Mining Rig using spare system

[zebigfoot]

Hi All,

I`ve got a spare system lying around & wanted to convert it into a Mining rig for below system specs.
I`m open to suggestions of which card will give be the best ROI (considering R9 280X & HD6950 right now)
I`ll have someone flying back from the USA shortly so thankfully they can pickup a couple of items as well

Intel mobo D945GCPE, Bus Clock: 200 MHz
1 PCIe 16x slot (which is PICe v 2.0 I guess) and 2 PCI 1x slots
3GHZ Intel P4 processor (64-bit ready and 2 hyper threads)
1GB DDR2 RAM (expandable upto to 2GB)
250W PSU (which i`ll definitely need to upgrade!)
Windows XP 32-bit OS SP3

I had a few queries for the upgrade and would appreciate any help and
hope this thread also helps others like me upgrade their old rigs.

1. I plan to buy a PCIe 3.0 card like R9 280X on the existing single PCIe16x slot.
But will the card get "bottle necked" in terms of hashrates going below 750kh/s ?
I did find the link below which said it wont, but has anyone tried this specifically for 
mining and can confirm it works ok ?

http://www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/will-i-bottleneck-the-r9-280x.192214/

2. If the R9280x is not bottle necked can i use 1X to 16X risers
(like these - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA3XT18W8386)
and pile on newer cards on the other 2 PIC slots ? Should these be powered risers ?
Considering the above specs, will a HD6950 be a better bet ?

3. Is there a huge difference in terms of power bills if I use a bronze PSU & Gold PSU ?
If  yes, how much of a benefit will it make? For a 1 card setup I was thinking of a
Seasonic 620W S12II or Corsair CMX600. If the multi-card setup seems feasible and Gold PSU`s
make a reasonable power savings I don`t mind spending a bit extra to pick up a good 750W PSU

4. Are ATI drivers and APP libraries available for CGMiner to work properly on 32-bit XP ?
I`ve been trying to get this done on another WinXP box but it hasn`t been easy yet.
For this mobo, Win7 is not a recommended installation. I`m trying to get a rig up ASAP
and would need to avoid an OS installation right now since this system needs a fair amount of file backups t

5. Are the scrypt hash rates impacted by the OS being 32-bit or 64-bit OS ? and also by RAM amount?

6. For a multi card setup, is it required to use ATI Crossfire on this mobo ? Whats the
advantage to using Crossfire?

[zebigfoot]

BUMPing...would appreciate a little help folks... some of the queries are generic & will also help other noobs

[bjalbert]

To answer:

1. no not even close 1x slots will not even slow you down get pci-e 1.0 2.0 out of your head.

2. I haven't looked at your mobo and if it has 24pin and some other 8 pin then no. But an intel board is not a gaming board so not sure. Anyways you are going to need a riser for 1x slot so buy powered ones for like $15.

3. How much do you pay per Kwh? but I always go platinum and cut it close watt wise. For example my "normal" everyday rig has 3x 280x cards(undervolted 1150) CPU OC'd to 4.3ghz and 16gb ram all on a 1000watt evga platinum. Everyone overestimates what you need and it is what you draw at the wall. That being said you will be fine with gold psu. Just say for gold PSU: 300watts per 280x/7970 and max 250 for OC cpu/mem and peripherals. Most like to have a safe zone beyond reason but to each their own.

4. haven't done 32bit but I don't see how it would matter. just download and use the correct versions. 32/64

5. I know cpu mining matters 32bit vs 64 bit but not sure on scrypt mining. As for ram it is not much. I mine protoshares(cpu) while mining(gpu) to max out profits. Look up Yam yvg1900 for miner and depending on CPU 2 threads less than the number of cores you have should work. just test to make sure you are not going to lose hash rate.

6. DO NOT CROSSFIRE! each card performs better solo.

Hope that helps.

