Mining on gaming consoles

[Anonymous]

Is there a way for me to use my xbox360, ps3, or wii, to mine for bitcoins?? Some sort of code written to be like a game, but actually is a miner. I would think that a gaming console would have the highest hash rates of them all.

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[heinz]

Other
Model   p/t   Mhash/s   Mhash/J   Mhash/s/$   ACP [W]   Clock   Version   Comment
Cell   6   21   0.35   0.07   60W   3.2 GHz   Cellminer   Sony Playstation 3 (FAT): Needs custom firmware. source source Total power usage of PS3 fat is 120W but only the Cell cpu is active.
Cell   7   26.6   ?   ?   60W   3.2 GHz   Cellminer   Sony Playstation 3 (FAT): Needs custom firmware. source source Running with 7th spu enabled and both ppe cores.
Cell   6   21   0.7   0.07   35W   3.2 GHz   cellminer   Sony Playstation 3 (SLIM): Total power usage of PS3 slim is 70W but only the Cell cpu is active.

Taken from https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Mining_hardware_comparison

[Azrael_PT]

Hi.
I think that the PS3 has something but it runs on linux.
http://www.ps3hax.net/2011/06/cellminer-bitcoin-miner-for-the-cell-broadband-engine-architecture/
The hash rate is not so high as you think.
https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Mining_hardware_comparison#Other

[DeathAndTaxes]

Is there a way for me to use my xbox360, ps3, or wii, to mine for bitcoins?? Some sort of code written to be like a game, but actually is a miner.

Yes.

I would think that a gaming console would have the highest hash rates of them all.

No.

When Bitcoin was CPU mined consoles were pretty powerful compared to home computers.   However GPU destroyed those perfromance metrics.  Remember xbox360 & PS3 are now what 7 years old?  That means the hardware (which was finalized about 2 years before launch) is almost 9 years old.

It would be like saying I think a low end video card from 9 years ago would be a powerful miner.   Moore's law is a monster.  Even if a console is top of the line (which usually they aren't)  a decade in an insanely long time.   GPU performance roughly doubles every 18 months.  An entry level video card today (i.e. $59 special) is many magnitudes more powerful that the most powerful GPU from 10 years ago.    Worse the GPU on consoles can't be used at all.  They come from a time before programmable shaders.  They can't run OpenCL code.

Hypothetically shortly after launch of the "next xbox/PS" they may be decent miners depending on how powerful their GPU are and if they are OpenCL capable.  No way to know until they launch.   Today PS3/xbox is worthless for Bitcoin.  Maybe someone could look to see if they can mine "CPU friendly" chains.  A lot would depend on how much L1 cache they have.  My guess is they won't do a very good job there either.

[Anonymous]

Oh, I see. Thank you all.

[ssvb]

Maybe someone could look to see if they can mine "CPU friendly" chains.  A lot would depend on how much L1 cache they have.  My guess is they won't do a very good job there either.

There is Cell/BE optimized miner for litecoin, which can run on linux capable PS3 consoles : https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=55953.0
Probably a lot of people have already noticed it, but I got zero feedback from PS3 owners so far

[fivemileshigh]

Probably a lot of people have already noticed it, but I got zero feedback from PS3 owners so far

I'm thinking of getting a PS3 just for litecoin mining. Just doing the math to see if it makes sense. If your numbers are right, the PS3 is the cat's ass, by a very long shot. I wonder why there don't seem to be more people using it.

[Red Emerald]

Probably a lot of people have already noticed it, but I got zero feedback from PS3 owners so far

I'm thinking of getting a PS3 just for litecoin mining. Just doing the math to see if it makes sense. If your numbers are right, the PS3 is the cat's ass, by a very long shot. I wonder why there don't seem to be more people using it.

Except litecoins are not even worth pennies and only going down. Just because you can get a bunch of KH/s doesn't make it good.  Run the numbers for the electricity and then see if you think it is still "the cat's ass"

[fivemileshigh]

I meant cat's ass relative to anything else on that list. I'm aware ltc is barely pennies, but so was btc at one point. I'll do the math and we'll see.

