New to Mining - Need some Recommendations

[fred5283]

Yo,

New to mining, did some tests this weekend to see if I could get up and running with my GPU's using GUIMiner - looks like I'm mining!  But, with such a low hashrate, that's not the way to go these days.  So, in order to get some good hashrate, here are my questions:

1. What are some hardware recommendations?  USB sticks?  Erurptors?
2. What software should I use?
3. Pool recommendations?
4. Mine another type of coin?

I have a 1000W rig, 1090 x6 CPU, dual 5870 gpus.

I appreciate all feedback.  No high cost / $10k system recommendations please!  I see those USB sticks are ~$40 and that seems like a good place to start...

Thanks,
Nick

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[mojacho]

Try antminer s1.
But the electricity cost is high

[fred5283]

Try antminer s1.
But the electricity cost is high

OK, I'll look into it, thanks for the recommendation!  

Anything else come to mind?  I see something like this is out there: http://minerscube.com/ ; Great hash rate for the price - Might be a little out of my price range, but anything in the $100-$1000 price range?

I'm guessing some of this stuff isn't plug and play?  Also, as difficulty increases, hardware can become outdated fairly quickly??

On with the comments, thanks in advance!

EDIT: sounds like that minerscube is a scam!

EDIT#2: with my current set up, I could probably mine some Litecoin?

[byt411]

Try antminer s1.
But the electricity cost is high

OK, I'll look into it, thanks for the recommendation!  

Anything else come to mind?  I see something like this is out there: http://minerscube.com/ ; Great hash rate for the price - Might be a little out of my price range, but anything in the $100-$1000 price range?

I'm guessing some of this stuff isn't plug and play?  Also, as difficulty increases, hardware can become outdated fairly quickly??

On with the comments, thanks in advance!

EDIT: sounds like that minerscube is a scam!

EDIT#2: with my current set up, I could probably mine some Litecoin?

Yes, Minerscube is probably is a scam. Also, you can try out Cloud Mining, with services such as cex.io or PBMining.

[alexrossi]

Minerscube is a scam, you can try an s1 but i warn you that it won't easy to achieve ROI, unless you have free power

[fred5283]

Minerscube is a scam, you can try an s1 but i warn you that it won't easy to achieve ROI, unless you have free power

Yea, I understand!

Seems like mining for BTC is very difficult these days, even if you do it in a pool.

I'm still interested, just not sure if I want to mine BTC now.... maybe something else would be worth it??

[byt411]

Minerscube is a scam, you can try an s1 but i warn you that it won't easy to achieve ROI, unless you have free power

Yea, I understand!

Seems like mining for BTC is very difficult these days, even if you do it in a pool.

I'm still interested, just not sure if I want to mine BTC now.... maybe something else would be worth it??

Try cex.io or PBMining. You might not make that much of a profit, but it's a nice way to get into mining.

[PolarPoint]

I am not trying to discourage you from mining, you should use a mining profit calcuator to review the potential profits before you buy a miner. It may not be as profitable as you might expect.

[Chrithu]

I don't really know what to advise. Any calculator will tell you that probably you should stay out of mining unless you plan to give away at least a few hundred bucks for hardware. Doesn't matter which coin really. But to my knowledge any of those calculators only take the current value of BTC into consideration and work on the assumption that any mined bitcoins are meant to be traded for dollars right away. I myself keep mining with my 2 Antminer U2 USB Sticks because any Bitcoin fraction I mine now while I still get something from letting them run might be worth thousand times more ten years from now.

GPU mining generally is a good way to get started when one owns the cards already. BUT ONLY to have a look into the technical side of mining and to see how pools work and stuff. Because of the power consumption of GPUs it is definetly not advisable as it is the most ineffictive way possible and also yields the risk of burning your cards faster than normal leaving you there with nothing to game on.

[fred5283]

I don't really know what to advise. Any calculator will tell you that probably you should stay out of mining unless you plan to give away at least a few hundred bucks for hardware. Doesn't matter which coin really. But to my knowledge any of those calculators only take the current value of BTC into consideration and work on the assumption that any mined bitcoins are meant to be traded for dollars right away. I myself keep mining with my 2 Antminer U2 USB Sticks because any Bitcoin fraction I mine now while I still get something from letting them run might be worth thousand times more ten years from now.

GPU mining generally is a good way to get started when one owns the cards already. BUT ONLY to have a look into the technical side of mining and to see how pools work and stuff. Because of the power consumption of GPUs it is definetly not advisable as it is the most ineffictive way possible and also yields the risk of burning your cards faster than normal leaving you there with nothing to game on.

Thanks for the info!  I finally got up and running!  Yay!  Not that I'm going to make any BTC, but I'm good to go now. 

I did crash at one point and had to re-download the entire block chain again (Still DLing as of this moring, ~30 weeks left.  I forget the error message, but it was a weird one and looked it up, said that's what I had to do on the forums).

Anyways, with the hash rate I'm getting, could I be mining litecoins?

http://www.imagesup.net/dm-314005424083.png

http://www.imagesup.net/dm-1214005424087.png

All feedback welcomed!

[alexrossi]

You can mine litecoins, but beware of power consumption if you are mining with GPUs (they are very power hungry)

[fred5283]

You can mine litecoins, but beware of power consumption if you are mining with GPUs (they are very power hungry)

Will do ... using a calculator, says I would be in the positive??  I just don't know if my hashrate would be the same using GUIMiner for BTC v GUIMiner-scrypt for LTC??  I'll be testing that tonight...

