Is buying used R9 290X worth it?

[QuirkSilver]

I had a full rig of 290x and 390... of which one is left, experimnted alot.

In brief, Zcash with claymore on STOCK speeds of 390 (1010 mhz) gives 390 H/s which imo really GOOD!
290x Should have wether same or higher numbers.
Unmodded bios, GPU-z= 146watts (190 watts real world maximum?) But also its main GPU so, they are profitable 100%, same hash rate as the Garbage gaming Nvidias for 700$? with abit more of electricity, much higher ROI and quit mining with no real losses (i would never pay more than 125-150$ for these used, but also, you have to make sure they aren't absued)

Stilt Bios lower vrm switching frequency makes better effiecincy and wattage but increases vrm temperatures (or thats what i thought) ! (one of my 290s was burnt this way, that GPU was making 870 h/s cryptonight with 92 watts in GPU-Z!)

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[QuintLeo]

No point in mining ZEC with these cards (or the 290/390/390x) as they're all more profitable on ETH by a fair bit.

Worthwhile depends on your electric cost and how much you can get the cards for, even with an undervolt BIOS from TheStilt on my R9 290 cards they're still pulling ballpark guess 250 watts on ETH mining at 30ish Mhash/sec.

TheStilt BIOS get a lot of their efficiency from switching OFF a lot of the "video output" related parts of the card as well as undervolting - they do NOT "lower vrm switching frequency" as that would DECREASE efficiency.

GPU-Z wattage figures for AMD cards ALWAYS understate them a lot - seems like it only looks at the PCI-E power connection inputs and NOT at the power draw from the PCI-E bus or some such.
Nvidia-SMI does a MUCH better job of that on the Nvidia side of things.

[VasilyS]

r9 290's are profitable even in 2019 while mining Ethereum (29-30 mh/s) on Ubuntu (version no higher than 16.04 for GPU compatibility). While mining Beam it gives 12-13 sol/s, CryptonightR - 650 h/s. There is a guide how to do it (in Russian): https://www.cryptoprofi.info/?p=3313. Also these cards are very good heaters in winter time...

[adaseb]

From what I recently learnt from a similar ancient GPU thread,
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1540107.0

You can still mine ETH with the Hawaii GPUs however it won't work under Windows and/or with Claymore.

You need to use software like SMos or PhoenixMiner and you will get the full 30MH/s that everybody got in 2016/2017. I didn't realise this and pretty much almost got rid of my R9 290, however most likely in the winter months will power them up again.

[VasilyS]

It works perfectly with Claymore 14.7 and last Phoenix under Ubuntu.

[VasilyS]

Yes, R9 290 is possible to buy for 50 dollars. ROI is 5-6 monthes if you have price for electricity about 0,05 dollars.

[Mr.merson]

I was just looking for something related to these cards, in terms of price performance and capacity I am undecided

In my area I found some "offers" in the informal market (already used for mining, of course)
r9 290 4GB 65 $
rx 470 4 GB 75 $
R9 390x 8 GB 70 $
rx 570 8 GB 100 $
rx 470 8 GB 100 $

Some vendors say they have been used only for "games", come on ... I do not even think so. I would be encouraged to buy if any will go down for around $ 40 ...

they are usually double the price mentioned I suppose they will be desperate sale

[Piskeante]

yes, buy them. That way your profit will be -50 dollars per month, if not more.

Are people mad or what? Not even RX 580 hyper-undervolted are profitable on ETH right now. at 0,10$ per KWh you are lucky if you break even.

[adaseb]

I was just looking for something related to these cards, in terms of price performance and capacity I am undecided

In my area I found some "offers" in the informal market (already used for mining, of course)
r9 290 4GB 65 $
rx 470 4 GB 75 $
R9 390x 8 GB 70 $
rx 570 8 GB 100 $
rx 470 8 GB 100 $

Some vendors say they have been used only for "games", come on ... I do not even think so. I would be encouraged to buy if any will go down for around $ 40 ...

they are usually double the price mentioned I suppose they will be desperate sale

In my area the pricing is pretty similiar. The RX 470 4GB resell value is very low probably because AMD made millions of those GPUs and almost all got bought by miners and now nobody wants them anymore.

The 8GB always goes for more because it has more memory and in certain newer and more intensive games it performs better. It also performs a little faster with ETH mining due to the faster ram.

The 290/390 pricing is similiar since they are power-hog type of GPUs and miners don't want them. And gamers might want them but due to the power issues they are noiser than say an RX 580 or some Nvidia 1070 GPU.