Newbie Help

[Spicy Dennis]

Sup homies,

So I am interested in getting started in the world of BTC mining and I have a couple questions. First, what kind of wallet should I use? Should I use an online wallet like coinbase, or a hard drive wallet like Armory? Second, I was looking at the AntMiners, too me they look like more of a hobby kind of machine rather than some big noisy thing you would need to stick in your garage. I was planning on just buying one and seeing how it went, it doesn't seem like a huge investment to make and if it doesn't work out, meh. If someone could link me to the newest model, or the most efficient model that would be awesome. Finally, with one AntMiner, should I do solo mining or pool mining? I know the difference, solo mining is more high risk, high reward, and pool mining is more consistent money. Also if I was going to do pool mining, what is a good website I won't get scammed on and is always up and running and simple too use.

Thanks,
Dennis

[1715170753]

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[odolvlobo]

So I am interested in getting started in the world of BTC mining and I have a couple questions. First, what kind of wallet should I use? Should I use an online wallet like coinbase, or a hard drive wallet like Armory? Second, I was looking at the AntMiners, too me they look like more of a hobby kind of machine rather than some big noisy thing you would need to stick in your garage. I was planning on just buying one and seeing how it went, it doesn't seem like a huge investment to make and if it doesn't work out, meh. If someone could link me to the newest model, or the most efficient model that would be awesome. Finally, with one AntMiner, should I do solo mining or pool mining? I know the difference, solo mining is more high risk, high reward, and pool mining is more consistent money. Also if I was going to do pool mining, what is a good website I won't get scammed on and is always up and running and simple too use.

For most mining pools, the wallet is irrelevant, but some mining pools are generally incompatible with online wallets. it is best to choose a wallet that gives you control of the private keys.

This is the miner you want: https://www.bitmaintech.com/productDetail.htm?pid=000201412231604153619o9X1obn0693

Unless you have a lot of hash power, you should mine in a pool.

[Finksy]

Personally I would hold out about a month or so to buy, we are due for a new generation of mining equipment, and at that time you might be better off buying the stuff getting off-loaded (Like the current-gen Antminer S5) for considerably cheaper.  I would not waste my time solo mining unless you had upwards of 100 TH/s of hash power (enough currently for 1 block per month).  Even with variance and that much equipment, you could go months without seeing a block.  With only 1 Th/s, the estimated time to mine 1 block is just over 73 months, and that is without factoring variance or the difficulty increasing (which it will).  Use a pool.  I prefer pools with no fees, such as Ghash or Eligius, with the exception of Kano's pool (kano.is) which charges 0.9% which I use as well to help support him and his efforts in the community.

As for wallets, I prefer PC and smartphone wallets vs online wallets.  The two PC wallets I've used are Armory and MultiBit.  I much prefer Multibit because Armory takes forever to load (requires downloading and updating the entire blockchain).  You would also do good to take some precautions and print some off-line, completely safe paper wallets for savings.  See here for instructions: https://blockchain.info/wallet/paper-tutorial  The only difference is I prefer to save the bitaddress web page completely, and open it and print wallets on a completely off-line computer.  It sounds excessive, but you can't be too safe.  Good luck, and post if you have any more questions.

[Bitcoin_Mafia_Me]

I'm no expert, but with the difficulty rate and hashing power needed to mine any significant amount of bitcoin (e.g. more
than just dust) I think you're better off mining a stable altcoin and then trading that altcoin on the exchanges for bitcoin.

Wash. Rinse. Repeat.

[pooya87]

Sup homies,

So I am interested in getting started in the world of BTC mining and I have a couple questions. First, what kind of wallet should I use? Should I use an online wallet like coinbase, or a hard drive wallet like Armory? Second, I was looking at the AntMiners, too me they look like more of a hobby kind of machine rather than some big noisy thing you would need to stick in your garage. I was planning on just buying one and seeing how it went, it doesn't seem like a huge investment to make and if it doesn't work out, meh. If someone could link me to the newest model, or the most efficient model that would be awesome. Finally, with one AntMiner, should I do solo mining or pool mining? I know the difference, solo mining is more high risk, high reward, and pool mining is more consistent money. Also if I was going to do pool mining, what is a good website I won't get scammed on and is always up and running and simple too use.

