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December 31, 2013, 05:36:24 AM |
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I had heard about bitcoins back when I could have solo mined with a graphics card but had some preconception that it was a difficult thing to do. I found out just how simple it was just a few weeks ago when 1btc hit 1200 bucks. I started looking into it and thought "this is easy!" But of course my research lead me to the whole difficulty factor and how much processing power it continuously takes to earn a descent reward. One of the first (if not the first) articles I read about getting started in mining stated in beginning that you shouldn’t go into mining to get rich but rather to have fun as a hobby. I have tried to take this advice to heart and hey, what’s more fun than a hobby you can throw a bunch of money into on pricey computer gear...yay =)
About 2 - 3 weeks ago I setup my Alienware gaming rig to mine from its graphics card just to see if I could do it. It was pretty easy and it took me about 15 minutes from start of beginners guide and I was mining on slush's pool. Getting like .00002 per share and hasing at about 80M hashes I was actually pretty stoked just to see results. It was kind of fun. If you've played Starcraft, I was reminded of mining for crystals and Vespine gas. After a few days though I just wasn’t digging the tiny reward. I knew I was way behind the game so I started to look on eBay for asic miners. I was able to score a 5G BFL Jalapeno but way over paid for it and I knew it. It's either over pay on eBay and get it in a few days or buy from a manufacturer and wait for ever for it. So I got it, I had an Ubuntu Linux box loaded up with bitcoin-qt and bfgminer and was able to get it to recognize the BFL device. I was feeling really cool and geeky at that point since I really consider myself to be a Linux perma-noob! the device hashed away at 5.5G and I was getting about .00025 per block. I was hooked at that point. Since then I have added 2 more Jalapeno devices (one doing over 6G and another doing 8G) altogether I am getting about 20G and about .001 on a good round and .0008 to .0009 as of late. But still I wasnt done. Over the weekend I eBayed an Avalon Gen2 200G hasher, an Avalon dual module 60G haser, and another Jalapeno 8G haser. They should all be here by or before this Friday. So for this expected 290 to 300G hashes I hope to get I paid a total of $7140! ouch...I think I needed to read that. I still contend I am not trying to get rich but, I damm sure do want to see some full BTC in my wallet!! I dont know how to use those calculators, it is confusing for me but I'm thinking I could get around 7 to 9 BTC by around March before difficulty renders even 300 GH/s useless =( considering I can get these up by this weekend and keep them up. I'm also very intersted to see what my January elecric bill will look like =/
I would also like to look into building a custom rig, if I do reach my BTC goal all proceeds will go towards building my own rig. I dont know much about it, I have not researched it much on the interwebs but I'm thinking it isnt that hard providing you can get your hands on the right equipment. If anyone has any suggestions or links on the subject I'd love to check it out. Well, thanks for reading if you're still here. How is that for a newbie post? I think I earned the right to post everywhere else with this I hope.
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