Hardware advice for LiteCoin Mining?

[Keen_Interest]

Hey guys, I'm building a new PC which primarily will be a LTC miner. I was looking to see if anyone could tell me, is RAM that important? And is mining similar to folding in as much as, you download a problem>solve it>upload answer? Or do you need a good internet connection all the time? 

 

I will hopefully run 4x Sapphire HD7950 VaporX, which I'm told is best cost/production. As well as a 4770K (which is overkill, but awesome.)

 

Any other advice you can give? 

Cheers.

[xAdam]

Wow. I have no idea, but build log please? :)

[Jay123]

I think you need a constant internet connection but it doesn't have to be any especially fast. Also the 4770K is a total waste and for the money you're spending you might as well get an ASIC miner for Bitcoins as I think they've started to arrive from butterflylabs. 7950 is best khash/s:price, I think you get around 600khash/s

[Keen_Interest]

Wow. I have no idea, but build log please? :)

There most likely will be a build log, but not especially detailed. Its now looking to be a 3x 7950 (due to issues with motherboard/cooling/soundcard).

 

 

I think you need a constant internet connection but it doesn't have to be any especially fast. Also the 4770K is a total waste and for the money you're spending you might as well get an ASIC miner for Bitcoins as I think they've started to arrive from butterflylabs. 7950 is best khash/s:price, I think you get around 600khash/s

That would be true for bitcoins. But intend to do litecoins, I'll also be playing games occasionally, and I did say already that I know its overkill... 

 

I have another question, is mining overly effected by the bandwidth of the PCIe slots?

[AK0490]

There most likely will be a build log, but not especially detailed. Its now looking to be a 3x 7950 (due to issues with motherboard/cooling/soundcard).

 

 

That would be true for bitcoins. But intend to do litecoins, I'll also be playing games occasionally, and I did say already that I know its overkill... 

 

I have another question, is mining overly effected by the bandwidth of the PCIe slots?

Bandwidth doesn't matter at all for mining, you can mine of 1x slots with adapters

[pGuerrerox]

@Keen_Interest

If you are going to jump into mining crytocurrencies seriously you should consider building a dedicated miner.

 

Miner: Get x4 7950, a cheap mobo, a cheap CPU, a GOOD PSU, extra fans and 4gb stick RAM.....

Gaming: Get another 7950 + good GPU, average PSU and good ram... 

with this you will have ~2400kh/s mining power 24/7..... when when not gaming add 600kh.

 

* the miner needs to be online all the time.

* as mention above, x1 bandwidth is enough for mining.

[RuecanOnRails]

Ram can important when mining Litecoin/Scrypt based coins. If you don't at least match the total ram to the total memory the gpu's offer, you may run into a bottleneck trying to get the most out of your cards. (doesn't happen often but with certain configurations it can.)

Ram is not an issue with bitcoin/SHA-256.

 

You will definitely need to create your own cooling set up as each card can be running upwards of 85 Celsius, more so if the cards are close together. IE: using the pcie slots on the motherboard directly.

 

Consider not using a case, create your own milkcrate style open case and suspend the gpu's using risers to allow large gaps between each card for cooling. A mining rig INSIDE a case will not run very well with multiple gpu's. Expect to heavily modify the case to add many large fans.

 

If your intentions are to use this for mining AND a gaming rig. You will be better off to build 2 rigs. One dedicated to only mining using the cheapest motherboard/cpu set up as pGuerrerox said.

Then build a gaming rig with your 4770k, and a 7970 (not GHZ edition, look for the powercolor cheap 7970 as it can mine much better) and whatever other parts and case you want. If you find that you need more GPU power in your gaming rig for a single game, you can crossfire a 7950 with a 7970 (once AMD improves frame time sync via drivers it will work great) after gaming, throw the 7950 back into your mining rig.

 

 

As for internet connection. You will need a strong connection online 24/7 while mining. For litecoin the target time to solve a block is 2.5 minutes. Every 2 and a half minutes your client will receive new work to complete and discard the previous work. If your connection is slow, or high latency between peers you will be throwing away anywhere from 1 - 15% of the work you have done as you will be trying to solve a block that has already been solved. 

It is different when mining in a pool (the likely option you should choose) When mining in a pool, the pool will set a fake difficulty with a very low number allowing you to be constantly solving blocks in order to keep track of your shares. Because you are constantly solving blocks. a couple dozen per minute, you will need to be uploading and downloading new data constantly.

[Keen_Interest]

Ram can important when mining Litecoin/Scrypt based coins. If you don't at least match the total ram to the total memory the gpu's offer, you may run into a bottleneck trying to get the most out of your cards. (doesn't happen often but with certain configurations it can.)

Ram is not an issue with bitcoin/SHA-256.

 

You will definitely need to create your own cooling set up as each card can be running upwards of 85 Celsius, more so if the cards are close together. IE: using the pcie slots on the motherboard directly.

 

Consider not using a case, create your own milkcrate style open case and suspend the gpu's using risers to allow large gaps between each card for cooling. A mining rig INSIDE a case will not run very well with multiple gpu's. Expect to heavily modify the case to add many large fans.

 

If your intentions are to use this for mining AND a gaming rig. You will be better off to build 2 rigs. One dedicated to only mining using the cheapest motherboard/cpu set up as pGuerrerox said.