[maardein]

Hi All,

I`ve got a spare system lying around & wanted to convert it into a Mining rig for below system specs.
I`m open to suggestions of which card will give be the best ROI (considering R9 280X & HD6950 right now)
I`ll have someone flying back from the USA shortly so thankfully they can pickup a couple of items as well

Intel mobo D945GCPE, Bus Clock: 200 MHz
1 PCIe 16x slot (which is PICe v 2.0 I guess) and 2 PCI 1x slots
3GHZ Intel P4 processor (64-bit ready and 2 hyper threads)
1GB DDR2 RAM (expandable upto to 2GB)
250W PSU (which i`ll definitely need to upgrade!)
Windows XP 32-bit OS SP3

I had a few queries for the upgrade and would appreciate any help and
hope this thread also helps others like me upgrade their old rigs.

1. I plan to buy a PCIe 3.0 card like R9 280X on the existing single PCIe16x slot.
But will the card get "bottle necked" in terms of hashrates going below 750kh/s ?
I did find the link below which said it wont, but has anyone tried this specifically for 
mining and can confirm it works ok ?

http://www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/will-i-bottleneck-the-r9-280x.192214/

2. If the R9280x is not bottle necked can i use 1X to 16X risers
(like these - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA3XT18W8386)
and pile on newer cards on the other 2 PIC slots ? Should these be powered risers ?
Considering the above specs, will a HD6950 be a better bet ?

3. Is there a huge difference in terms of power bills if I use a bronze PSU & Gold PSU ?
If  yes, how much of a benefit will it make? For a 1 card setup I was thinking of a
Seasonic 620W S12II or Corsair CMX600. If the multi-card setup seems feasible and Gold PSU`s
make a reasonable power savings I don`t mind spending a bit extra to pick up a good 750W PSU

4. Are ATI drivers and APP libraries available for CGMiner to work properly on 32-bit XP ?
I`ve been trying to get this done on another WinXP box but it hasn`t been easy yet.
For this mobo, Win7 is not a recommended installation. I`m trying to get a rig up ASAP
and would need to avoid an OS installation right now since this system needs a fair amount of file backups t

5. Are the scrypt hash rates impacted by the OS being 32-bit or 64-bit OS ? and also by RAM amount?

6. For a multi card setup, is it required to use ATI Crossfire on this mobo ? Whats the
advantage to using Crossfire?

1: Any PCIe card should be fine, mining does not use a lot of bandwith (unlike gaming), so no bottleneck.

2: No, PCI and PCIe are COMPLETELY different, and you can NOT connect a PCIe card to a PCI slot. So if you have one PCIe slot, one card is your max (and you can use a riser with it if you wish).

3: The difference between bronze/gold/platinum is small. If the price is the same, go for the highest rating, otherwise take the cheapest (but stick with reliable brands).

4: Haven't tried XP, but make sure to use cgminer before 3.7.2, after that scrypt and GPU's are not supported anymore!

5: No, and no. Maybe with the exception if your ram amount is so tiny that your OS is struggeling with it (like 128mb on XP or something).

6: Do not use crossfire for mining. There is no advantage, only with gaming.

By the way, are you sure you have PCIe slots at all? If I look up your motherboard on google, I find boards with only two PCI slots?

[zebigfoot]

thanks for your replies bjalbert and maardein - i did have a look at the mobo now and sadly there is no PCIe slot available, although it should be as per http://www.pc-specs.com/mobo/Intel/D945GCPE/1506
on the plus side, i did learnt a LOT about graphics cards and system specs - i`m now working on building a decent mining rig which can double up as a gaming machine once the GPU mining phase is over
in order to help out others in a similar situation , here are my findings :

1. get your PCI versions in place mainly to know the difference between PCIe and plain-old PCI.

2. for windows xp users it IS possible to run cgminer , i got it up and running on an old onboard graphics chipset of mine. You`ll need to install Catalyst Control Center 11.12 and APP SDK of 2.6 - visit oldapps.com to download the installables. The matching cgminer version is 3.4.3 but this may give lower hashrates
If possible upgrade to Win7 to avoid the hassles of using old drivers and lower hashrates

3. Get the basic building blocks right - invest in a good quality PSU and also UPS to avoid burning out your cards ! 32-bit or 64-bit does not seem to matter but having larger system RAM never hurts