why mess around with alt coins, litecoin

[Bitcoin Oz]

Unfortunately not, I didn't read careful enough, my GPU power is obviously of no use for mining Litecoin

I hope you understand how to run an exchange better than you understand how to mine litecoins...

[1715101122]

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[1715101122]

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[CAMOPEJB]

Unfortunately not, I didn't read careful enough, my GPU power is obviously of no use for mining Litecoin

I hope you understand how to run an exchange better than you understand how to mine litecoins...

+1

Also, if your exchange working with Litecoins too (http://www.vircurex.com) you can advertise it in Litecoin thread ;-)

[allten]

Any chain prefering a single piece of hardware will just cause miners to purchase it instead, better cpu mining? stock up on dual and quad socket server boards, better gpu mining? get some radeons. It's not leveling any playing field the same people that could afford a pile of graphcis cards can afford a pile of xeons or opterons (depending on which arcitecture deals with it better)

+1

As soon as real money becomes involved. It is a game changer!
But maybe litecoin was more for just fun and not a widely used successful currency?

[rjk]

As I understand it, the point is that you can mine both Litecoins and Bitcoins in the same rig. Since Bitcoins are preferring the GPUs, you then have the CPUs available to mine Litecoins using scrypt.

[Gabi]

As I understand it, the point is that you can mine both Litecoins and Bitcoins in the same rig. Since Bitcoins are preferring the GPUs, you then have the CPUs available to mine Litecoins using scrypt.

You are right.

That's exactly what i am doing right now. GPU mining Bitcoin and CPU mining Litecoin.

Problem is, people mine litecoin only if they are worth something, but the fact that we can mine them on cpu won't make them automatically worth something.

[Choad]

Problem is, people mine litecoin only if they are worth something, but the fact that we can mine them on cpu won't make them automatically worth something.

This is the biggest problem I see with litecoin.  So far, basically all you can do with them is trade them for bitcoin or usd.

[Gabi]

It's more than enough for me

[dryden]

As I understand it, the point is that you can mine both Litecoins and Bitcoins in the same rig. Since Bitcoins are preferring the GPUs, you then have the CPUs available to mine Litecoins using scrypt.

You are right.

That's exactly what i am doing right now. GPU mining Bitcoin and CPU mining Litecoin.

Problem is, people mine litecoin only if they are worth something, but the fact that we can mine them on cpu won't make them automatically worth something.

What's to stop someone from adapting the scrypt algorithm from cpuminer into a GPU miner client for litecoin?  They could silently corner the market.

[Explodicle]

What's to stop someone from adapting the scrypt algorithm from cpuminer into a GPU miner client for litecoin?  They could silently corner the market.

http://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/1305/what-features-of-scrypt-make-tenebrix-gpu-resistant

[DeathAndTaxes]

What's to stop someone from adapting the scrypt algorithm from cpuminer into a GPU miner client for litecoin?  They could silently corner the market.

One word answer... cache.

GPU have insufficient L1 data cache.  Scrypt is highly dependent on memory latency.  L1 cache is usually 1 clock latency.  Shared Memory on GPU is usually a 20+ clock cycle latency.  When you consider a GPU runs about 1/4th the speed (in MHz) compared to a CPU that is more like a 80x increase in latency.

Scrypt isn't GPU hostile that is an imprecise term.  Scrypt is small cache hostile.  Someday there will be a GPU w/ 32KB of L1 cache and will destroy so called CPU-only chains but ... not today.

[dryden]

@Explodicle, @DeathAndTaxes, Thanks.  I suppose I could've looked it up, but it didn't occur to me there was a deeper reason.

[CAMOPEJB]

What's to stop someone from adapting the scrypt algorithm from cpuminer into a GPU miner client for litecoin?  They could silently corner the market.

One word answer... cache.

GPU have insufficient L1 data cache.  Scrypt is highly dependent on memory latency.  L1 cache is usually 1 clock latency.  Shared Memory on GPU is usually a 20+ clock cycle latency.  When you consider a GPU runs about 1/4th the speed (in MHz) compared to a CPU that is more like a 80x increase in latency.

Scrypt isn't GPU hostile that is an imprecise term.  Scrypt is small cache hostile.  Someday there will be a GPU w/ 32KB of L1 cache and will destroy so called CPU-only chains but ... not today.

Do you have some info when would it happen?

[tradesteady]

thanks for the sharing indeed!

[DeathAndTaxes]

What's to stop someone from adapting the scrypt algorithm from cpuminer into a GPU miner client for litecoin?  They could silently corner the market.

One word answer... cache.

GPU have insufficient L1 data cache.  Scrypt is highly dependent on memory latency.  L1 cache is usually 1 clock latency.  Shared Memory on GPU is usually a 20+ clock cycle latency.  When you consider a GPU runs about 1/4th the speed (in MHz) compared to a CPU that is more like a 80x increase in latency.

Scrypt isn't GPU hostile that is an imprecise term.  Scrypt is small cache hostile.  Someday there will be a GPU w/ 32KB of L1 cache and will destroy so called CPU-only chains but ... not today.

Do you have some info when would it happen?

No clue.  L1 cache is expensive in terms of die space.  Not really any need for L1 cache to do graphics work but as GPU are called upon to do more and more non-graphics work the demand for L1 cache will increase.  NVidia top of the line Tesla has 48KB of L1 cache.  Granted that is a $2K card so I doubt anyone has interest in using it for "CPU mining" still Moore's law has taught us that what is available for $2K today will be available for $100 eventually.

[CAMOPEJB]

KK. I thought you did some research 

It will be available for $100 eventually but the question is: which CPUs will be available then? 

[RaggedMonk]

What rate can you mine litecoins at with average or top of the line CPUs?

[CAMOPEJB]

8-16Kh/s

Check here:
http://liteco.in/threads/the-hardware-and-hashrate-thread.21/

[RaggedMonk]

8-16Kh/s

Check here:
http://liteco.in/threads/the-hardware-and-hashrate-thread.21/

Thanks, that was exactly what I was looking for.

I just downloaded the basic Litecoin client and left my computer on overnight mining.  When I click the "Start Mining" button, i get the messaged "Solo Mining Started", but I don't see any Kh/s measure or any indication that I am actually doing any work.  How can I tell if my computer is mining correctly?

Anyone have a recommendation of an easy-to-setup mining program and/or mining pool for litecoin?

[Gabi]

Use that pool http://pool-x.eu

And the miner you find on that site, look on top 

[pooler]

Anyone have a recommendation of an easy-to-setup mining program and/or mining pool for litecoin?

You can compare mining pools here:
https://github.com/coblee/litecoin/wiki/Comparison-of-mining-pools

Almost all the pools listed above have a "getting started" or "help" page with detailed instructions.