Then build a gaming rig with your 4770k, and a 7970 (not GHZ edition, look for the powercolor cheap 7970 as it can mine much better) and whatever other parts and case you want. If you find that you need more GPU power in your gaming rig for a single game, you can crossfire a 7950 with a 7970 (once AMD improves frame time sync via drivers it will work great) after gaming, throw the 7950 back into your mining rig.

 

 

As for internet connection. You will need a strong connection online 24/7 while mining. For litecoin the target time to solve a block is 2.5 minutes. Every 2 and a half minutes your client will receive new work to complete and discard the previous work. If your connection is slow, or high latency between peers you will be throwing away anywhere from 1 - 15% of the work you have done as you will be trying to solve a block that has already been solved. 

It is different when mining in a pool (the likely option you should choose) When mining in a pool, the pool will set a fake difficulty with a very low number allowing you to be constantly solving blocks in order to keep track of your shares. Because you are constantly solving blocks. a couple dozen per minute, you will need to be uploading and downloading new data constantly.

What case would you recommend for mining? Actually, what motherboard would you recommend as well? My problem is I don't have massive capital, it may have to be one or the other..

[Keen_Interest]

I think for the amount I have to spend, it makes more sense for me to build a combined rig (for now) with 3 7950s. If in the future I feel I have the capital to spend, I may transfer stuff to a sole mining rig, and replace parts in my main rig. But I just don't have the money to build two just now..

[RuecanOnRails]

I would still go caseless.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=66432.0

 

build your combination rig as a miner. Then after awhile as you get more money saved up begin piecing together the necessary parts to separate the two. Running 3 7950's in a case will create a heat bottle neck forcing you to drop the the hashrate.

 

It really doesn't matter what motherboard/brand you get. Just look for ones with the most amount of PCIE slots, the bandwidth of them doesn't matter. You can mine using 1x. One thing to consider is picking up a motherboard that supports powered pcie. Look for a 6 pin connector next to the pcie slots on the motherboard. This will allow you to save some money if you choose to add raisers as you wont require the powered raisers which are costly compared to the others.

[Keen_Interest]

I would still go caseless.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=66432.0

 

build your combination rig as a miner. Then after awhile as you get more money saved up begin piecing together the necessary parts to separate the two. Running 3 7950's in a case will create a heat bottle neck forcing you to drop the the hashrate.

 

It really doesn't matter what motherboard/brand you get. Just look for ones with the most amount of PCIE slots, the bandwidth of them doesn't matter. You can mine using 1x. One thing to consider is picking up a motherboard that supports powered pcie. Look for a 6 pin connector next to the pcie slots on the motherboard. This will allow you to save some money if you choose to add raisers as you wont require the powered raisers which are costly compared to the others.

Tbh I'd rather have a decent working personal rig and sacrifice some performance, However, I can just take the side of the case off if I really need to. I'm not going to get any money any time soon. Because I'll be at Uni. SO! Unless I win the lottery, money is going to be tough to come by. :P

[RuecanOnRails]

perhaps look into building a decent gaming rig. Then using the money saved, buy coins directly. (get a single cheap powercolor 7970, instead of 3 7950's)

It could take several months to pay off the additional gpu's if they are not running at full speed 24/7. In that time, the difficulty to get coins may double. When compared to mining and buying them now you may end up with more coins.

 

If the time frame to pay off a card doubles due to the difficulty jumping up within the several months. You could potentially buy the coins now and have nearly twice as many at the point where you would have begun making profit from mining. You then sell those "bonus" coins from buying directly and get a second gpu to mine with, along with possibly buying or selling more coins depending on price.

 

Litecoin's difficulty has gone up more than 6x what it was 3 months ago. Whether that trend will continue is anyone's guess.

[pwnorbpwnd]

If this isn't going to be your main rig go balls to the wall with 6 x 5870's instead of 7950's and save some change man.

[pGuerrerox]

If this isn't going to be your main rig go balls to the wall with 6 x 5870's instead of 7950's and save some change man.

 

he will do better getting 7950's, they are more power efficient and had better kh/s

 

x6 5870= (450kh/ea??) 2.7Mh/s = 1300W = (150 US/ea??) 900 US and they are going to be use, so no warranty.

x4 7950 = (min. 600kh/ea) 2.4Mh/s = 1000W = (300 US/ea??) 1200 US and they will be new with warranty + game codes depends where you get them.

[Keen_Interest]

It briefly seemed I would have a way to build two machines, but I'm now stuck due to the fact that apparently you can't frickin buy frickin PCIe x1 to x16 powered extension in the frickin UK!

 

FRICKIN RAGE!!

[RuecanOnRails]

It briefly seemed I would have a way to build two machines, but I'm now stuck due to the fact that apparently you can't frickin buy frickin PCIe x1 to x16 powered extension in the frickin UK!

 

FRICKIN RAGE!!

 

 

If the motherboard you buy has a 6 pin next to the pcie slots, you don't need powered raisers.

For example this board http://ncix.com/products/?sku=71283&vpn=990FXA-GD65%20V2&manufacture=MSI%2FMicroStar

If you look at the image, you can see the 8 pin cpu power. AND a 6 pin beside the pci slots.

 

Spending a few extra on the motherboard could save you money when compared to the price of multiple powered risers.

[Keen_Interest]

I can get a case+mobo+ram+processor off a friend for £75. (Hopefully) So its cheaper for me to get powered risers, and I've found somewhere that sells them. :)