Bitmining Question

[xPyrox]

Hello there

Disclaimer: I'm completely new to this

I spent about five or six hours trying to understand how to setup a bitmine.
After a few bumps I came across this platform (I don't know if it's the right terminology) called NiceHash.

I set it up and ran it for a time.
I must say that my setup isn't good for this, at least that's what I understood of my research.

CPU: Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-4460s CPU @ 2.90GHz
RAM: 8GB
GPU: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 745

Now, I was bit mining for a while, about 30 - 45 minutes while searching a few things that were appearing in the prompt and I came across this thread:

 

He mentions two curious things:

• NiceHash isn't a mining application, it's a mining marketplace
• CGMiner and Minerd

So, I came to the conclusion that by using NiceHash, I'm limiting the possibility of increasing the profits of bit mining.

I'm sorry for the long post but once again, I'm new to this.
My questions are:

• Is it worth bit mining with the setup I have?
• What are your thoughts, from the people that really know this subject, about NiceHash?
• Should I be bit mining in a different way, as in a different platform or something alike?

 

Thank you in advance!

[minibois]

7 minutes ago, xPyrox said:

• Is it worth bit mining with the setup I have?

Do you mean mining bitcoin? Definitely not worth it.

Mining another crypto? Probably definitely not worth it too.

A lot of cryptos are only worth it to mine on either low power high hasrate cards or ASICs. Mostly ASICs.

7 minutes ago, xPyrox said:

• What are your thoughts, from the people that really know this subject, about NiceHash?

NiceHash is the easy way out, if you don't know how to setup mining software yourself.

Was a decent way to mine, when there were still cryptos like ETH and ZCash that were 'easy' to mine.

 

NiceHash of course takes a cut. But they also had some issue years ago with a lot of money being stolen. Maybe they recovered it? I'm not sure, but it makes me weary of them.

7 minutes ago, xPyrox said:

• Should I be bit mining in a different way, as in a different platform or something alike?

Do your own research to see what is best.

 

I don't know:

- what you pay in power

- what cryptos you want to mine

- etc.

 

There are still tons of calculators, which if you have any power cost will likely indicate you'll be losing a ton of money.

You're a couple years too late.

[xPyrox]

@minibois Thank you for the quick reply!

Well, I know there are several algorithms but I honestly don't know which is for what currency. I tried to google it but I failed.
 

3 minutes ago, minibois said:

Do you mean mining bitcoin? Definitely.

Mining another crypto? Probably definitely too.

That's interesting... In a lot of places I read an could actually understand something, I got convinced it was lilkely I'd lose a lot of money...
 

6 minutes ago, minibois said:

A lot of cryptos are only worth it to mine on either low power high hasrate cards or ASICs. Mostly ASICs.

Could you elaborate this sentence? And, is my GPU an ASIC? (If it's a dumb question, I'm sorry. An unknown world to me)

 

3 minutes ago, minibois said:

NiceHash is the easy way out, if you don't know how to setup mining software yourself.

Was a decent way to mine, when there were still cryptos like ETH and ZCash that were 'easy' to mine.

 

Don't they exist anymore?

 

8 minutes ago, minibois said:

Do your own research to see what is best.

How do I do it in an accurate way? Like I mentioned, I spent five to six hours just trying to understand how I could start mining...

 

9 minutes ago, minibois said:

I don't know:

- what you pay in power

- what cryptos you want to mine

- etc.

Do you want me to provide a list?
I mean, you could do the questions and I could try to answer the best that I can.

Once again, than you for the response!

[minibois]

1 minute ago, xPyrox said:

That's interesting... In a lot of places I read an could actually understand something, I got convinced it was lilkely I'd lose a lot of money...

Sorry, wrote that part wrongly.

I edited my post, but you quoted me before that.

Meant to say definitely NOT worth mining Bitcoin, likely NOT worth it to mine other cryptos.

