Mining scrypt based cryptocurrency

[psijic]

Hello everyone.

I finally decided to join the forums after spending almost a week on it.

I recently got interested in mining crypto-currency, and have been contemplating setting up a mining rig. After doing some extensive reading, I've concluded that its not feasible for me to get into bitcoin mining. I'm now looking to mine scrypt based currencies, and trade them in for bitcoins, or perhaps use an auto-switching pool like middlecoin, and get paid in bitcoins.

I'm currently capable of investing around $1000. In my country, that would basically get me a basic system with one 7950, and a power surge protection unit. I'll then be spending around $50 a month on electricity, if I keep the rig active 24 hours a day. This should give me around 600~700 kH/s.

Using the various mining profitability calculators, and seeing user responses on the rather massive middlecoin thread, I figure that I won't be making much in the initial stages, at least.

I'm not too worried about that. What I am worried about is that since I'll be using my mining profits to purchase additional 7950s for my rig, it might take me a few months to actually bring my system up to a couple of MHashes/sec level. With the announcement of dedicated scrypt mining FPGAs by companies like crypto industries, I'm certain that the difficulty level of alt coins is going to increase as more and more people start purchasing and pointing 10 MH/s devices to the various pools. Which means that my profitability will decrease further, and it will take me even longer to upgrade my rigs, and even then, I wouldn't be making as much as I could.

I really wish I could go out and set up a 2 or 4 MH/s rig tomorrow, but I just can't.

Can some one please advise me on this situation? Is it worth it, in my case, to get into mining? How does everyone plan to deal with the onset of these dedicated devices?

Any general advice, or comments are also welcome.

I look forward to reading your responses.

Thanks!

~ psijic

[Eksotik]

Hello and welcome!

Eventhough I'm bitcointalk newbie myself, I've done some mining 2 months now, basically scrypts.

First of all, all those mining profit calculators shows the profit with current value of some coin, so if you trust that the market share with some specific coin you are mining is going up, then you shouldn't be too much worried about the profits at the moment. Of course it's not healthy if it costs you $50 a month and there's no profits coming. Anywho, this was probably same thing with bitcoins in the early years.

Second, there have been rumours about FPGA/ASIC miners for a couple of months already. Before the companies give some proof that they got a working miner I wouldn't worry about them too much.

But yeah, I guess it's more of like where do you believe the coin you mine are going and not what you can get off it now.. Happy mining if you decide to start it!

[CaptainBeck]

Its best to invest what you can to start mining, then add more as you can invest more. If you dont want to play the markets or pick coins use a switch pool.

On the right switch pool with that hash you could make about $8+ a day. What you have left will go into buying more until u get to your hash target. It will be slow to begin with, but the first step is getting a miner going or investing in some coins.

[theBishop]

Tried to mine altcoin at Uni but laptop got overhot and lit up room!  Should I try sha 256 instead?

[CaptainBeck]

Laptops are crap at anything but being moved, they havent got the fans to keep the cool.

With a £400 $600 u can have an ok rig to start mining scrypt coin, make a couple of $ a day, at the current rate in a couple of months u can add alot of stuff to increase the hash.

Just dont use your laptop it will kill it!

[theBishop]

Its good at BF4 with good card and cant do both so yeah Ive stopped.

[psijic]

Thank you Eksotik and CaptainBeck, for the advice.

I think I'll start with one card, and see how I fare with middlecoin.

[infinitybo]

Yes it is.
This hash rate "2 or 4 MH/s" looks like a very interesting hardware therefore you should get into mining.

[adworker]

I'm currently capable of investing around $1000. In my country, that would basically get me a basic system with one 7950, and a power surge protection unit. I'll then be spending around $50 a month on electricity, if I keep the rig active 24 hours a day. This should give me around 600~700 kH/s.

Power surge protection unit is unnecessary, to reduce power consuption per GPU card, use rig with 4 GPU cards.

[infinitybo]

@Eksotik By the way it's still very cool to read an introduce such yours anyways good luck !

[psijic]

@adworker

Thanks for your suggestion. Unfortunately, in my area, we get many voltage fluctuations and power-outs in the monsoon season. This often causes damage to my computer components. In the last 2 years, I've lost 2 graphics cards (5750 and 7750) during the monsoon phase. Now that I'm going for much more expensive, and possibly multiple, cards; I think it'll be best to go for a power surge protection unit. It would be a tremendous loss to lose these new cards to similar circumstances.

By power surge protection, I basically mean a sine wave inverter which protects against voltage fluctuations, and provides several hours of power backup in case of power outage.