Thanks,
Dennis

for wallet:
use online wallets for small amounts, and day to day use
use desktop for more security.
use offline desktop wallets or paper wallet for most secure wallet
use something like trezor if you are willing to pay for wallet which can be free!

for mining i found this thread most useful:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=878387.msg9697654#msg9697654

[LiteCoinGuy]

dont mine BTC. just buy some BTC for 10$ and play with it & learn more about BTC.

[maku]

Op Unless you have some little fortune to buy mining equipment just don't start mining. At least bitcoin mining, without some advanced gear only industrial miners have a chance to mine something. I guess using faucet will bring you more BTC than mining BTC with 1 miner or something like that.

[champbronc2]

Do not mine bitcoins unless you have $100k+ to invest.

Better investment is to just buy some bitcoins.

I also recommend https://www.bitgo.com as a secure online wallet.

[(Lithium)]

Do not mine bitcoins unless you have $100k+ to invest.

Better investment is to just buy some bitcoins.

I also recommend https://www.bitgo.com as a secure online wallet.

never heard about bitgo wallet

there are others well know, like blockchain or coinbase.

[uki]

dont mine BTC. just buy some BTC for 10$ and play with it & learn more about BTC.

that is a very good advice. Mining BTC directly requires huge amount of computational  power and thus is not profitable unless you have free access to powerful machines.
Thus, try to check what are the profitable altcoins atm (any mining pool has a list of them) and try to mine them and trade for BTC.

[pereira4]

Go on coinwarz.com to calculate gains from mining altcoins.

[Muhammed Zakir]

Go on coinwarz.com to calculate gains from mining altcoins.

Coinwarz calculate with current difficulty and typically take some time to update it. So the miner maybe profitable now but might not be later. So using calculators like bitcoinwisdom and vnbitcoin are recommended.

   -MZ

[avw1982]

dont mine BTC. just buy some BTC for 1000$ and play with it & learn more about BTC.

Corrected it.

[Muhammed Zakir]

dont mine BTC. just buy some BTC for 1000$ and play with it & learn more about BTC.

Corrected it.

This is a mistake. Nobody want to play with $10,000. $10 is good to play with and to learn more about Bitcoin. If you have studied basics of Bitcoin, you can go for higher. That is, you can't go for Degree without studying in preliminary school.

   -MZ

[erikalui]

I use Coinbase and it is quite safe to use and reliable as well but if you want to go for a paper wallet, it would be even better as you would more security of your bictoins. There are several mining opportunities in the services section.

[MEPHuk]

I'm no expert, but with the difficulty rate and hashing power needed to mine any significant amount of bitcoin (e.g. more
than just dust) I think you're better off mining a stable altcoin and then trading that altcoin on the exchanges for bitcoin.

Wash. Rinse. Repeat.

THIS tbh, if your mind is set on mining

MEPH

[ajareselde]

Sup homies,

So I am interested in getting started in the world of BTC mining and I have a couple questions. First, what kind of wallet should I use? Should I use an online wallet like coinbase, or a hard drive wallet like Armory? Second, I was looking at the AntMiners, too me they look like more of a hobby kind of machine rather than some big noisy thing you would need to stick in your garage. I was planning on just buying one and seeing how it went, it doesn't seem like a huge investment to make and if it doesn't work out, meh. If someone could link me to the newest model, or the most efficient model that would be awesome. Finally, with one AntMiner, should I do solo mining or pool mining? I know the difference, solo mining is more high risk, high reward, and pool mining is more consistent money. Also if I was going to do pool mining, what is a good website I won't get scammed on and is always up and running and simple too use.

Thanks,
Dennis

Forget about mining, its only profitable when the bubble is happening, and then ure just left behind with mining equipement that u paid like its made of gold and noone wants it.
If you are hard headed about it, first try cloud mining, where u just buy hashing power, and dont have to worry about your device failing, and you will soon see that the profits are low or non-existing.
Mining is now an industrial thing , and the little man was pushed from it long ago.
Whatever you do, keep your coins safe, i would advise locked local wallet, and keeping it offline at all times unless you need to make a transaction, and for smaller amounts use blockchain or coinbase.

cheers