Also, looked into PBmining.com - 1000 GH/s = 5.00002120 for 5 years --> that's only ~0.105 BTC per week looking at their list - I don't think the payback is there?

EDIT - maybe the payback doesn't look like it's there because "Weekly payouts are scheduled for every Sunday before Midnight ( 24:00 GMT -6 )."?  I'll have to check at the end of the week...

EDIT2 - lastly if I want to get some more BTC in my wallet, any good recommendations on where to buy some from the USA?

[Chrithu]

You can mine litecoins, but beware of power consumption if you are mining with GPUs (they are very power hungry)

Will do ... using a calculator, says I would be in the positive??  I just don't know if my hashrate would be the same using GUIMiner for BTC v GUIMiner-scrypt for LTC??  I'll be testing that tonight...

-snip-

Nope as scrypt is a different algorithm your hashrate when mining scrypt coins will be shown in KH/s. I got two 5750s. When I let them mine LTC using BFGMiner 3.10 they get about 150 KH/s each. Not exactly sure but I guess your 5870s should land around the 170 to 180 mark? Somewhere around there.

Here's a hardware comparison list for GPUs mining Litecoin: https://litecoin.info/Mining_hardware_comparison

[fred5283]

You can mine litecoins, but beware of power consumption if you are mining with GPUs (they are very power hungry)

Will do ... using a calculator, says I would be in the positive??  I just don't know if my hashrate would be the same using GUIMiner for BTC v GUIMiner-scrypt for LTC??  I'll be testing that tonight...

-snip-

Nope as scrypt is a different algorithm your hashrate when mining scrypt coins will be shown in KH/s. I got two 5750s. When I let them mine LTC using BFGMiner 3.10 they get about 150 KH/s each. Not exactly sure but I guess your 5870s should land around the 170 to 180 mark? Somewhere around there.

Here's a hardware comparison list for GPUs mining Litecoin: https://litecoin.info/Mining_hardware_comparison

I was afraid of that... Guess I'll be mining in the kh/s v mh/s, at least in regards to LTC mining.   I'll see what I get tonight and let you know.  (No -f flag to use to bump that hash rate? I see there is an intensity field...)

[fred5283]

You can mine litecoins, but beware of power consumption if you are mining with GPUs (they are very power hungry)

I just re-read this - what hardware do you suggest that's a good hashrate/$ ??

[byt411]

You can mine litecoins, but beware of power consumption if you are mining with GPUs (they are very power hungry)

Will do ... using a calculator, says I would be in the positive??  I just don't know if my hashrate would be the same using GUIMiner for BTC v GUIMiner-scrypt for LTC??  I'll be testing that tonight...

Also, looked into PBmining.com - 1000 GH/s = 5.00002120 for 5 years --> that's only ~0.105 BTC per week looking at their list - I don't think the payback is there?

EDIT - maybe the payback doesn't look like it's there because "Weekly payouts are scheduled for every Sunday before Midnight ( 24:00 GMT -6 )."?  I'll have to check at the end of the week...

EDIT2 - lastly if I want to get some more BTC in my wallet, any good recommendations on where to buy some from the USA?

A really good exchange that I use is ANXPRO. 0% Trading Fee, and it now also supports SEPA withdrawals.

[alexrossi]

You can mine litecoins, but beware of power consumption if you are mining with GPUs (they are very power hungry)

I just re-read this - what hardware do you suggest that's a good hashrate/$ ??

If you want to mine litecoin or other scrypt coin, maybe you can find some used gridseed (lowest power consumption) at a decent price

[byt411]

You can mine litecoins, but beware of power consumption if you are mining with GPUs (they are very power hungry)

I just re-read this - what hardware do you suggest that's a good hashrate/$ ??

If you want to mine litecoin or other scrypt coin, maybe you can find some used gridseed (lowest power consumption) at a decent price

I am looking for that too, but I'm in EU and it's like impossible to do so.

[alexrossi]

You can mine litecoins, but beware of power consumption if you are mining with GPUs (they are very power hungry)

I just re-read this - what hardware do you suggest that's a good hashrate/$ ??

If you want to mine litecoin or other scrypt coin, maybe you can find some used gridseed (lowest power consumption) at a decent price

I am looking for that too, but I'm in EU and it's like impossible to do so.

I think that now, brand new staff is quite overpriced (especially gridseed stuff at minereu.com). I've heard some rumors about project prime from GAWminer, that probably will change the standards in scrypt mining (like bitmain, before they launched their products ALL the asic market was based on preorders).

[byt411]

You can mine litecoins, but beware of power consumption if you are mining with GPUs (they are very power hungry)

I just re-read this - what hardware do you suggest that's a good hashrate/$ ??

If you want to mine litecoin or other scrypt coin, maybe you can find some used gridseed (lowest power consumption) at a decent price

I am looking for that too, but I'm in EU and it's like impossible to do so.

I think that now, brand new staff is quite overpriced (especially gridseed stuff at minereu.com). I've heard some rumors about project prime from GAWminer, that probably will change the standards in scrypt mining (like bitmain, before they launched their products ALL the asic market was based on preorders).

Care to expand on that? I only know about the new series of miners that Gawminers is launching...