł0.558	Ł15.074		$57.00	$1,540.39		$-59.61
7 Aug	3207767	Ł0.549	Ł15.623		$56.08	$1,596.46		$-3.54
14 Aug	3259651	Ł0.540	Ł16.163	Ł2.21	$55.18	$1,651.65	$226.21	$51.65

[fanatic26]

It shows ROI time table. with an increasing difficulty.

I didn't want to list all the data as it was a lot of data... but here you go:

The numbers on a calculator are so far off you may as well scribble numbers on a wall and throw darts at it. There is no way to estimate difficulty or LTC price that far out so all those numbers are trash.


The reality is, an ASIC miner in this space as a 3 month ROI, a GPU rig will cost twice as much and have more like an 8 month ROI

[Oonej]

It shows ROI time table. with an increasing difficulty.

I didn't want to list all the data as it was a lot of data... but here you go:

The numbers on a calculator are so far off you may as well scribble numbers on a wall and throw darts at it. There is no way to estimate difficulty or LTC price that far out so all those numbers are trash.


The reality is, an ASIC miner in this space as a 3 month ROI, a GPU rig will cost twice as much and have more like an 8 month ROI

I agree it is too far out to tell, which is why i'm hesitant to buy an ASIC. Who knows that the market would bring in that time frame. So you would say ASIC over a GPU rig? Even if the ASIC is a 4 month wait?

Oonej