Can you elaborate on how power usage per GPU will be reduced when using 4 cards in one system? If I'm trying to get as much out of the cards as I can, shouldn't they all be working at maximum capacity, and thereby using the same amount of power as a 2 card or a 3 card system?

[nahallacman]

I'm currently capable of investing around $1000. In my country, that would basically get me a basic system with one 7950, and a power surge protection unit. I'll then be spending around $50 a month on electricity, if I keep the rig active 24 hours a day. This should give me around 600~700 kH/s.

Power surge protection unit is unnecessary, to reduce power consuption per GPU card, use rig with 4 GPU cards.

Woah woah woah. Don't go telling people surge protectors are useless. This is very misguided. A surge protector can save your entire investment. In the US we have what is considered to be pretty clean power, and almost every single electronics person I talk to would call you an idiot for not using one. In another country the power could be even less consistent. Any surge has the ability to destroy your equipment, or reduce the length of it's lifespan.

http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/everyday-tech/surge-protector.htm

A good link on why they are important.

Using less power is always a very good idea, and having as many cards in a single machine that you can uses less power since you have to power less motherboards and processors, but in the end the biggest power hogs in most systems are the GPU's anyways. Just make sure you can properly power each card you buy with the proper power supply. Also, 7950's are an older generation of cards now. They are still price effective but newer cards do even better. Also look up specific settings for your card (not another brand with the same model number) to know what sort of kh/s rates you will be getting at MAX. Many cards are actually unstable at the rates posted online, or at least have been in my experience. Don't forget that getting your rig running optimally will take some effort and tinkering, don't expect things to just work at their optimum out of the box.

[psijic]

@nahallacman

Thanks for the explanation.

I've decided to go for R9 280x cards due to availability. They use slightly more power, but in turn, the average KH/s also seems to be higher. The results posted by users on the litecoin mining hardware comparison page for the 280x range from 670 to 815 KH/s. I'm aware that I'll need to tweak and tinker with the system to achieve optimal performance. I'll consider myself successful if I can clock around 725 kH/s or more.

What do you think?

The one thing that I need to figure out now is the PSU. There is a collossal price jump between 850W, 1000W, and 1200W PSUs. 

[psijic]

Of course, I understand that I'll need a 1200W or higher PSU when I have 3 to 4 cards, but since I'm starting off with one or two cards at the moment, should I go for a 860W PSU now (in the interest of reducing initial investment), or should I just go for a 1200W right off the bat. Both have their pros and cons.

With a 1200W PSU, I'm sure that I'll be able to use it for at least three cards, and maybe 4 depending upon how much my system ultimately draws.

Using a 860W PSU for now would be cheaper, but I'll have to buy 1200W eventually anyways. However, I can then use this 850W PSU when I get started on my second rig.

[nahallacman]

That should work fine. You have to do what works for you in the end. If you do enough google searching you should be able to find the power consumption of all your devices and the power supply you may need. There are many calculators out there. Also, there are connectors that allow you to use 2 power supplies in tandem. Make sure when you buy a power supply you know how many 6/8 pin PCI-E connectors you have on the power supply. It is common to only have 4 6/8pin connectors (each plug can work as a 6 or an 8 pin), meaning you would need a power supply for each 2 cards. This is of course assuming each card has a 6pin and an 8pin connector on it. I believe that is how the 280's work but you should research all of this to be certain. A few hours of research can save you a lot of regret.

[mattopia]

I have one 280x in one of my systems and I'm getting about 720kh/sec with minimal tweaking.  I'm sure I could get a little more.  It's very solid, good choice. 

I think the ASICs will be awhile, nothing concrete yet.  You can always sell the hardware later to gamers, which minimizes your risk.  And, it's a bit of fun. 

Middlecoin is a good choice, I use them and like them.  With a limited hash rate, you can probably do a little better by watching the coins (coinwarz, coinmarketcap, etc), mining when diff is low, selling when value is high.  More work, a little higher risk, but more rewards, if you have the time.

Good luck!

[psijic]

That should work fine. You have to do what works for you in the end. If you do enough google searching you should be able to find the power consumption of all your devices and the power supply you may need. There are many calculators out there. Also, there are connectors that allow you to use 2 power supplies in tandem. Make sure when you buy a power supply you know how many 6/8 pin PCI-E connectors you have on the power supply. It is common to only have 4 6/8pin connectors (each plug can work as a 6 or an 8 pin), meaning you would need a power supply for each 2 cards. This is of course assuming each card has a 6pin and an 8pin connector on it. I believe that is how the 280's work but you should research all of this to be certain. A few hours of research can save you a lot of regret.