[gurg2.o]

Good idea, not so productive though 

[ssvb]

I'm thinking of getting a PS3 just for litecoin mining.

For LTC mining, OtherOS capable PS3 is needed. And there are no chances of finding one of these in the shops nowadays. But some people may still have PS3 consoles with the older version of firmware.

[DeathAndTaxes]

I meant cat's ass relative to anything else on that list. I'm aware ltc is barely pennies, but so was btc at one point. I'll do the math and we'll see.

That wasn't the point.  When BTC was worth pennies it was still worth more than the electrical cost to produce them.   Compare electricity consumed vs value of LTC produced.

[ukcryptoking]

Oddly enough I've just purchased 52 PS3 consoles in bulk for a grand total of ... drum roll ....
£35 ( about $48 lol )

Now they all work & are operational .. just needed new hard drives

So I'm installing YellowDog this week ..installing CPU Miner ( supports Cell ) and am mining ZOIN

The highest guy in my mining pool has 124 kH/s
2nd highest 28 kH/s

The PS3 delivers an average of 38 kH/s

Based on how new zoin an a lot of other coins are they are extremely easy to mine & give good rewards

I'll post my updates here once I've got the first one up and running this week

Oh and for those who say it wont be profitable ..
the PS3 left on for 24 hours will only use approx 3 kw
My electricity cost per kw/h is £0.13
Total daily cost per machine .. less than £0.70 per day

The cost of 1 ZOIN at this moment is $0.98
Now .. the top guy in my pool today for his 124 kH/s received 81 ZOI
81 x $0.98 = $79.38 !

Not too shabby !

Why people still try and mine BTC /LTC / ETH even XMR is beyond me.. much better options out there

[xarly1]

I think a lot on it you will not earn , it's not something that you can extract cryptocurrency, it is better to use everything for its intended purpose

[DigitalLemming]

Oddly enough I've just purchased 52 PS3 consoles in bulk for a grand total of ... drum roll ....
£35 ( about $48 lol )

How on earth did you score an epic deal like that?!? I'm really interested in the results of this. I would mine 1 for a few days just to get an idea how much your making. Then multiply by 52 to see if you will be profitable before going through all the trouble setting them up.

[ukcryptoking]

They company on ebay listing them had them all as spares repairs so I bought the job lot lol

To be fair though 3 are knackered .. the rest except 1 which keeps overheating work perfectly fine

If the difficulty of ZOI increases too much I'll switch coins..

Heck when I've finished I'll stick them back on ebay either as is for £10 each or put the PS3 OS back on lol and sell them for £30 each

Making money either way

I'm setting up a youtube channel as I will be posting regular videos covering this from start to finish

A lot of people say the PS3 is crap.. yeah for BTC or any other coin thats been around for ages .. the difficulty & DAG size is just impossible..

There is an old saying which applies to mining crypto as well...

Look after the pennies.. the pounds look after themselves

[lakimens]

You think a gaming console that's made ONLY for gaming will be very good at MINING?

[ukcryptoking]

Why not some crypto currencies still use CPU mining ..
and wouldnt a console built to process data quickly have a decent CPU ...

And see thats where you're wrong ..
It wasnt ONLY built for gaming ..
It was built as an ENTERTAINMENT unit hence the blu-ray drive !

38 kH/S is good enough to mine some decent coins

See for yourself
http://cryptomining24.net/table-of-mining-cpu/     It made the list .. cant be that crap & compare it to other CPUs !

Anyway we'll see..
Cant wait to start doing some videos..

[ukcryptoking]

Or better yet ..

https://www.cryptocompare.com/mining/calculator/xmr?HashingPower=38&HashingUnit=KH%2Fs&PowerConsumption=129&CostPerkWh=0&MiningPoolFee=0

Anyway thats Monero.. I dont care about that coin .. I want the NEW coins with low difficulty
More reward..

I'll be creating a full video series of this from start to finish so once and for all people will know the answer to this question

[Trscottc]

I am trying to get my PS3 to mine and I'm having difficulties.  Did you put any videos together yet?  Are you using yellow dog?  What mining software are you using?