Short version: PCoin is a Bitcoin Core v29.4 fork with RandomX proof-of-work. The
miner is
built into the node, so there is no xmrig to configure, no
stratum URL to get wrong and no config file. One command and your CPU is mining.
Full announcement and the honest disclosures are in the ANN thread:
topic 5591113. This
post is just the practical part.
Start mining in one commandLinux (Debian/Ubuntu). The installer verifies its download against the
release checksums and runs a setup wizard that asks for your payout address:
curl -fsSL https://pc.am/dl/install.sh | sudo sh
- portable zip, node + CLI + a tray miner:
github.com/pars5555/pcoin/releasesMining is off by default on purpose. Turn it on from the tray once the node has
synced - a node that mines before it has verified the chain is building on
something it has not checked, and anything it finds is thrown away.
Android - a miner APK is in the same releases page. A phone does perhaps
50 H/s, which is not much, but it works and it costs you nothing.
Manual control on Linux if you skip the wizard:
sudo -u pcoin pcoin-cli -datadir=/var/lib/pcoin getcpuminerinfo
sudo -u pcoin pcoin-cli -datadir=/var/lib/pcoin startmining "<your pc1q... address>" 4
The last number is threads; 0 means every core.
What to actually expect from a CPUMeasured on my own machines, light-mode RandomX:
| CPU | threads | H/s |
| i9-10900X (20 threads) | 4 | 264 |
| i9-10900X (20 threads) | 10 | 595 |
| i9-9900K (16 threads) | 3 | 235 |
| 6-core desktop | 1 | 74 |
| Android phone | - | ~50 |
More threads is not proportionally more hashrate. Light mode shares a
256 MiB cache, so past roughly a third of your cores you are mostly buying cache
contention. One machine went from 13 threads to 3 and lost only 58% of its
hashrate - per-thread rate nearly doubled. Try a few settings before assuming
100% is correct.
The arithmetic, including the part you will not likeDo not trust a hashrate number in a forum post, including this one. When I
first wrote this the network was around 17,000 H/s; within a day it had risen
several times over, and difficulty with it. Work it out yourself instead - it
takes ten seconds:
https://pool.pc.am/api/pools
Read
networkStats.networkHashrate. The chain emits 50 PCN per block at a
600 second target, so roughly 7,200 PCN a day is split across everyone mining.
So:
(your H/s / network H/s) x 7,200 = roughly your PCN per day.
That number
falls as more people join - it is a share of a fixed emission,
not a rate. It has already fallen sharply once. If the network doubles, your share
halves, and nothing about your machine changed.
And the caveat that matters more than any of the arithmetic: PCN is not traded
anywhere. There is no exchange, no orderbook and no way to sell it. What it
currently does is buy credit at five services I run (an uptime checker, a Telegram
site builder, an AI control panel and two 3D-model generators) at a rate I set.
That is a use, not a price, and you should treat it as worth zero dollars until a
real market exists.
If you want money, mine something else - genuinely. If you want to point idle
cores at a young chain and hold the coins in case it becomes something, this is
that.
Solo variance, and the poolSolo mining is a lottery: you find a whole 50 PCN block or you find nothing.
At 500 H/s you would average a block every ~7 hours, but that is an average -
plenty of days you will see nothing and conclude it is broken.
The pool is open. It pays miners
directly from each block's coinbase,
so there is no pool wallet, no private key on the server, no withdrawal to
request, and nothing an operator could run off with. PPLNS, 2% fee taken off the
block reward, minimum 0.00000294 PCN (the network dust limit). Your login is your
payout address - there is no registration.
Live stats and the exact command for your OS:
pool.pc.amYou need
v1.3.0 or newer, and both the node and bitcoin-cli must be that
version - an older CLI sends the thread count as text and the call fails with a
type error. Solo still works exactly as before if you would rather keep the whole
block reward and the variance that comes with it.
Check everything yourselfExplorer API https://explorer.pc.am/api/status
Pool API https://pool.pc.am/api/pools
Supply https://pc.am/supply/circulating.txt (bare number, from a full node)
Source https://github.com/pars5555/pcoin
Releases published with SHA-256 checksums
Binaries are
unsigned, so Windows SmartScreen will warn on first run. I do
not have a code-signing certificate. Say so plainly rather than have you find out.
Questions here or in the ANN thread.
