Confused about which mining pool to join and stick with.

[ccualumni]

I am having a blast mining and am on information overload.


The one thing that seems to be missing is how much people are currently making mining.

Since that does not appear to be a hot topic, my question is about selecting a mining pool.

Is there a way to figure out which pool is going to make you the most money?

I understand that are certain parameters that are out of your control, but in general which pool is the best to join?


Are you better off with a smaller pool or a bigger one? When does the economics make sense to change pools?

I am guessing that there has to be a break even point (not sure what it would be called with mining) where you get too many people in a pool because when the pool pays out there is not enough for everyone. In other words, if we have a certain hash rate with 50 people in the pool, it will be a better payout with 500 people in the pool with the same hash rate.

Has anyone ran the numbers or tried to calculate what the "perfect pool" is?

Just curious what everyone thinks about this.

[wizkid057]

Eligius for sure.

[eleuthria]

Well if you're going to play that game:

BTC Guild for sure!

[Denni]

We need even bigger fonts!

[HellDiverUK]

I go between Eligius and BTC Guild.  My tertiary backup is Eclipse (it's a reliable PPS pool).

[Mivexil]

I am having a blast mining and am on information overload.


The one thing that seems to be missing is how much people are currently making mining.

Since that does not appear to be a hot topic, my question is about selecting a mining pool.

Is there a way to figure out which pool is going to make you the most money?

I understand that are certain parameters that are out of your control, but in general which pool is the best to join?


Are you better off with a smaller pool or a bigger one? When does the economics make sense to change pools?

I am guessing that there has to be a break even point (not sure what it would be called with mining) where you get too many people in a pool because when the pool pays out there is not enough for everyone. In other words, if we have a certain hash rate with 50 people in the pool, it will be a better payout with 500 people in the pool with the same hash rate.

Has anyone ran the numbers or tried to calculate what the "perfect pool" is?

Just curious what everyone thinks about this.

There will always be enough. Pools with bigger hashrate will give you less BTC per block, but will find blocks more often. So there really is not much of a difference.

Try to join a decently sized pool (so that it can hit blocks fairly consistently), but try not to get on the biggest player - it's better for the general economy if the hashrate is spread evenly between different pools (to minimize the risk of 51% attack).

[semaster]

look at my benchmark

I still recommend any p2pool.in node as of it decentralized nature. But yes you will have great variance.
In next benchmark round I will include reesult from Eligius.st

[anthem]

Its obvious that its better that people spread their hash over various pools, but its also obvious that people will gravitate to whatever will pay out best for them. .. 

[reikokuko]

Statistically, it doesn't matter what pool you join, in the long run, you will make the same regardless of what pool you join.  The only thing that can impact that is the pool's fee structure.

Big pools give you smaller but more frequent payouts, and this plays to a lot of miners' psyche.
Small pools will give you larger but less frequent payouts. (this is called variance).

So as far as how to pick a pool, looking at it from a profitability's perspective, look at their fee structure.  Otherwise, pick one with a good community (or not).

Personally, I would go with the smaller/mid-sized pools, they have a better more homely community and it helps spread out the hash rate.

[BTC LTC RUSH]

As the owner of a new pool I tend to agree with the earlier post.
I hashed a few pools when I first started & found that each pool was lacking something that I wanted.
It seems like the bigger pools are hard to communicate with, while the smaller pools take longer to get a return on your effort.
Most of the pools lack either that "community" feeling or they are very bare bones and kind of leave you on your own to figure things out.   In the end I just ended up creating my own pool.

Best of luck to you in your search.

[ccualumni]

Thanks everyone. I am doing it as a hobby and know that I will not break the bank. I have tons of questions and am very curious.

The problem is that while I do not expect to make a million, it would be nice to make a few dollars.

I do not have much of a hash rate, but am more than happy to spread it around so that the economy continues to grow

[cr1776]

Look at p2pool.  The fees are usually 1-6% lower than the other pools, so you make more. Likewise there is no account setup and earnings are paid instantly so you don't have to worry about a pool being hacked. The variance is higher, but over time you are better off.

[DrHaribo]

Try Bitminter. The only pool recommended by gummibears.

[ccualumni]

I like bit inter, but it does not work with the antminer

[Gator-hex]

Try Bitminter. The only pool recommended by gummibears.

I also recommend BitMinter. Been a sound pool for years and you can get payouts whenever you want, per day in my case.

For the sake of network integrity always avoid the biggest pools.

[Gator-hex]

I like bit inter, but it does not work with the antminer

You mean the java miner? It should work through cgminer or bfgminer.

[CeeCee]

Eligius for sure.

Well if you're going to play that game:

BTC Guild for sure!

Try Bitminter. The only pool recommended by gummibears.

wow just wow!

and now my opinion as not a pool owner.

1. eligius as it has 0% fees and and very nice payout system!
2. bitminter as fallback - only 1% fee

to btcguild -> it has a nice interface and you can find many informations. BUT 3% fees! (7% for PPS)

i really suggest you to start with eligius. its so easy to join the pool that you cant to anything wrong!

[eleuthria]

Eligius for sure.

Well if you're going to play that game:

BTC Guild for sure!

Try Bitminter. The only pool recommended by gummibears.

to btcguild -> it has a nice interface and you can find many informations. BUT 3% fees! (7% for PPS)

BTC Guild's 3% is identical to BitMinter's if you want the same features (paid orphans, idle alerts).  Paid orphans are a roughly 1% earnings increase (higher actually since I recall BitMinter and Eligius both averaging more than a 1% orphan rate).

[Hunterbunter]

Go with smaller nodes if you're patient. Go with big ones if you need to see coins trickling in daily.

Smaller ones keep the blockchain honest, but it is much more random how much you will earn on a given day. Ideally everyone should spread the love to protect the blockchain, but it's natural for a lot of people to just go with the big pools.

If you want to give a p2pool node a try, you'll end up supporting the blockchain better but also get reduced variance from the p2pool node system. Remember with PPLNS it takes a day to get up to full speed, so I'd do it for at least a week or two to get a feel for it. You can check out http://p2pool.in for the base one (to set up your own node), or I have a node which pays out devcoin bonuses here: http://blisterpool.com, plus there's a ton of other nodes out there. Happy mining!

[aurel57]

I will throw my 2 cents in on this. I have mined on Slush since June 2013 on and off. I have jumped to other pools since trying them out but have always ended back up at Slush until the last month. Here is what I think about the pools I tried:

I did  not do good on Eclipse after a week compared to my average payouts on Slush

I mined on Bitminter which I liked their easy setup but did better on Slush

 I mined on Eligius and once again I did not make as much after a few weeks as I had off Slush and also found the payout to be confusing. Only got a payout of 90+% which was no where close to my average payouts on Slush. Since then I have received a couple of small payouts even tho I have not mined on it in sometime that has now brought my payout to 98% of my earned amount. I have not been back but have thought of trying again as with the higher hash rate things might be better?

Now I have 2 BFL singles and am running one on Slush and one on BTC Guild so as to compare both pools. Some days BTC has beaten Slush and somedays Slush beats BTC Guild. Overall in the last 2 weeks Slush is ahead but by a small amount. Both pools have had their share of bad luck and good. What I like about Slush is it's a very simple to understand as long as you keep mining thru the whole block. BTC Guild has the advantage being bigger and a somewhat more stabilized payout. But I would say these are my 2 favorite pools.

Also I want to give credit to Eleuthria as who I think is the best pool operator. Always around to answer questions even on other pools