2 minutes ago, xPyrox said:

Could you elaborate this sentence? And, is my GPU an ASIC? (If it's a dumb question, I'm sorry. An unknown world to me)

ASIC: "Application-specific integrated circuit"

In short, your CPU and your GPU can do many different things. An ASIC can only do one thing.

It's kind of a 'master of one trade vs. jack of all trades' thing. 

 

Because your CPU and GPU can play games, run Excel, play a video, it can mine too etc. etc. it's not particularly 'the best' in the world at any of these.

An ASIC can only do one thing (like an ASIC for mining can only mine), but it will be the best it can be in that one thing.

In that way, Bitcoin mining on videocards is NOT worth it, because there are devices specifically and only made for that purpose, that can do it much better.

 

In short, a crypto will become harder to mine over time, at a certain point making some devices not worth it to mine on anymore. We reached that point years ago (I would say 2014 or so was the last time mining BTC was worth it).

6 minutes ago, xPyrox said:

Don't they exist anymore?

NiceHash still exists, as far as I know.

7 minutes ago, xPyrox said:

How do I do it in an accurate way? Like I mentioned, I spent five to six hours just trying to understand how I could start mining...

1. look at the hashrate on the specific crypto for your videocard*

2. look at the market value of the crypto you'll be mining

3. look at the power consumption of your system

 

Plotting these three together will give you an idea on if mining is worth it.

To make this easier, use a calculator. This one says you'll be making between 20 and 90 US cents a month. 0.2 - 0.9 USD. Not event a dollar.

Not even counting in power cost, I can easily tell you that is not worth it.

 

* CPU mining is almost never worth it. Too high power draw for the hashrate.

10 minutes ago, xPyrox said:

Do you want me to provide a list?
I mean, you could do the questions and I could try to answer the best that I can.

The calculator above should already provide enough information on why it is not worth it.

 

- I assume you live with your parents? Because otherwise you would/should know how much you pay in power (per kWh or a flat rate, etc.).

- The hashrate was listed above

- The market value of the crypto was already counted in.

 

TL;DR: Mining is not worth it for your system, because you will be earning almost no cryptocurrency at all.

[xPyrox]

@minibois

8 minutes ago, minibois said:

Sorry, wrote that part wrongly.

I edited my post, but you quoted me before that.

Meant to say definitely NOT worth mining Bitcoin, likely NOT worth it to mine other cryptos.

Well, I'm sorry to know that...

 

9 minutes ago, minibois said:

ASIC: "Application-specific integrated circuit"

In short, your CPU and your GPU can do many different things. An ASIC can only do one thing.

It's kind of a 'master of one trade vs. jack of all trades' thing. 

 

Because your CPU and GPU can play games, run Excel, play a video, it can mine too etc. etc. it's not particularly 'the best' in the world at any of these.

An ASIC can only do one thing (like an ASIC for mining can only mine), but it will be the best it can be in that one thing.

In that way, Bitcoin mining on videocards is NOT worth it, because there are devices specifically and only made for that purpose, that can do it much better.

 

In short, a crypto will become harder to mine over time, at a certain point making some devices not worth it to mine on anymore. We reached that point years ago (I would say 2014 or so was the last time mining BTC was worth it).

Specifics vs General. I got it.
Thank you for the in depth explanation!

 

11 minutes ago, minibois said:

1. look at the hashrate on the specific crypto for your videocard*

2. look at the market value of the crypto you'll be mining

3. look at the power consumption of your system

 

Plotting these three together will give you an idea on if mining is worth it.

You mentioned that it wasn't worth mining with a GPU compared to the ASIC, which I agree based on the explanation, but can it still be worth to mine using a particular strong GPU? that possess a big hashrate in a specific crypto, being low power consuming and that crypto be worth it aswell?

 

14 minutes ago, minibois said:

- I assume you live with your parents? Because otherwise you would/should know how much you pay in power (per kWh or a flat rate, etc.).