That's great advice. Thanks! I had not thought about that.

...

Middlecoin is a good choice, I use them and like them.  With a limited hash rate, you can probably do a little better by watching the coins (coinwarz, coinmarketcap, etc), mining when diff is low, selling when value is high.  More work, a little higher risk, but more rewards, if you have the time.

Good luck!

Thanks for the advice. I think I'll do what you recommended due to the limited hash rate.

[Pavlinius]

OK. Here's my advice. If you are sure that you will get more GPUs later then you need to prepare a PC that can handle several GPUs. I found that a PC with 4 x Radeon 280X to be a decent performer. Each of these cards makes between 700 and 800Kh/s but most of the time between 710 and 750Kh/s. So what you should go for is :

1. Motherboard with as many PCI-E slots as you can find for a decent price. Those PCI-E slots could be of any type from 1x to 16x, because you will have to use PCI-E extender cables anyway for multi-GPU configuration.
2. Cheapest CPU you can find
3. Not much RAM, 4GBs is enough (probably less is also OK)
4. Any HDD
5. Video cards - Radeon 280x, 7950, 7970. Make sure you buy a model with unlocked voltage, so that you can undervolt them. An example of what brand you should not buy is - Gigabyte. While XFX, Sapphire, ASUS are OK.
6. PSU - this is critical. I found that with a good 1KW PSU you can run 4x Radeon 280x but ONLY if you undervolt them (well this also depends on the brand of the cards, and also on each card itself). By default XFX Radeon 280X consumes about 280W (again this depends on the brand and the default GPU voltage), but with just a slight undervolt from 1.2 to 1.15V power consumption falls to 230W. So a good 1 KW PSU like Cooler Master V1000 or Fractal Design Platinum 1000 can power 4 of these cards. You should get a device for measuring the power consumption. That is for ensuring that you are not over-loading the PSU.



If you find the information useful you can donate me some DOGE.

[psijic]

OK. Here's my advice. If you are sure that you will get more GPUs later then you need to prepare a PC that can handle several GPUs. I found that a PC with 4 x Radeon 280X to be a decent performer. Each of these cards makes between 700 and 800Kh/s but most of the time between 710 and 750Kh/s. So what you should go for is :

1. Motherboard with as many PCI-E slots as you can find for a decent price. Those PCI-E slots could be of any type from 1x to 16x, because you will have to use PCI-E extender cables anyway for multi-GPU configuration.
2. Cheapest CPU you can find
3. Not much RAM, 4GBs is enough (probably less is also OK)
4. Any HDD
5. Video cards - Radeon 280x, 7950, 7970. Make sure you buy a model with unlocked voltage, so that you can undervolt them. An example of what brand you should not buy is - Gigabyte. While XFX, Sapphire, ASUS are OK.
6. PSU - this is critical. I found that with a good 1KW PSU you can run 4x Radeon 280x but ONLY if you undervolt them (well this also depends on the brand of the cards, and also on each card itself). By default XFX Radeon 280X consumes about 280W (again this depends on the brand and the default GPU voltage), but with just a slight undervolt from 1.2 to 1.15V power consumption falls to 230W. So a good 1 KW PSU like Cooler Master V1000 or Fractal Design Platinum 1000 can power 4 of these cards. You should get a device for measuring the power consumption. That is for ensuring that you are not over-loading the PSU.



If you find the information useful you can donate me some DOGE.

Thanks for your input. Here is the rig configuration that I'm planning:

1. MoBo: ASRock 970 Extreme 4 (I can easily add 4 GPUs to this)
2. AMD Sempron 145 (The cheapest processor I could find in the market)
3. 4 GB 1600 MHz RAM
4. 16 GB USB flash drive (I'll be using Linux)
5. GPU: The R9 280x offering by MSI
6. PSU: Corsair AX 1200W
7. A couple of fans for air circulation
8. Sine wave inverter - for power surge protection and power backup

Total cost: roughly $1275

I've been following this as a guide: http://www.cryptobadger.com/build-your-own-litecoin-mining-rig/

Thanks for the information about under-volting. I'd read about it in the guide I mentioned above, but I didn't realize that it would have this much of an impact on the total power usage.

I'd send you some Doge if I had any, but I'm just starting off in the crypto-currency world. Perhaps when I have mined "much coin" :-)

[CaptainBeck]

Some pci raisers might be needed there to get some space between the cards otherwise it will run on the hot end even with a fan.

Other than that it looks good. You thought about pools or coins yet??