And you got this right aswell! ^^

Thank you once again!

[minibois]

6 minutes ago, xPyrox said:

You mentioned that it wasn't worth mining with a GPU compared to the ASIC, which I agree based on the explanation, but can it still be worth to mine using a particular strong GPU? that possess a big hashrate in a specific crypto, being low power consuming and that crypto be worth it aswell?

Even the strongest consumer card - the 2080 Ti - only makes about 1.20 USD per day, if you pay nothing in electricity. 

At 12 cents per kWh (kind normal pricing in the US), that would be 0.40 USD per day profit.

 

So even at 0 power cost, strong consumer card; you'll be making the same in a month as you would make flipping burgers for a couple hours a month.

9 minutes ago, xPyrox said:

And you got this right aswell! ^^

Keep in mind PC's can use quite a bit of power running mining software all day, so I never recommend running such software when you don't have explicit consent to do so from the person paying the power bill.

 

Not sure if you're looking into mining because:

- you want to make money

- you are curious

 

But keep in mind mining on GPU's is not something you would be doing for profit anymore. More out of curiosity.

(Which something like Folding@Home might pique that curiosity too).

Whether investing in crypto is a good idea is up to you too (I don't want to suggest you doing that, as if you don't know what you're doing, it's basically gambling.. But I know if I didn't say that, people would get mad).

[xPyrox]

@minibois

Sorry for the late answer

1 hour ago, minibois said:

Even the strongest consumer card - the 2080 Ti - only makes about 1.20 USD per day, if you pay nothing in electricity. 

At 12 cents per kWh (kind normal pricing in the US), that would be 0.40 USD per day profit.

 

So even at 0 power cost, strong consumer card; you'll be making the same in a month as you would make flipping burgers for a couple hours a month.

I didn't know it was that small even with the strongest GPU.

 

1 hour ago, minibois said:

Keep in mind PC's can use quite a bit of power running mining software all day, so I never recommend running such software when you don't have explicit consent to do so from the person paying the power bill.

 

Not sure if you're looking into mining because:

- you want to make money

- you are curious

I understand. I only ran it for half an hour or forty five minutes.

I was curious but I also wanted to make some money.

 

1 hour ago, minibois said:

But keep in mind mining on GPU's is not something you would be doing for profit anymore. More out of curiosity.

(Which something like Folding@Home might pique that curiosity too).

Whether investing in crypto is a good idea is up to you too (I don't want to suggest you doing that, as if you don't know what you're doing, it's basically gambling.. But I know if I didn't say that, people would get mad).

Don't worry about it. I understand your side aswell.

But, just to close this and not upset you anymore.

I found this ASIC, the Antminer R4, it's evaluated at 1,000$
And I did the calculations and all of that (the best I could) and I still don't get profit in BTC. But, I switched it to Ethereum Classic and it does give A LOT of profit.
This led the question: Could I use this Antminer R4 to mine Ethereum Classic? Or is it strictly to Bitcoin?

 

 

[Tristerin]

Mining with that setup, for any coin, is not going to pay for the electricity cost to hash (unless electric bill is not your thing to pay of course lol).  However, risk vs reward.  My brother and I have a mining farm, specifically targeting a certain low level coin, for very specific reasons.  At first, this coin was not on the BTCExchange Market.  It is now.  Have I made money yet?  Nope, but IF the plan comes to fruition - this is our easy retirement.  If not, we have a lot of other plans in the works in other markets/things/etc. 

 

At some point, I will be announcing the coin I mine, the why - and why you should too.

 

Our plan is good enough I have 12 investors who have invested in our mining rig.  Technically I own zero GPU's in the farm. 

 

Our investors have to buy 1 GPU they own minimum (Radeon VII) and we house it, keep it in service, troubleshoot etc (and pay for the electric) - but their buy in more than covers the 1 year payment contracts we have with them for upkeep (that pays for electricity) with a 1% hash fee that we get to keep  

[minibois]

25 minutes ago, xPyrox said:

I found this ASIC, the Antminer R4, it's evaluated at 1,000$
And I did the calculations and all of that (the best I could) and I still don't get profit in BTC. But, I switched it to Ethereum Classic and it does give A LOT of profit.
This led the question: Could I use this Antminer R4 to mine Ethereum Classic? Or is it strictly to Bitcoin?

The whole Antminer thing is not somthing I am very familiar with. But looks like they have a list of coins you can mine with it listed on their website.

I don't see ETH on that list, but do see Bitcoin, BitcoinCash, Curecoin and some more.

27 minutes ago, xPyrox said:

But, just to close this and not upset you anymore.

Oh shoot, did I sound upset? Sorry, didn't mean to give that impression.

 

Maybe I'm still just a little salty all these miners bought all the videocards when I was looking to buy a PC :^)

/s

[xPyrox]

@Tristerin Thanks for the info!

 

1 hour ago, Tristerin said:

Mining with that setup, for any coin, is not going to pay for the electricity cost to hash (unless electric bill is not your thing to pay of course lol).  However, risk vs reward.  My brother and I have a mining farm, specifically targeting a certain low level coin, for very specific reasons.  At first, this coin was not on the BTCExchange Market.  It is now.  Have I made money yet?  Nope, but IF the plan comes to fruition - this is our easy retirement.  If not, we have a lot of other plans in the works in other markets/things/etc. 

 

At some point, I will be announcing the coin I mine, the why - and why you should too.

 

Our plan is good enough I have 12 investors who have invested in our mining rig.  Technically I own zero GPU's in the farm. 

 

Our investors have to buy 1 GPU they own minimum (Radeon VII) and we house it, keep it in service, troubleshoot etc (and pay for the electric) - but their buy in more than covers the 1 year payment contracts we have with them for upkeep (that pays for electricity) with a 1% hash fee that we get to keep  

Why not share it now? And how good is the Radeon VII?

[xPyrox]

@minibois
Not at all! You seem pretty calm about this I just don't want to abuse in the questions.
 

1 hour ago, minibois said:

I don't see ETH on that list, but do see Bitcoin, BitcoinCash, Curecoin and some more.

I did the math and the bitcoin would still be a loss for me... I have no idea on the BitcoinCash or Curecoin. Could you please tell me where did you find the list?
 

1 hour ago, minibois said:

Maybe I'm still just a little salty all these miners bought all the videocards when I was looking to buy a PC :^)

Bad timing... But eventually!

[minibois]

14 minutes ago, xPyrox said:

I did the math and the bitcoin would still be a loss for me... I have no idea on the BitcoinCash or Curecoin. Could you please tell me where did you find the list?

https://www.asicminervalue.com/miners/bitmain/antminer-r4

Scroll down a bit and you'll find a list under 'Minable coins'.

 

Bitcoin is open-source, so anyone can change the code and release something themselves. If your release goes in another direction, it is called a 'fork'. (because if you look at the roadmap, it can look like a literal fork)

So BitcoindCash is just one of many cryptos around.

 

Curecoin is something that just has always intrigued me.

Do you know of Folding@Home? If not, some explanation below. But CureCoin is a way to monetize F@H, which I think is an awesome endeavor!

 

F@H is a software that simulates protein folding, the simulation data can be used by researchers to find out how the proteins in our body works. With this information they can find out why diseases like Parkinson's and even cancer happen. Currently there is also some COVID-19 research.

Curecoin monetizes this and it has been the largest Folding@Home team for a very long time.

(Currently the LTT F@H team is outperforming them though! )

[Tristerin]

32 minutes ago, xPyrox said:

@Tristerin Thanks for the info!

 

Why not share it now? And how good is the Radeon VII?

Strategy, I WISH I could say more.  Radeon VII in compute destroys all others cost/power/hash rate ratio.