Topic: [0 GH/s 0% fee SMPPS] ArsBitcoin mining pool! - page 40. (Read 123752 times)

Exactly. It's kind of like the difference between a dividend-paying stock and the next high-flying tech darling - not sexy, but very reliable. Consistency and stability will be much more important as the Bitcoin environment develops anyway.

SMPPS +1

I support the change in payout scheme and have resumed mining at this pool.

Stick to your guns.  SMPPS was a good choice.

ArsBitcoin current stats:

Current Hashrate: 94.3 GH/s
Current Workers:  324

Seems like more have joined with the new payout.

This is great for people who want to just set it and forget it. In the old system, blocks that last for millions of rounds are really bad; I might personally shut down the miner as the probable rewards probably aren't worth it. For making money, boring is good.
I would suggest buying the lottery if you want some excitement. Keep in mind that the expected return is <1, which is the same case as PPS the way it was implemented (due to hoppers).

I'm not saying you did, just that someone did.


I admit I'll miss the excitement of logging on in the morning and finding 2 or 3 found blocks, but after watching my backup pool Bitclockers hit a 3 million share block and then a 6 million share block and then another 3 million share block back to back last round, I'd rather be a bit bored with a steady payout than deal with variance like that.

No one said any of this. Some of us have jobs and dont read everythread posted. Like I said I love BT and all he has done but I dont like this and I most likely will leave because of it. I like the small pool feel and this no longer has it.

For anyone who wants MORE proportional/SMPPS discussion to help them decide what they prefer, there is more fun here! http://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=24966.msg333619#msg333619

I can understand folks maybe not liking the switch, but don't say that BT just 'sprung' this on anyone.  He brought up the idea over a week ago and asked for comments.  If you had a problem back then, you should have spoke up, and if you're new, you should read at least a few pages of the posts before you hop into a pool.

That being said, this will level the playing field and give more standardized payouts, but it's not better or worse than any other way to mine for your wallet, you'll get paid the same.  Over the long haul, you are going to make XX amount of bitcoins (assuming the same hashrate/difficulty) no matter how you mine, minus any fees you pay of course.  It's probability, you may not like it, but you can't escape it.  

While it was great to get 9 payouts over the last 4 days, there were times we went way above the average number before you had a payout.  Eventually things would level out.  So maybe some of the 'excitement' of the pool is gone and it's now more of a steady payout, but it's really just a matter of preference.  If the system doesn't work out, I'm sure BT will switch back, but I still think it's better to see a regular, steady payout than see 9 in 4 days and then maybe go 6 days without one.

There's ton's of pools out there doing proportional shares (Bitclockers is awesome and is my backup pool) if you really don't want to do PPS and like the smaller pool/excitement thing.

Whatever you do though, don't go to deepbit.  They charge way too much and are too big already

As one on the first 7  or eight to join I do not like this change. I liked the randomness and the massive payouts. I do not like the new system at all.

Ok, I'm going to try to stop responding to every post.  This IS a new payment system, and we will have to see how it goes.  Almost every other pool out there is proportional, so there are plenty of options if you prefer that method.  For those that are interested in this method, you're welcome to stay.  I think it just comes down to preference.

Here are some more resources to compare payment methods, courtesy of luke-jr from Eligius.

Charts comparing real-world payouts:
http://eligius.st/~luke-jr/samples/800MH/

Notice the pros and cons of proportional:
    Easy math: (your shares / total shares) * reward
    Pays full reward for every block for work on that same block
    Pays in excess of work done for short blocks
    Pays less than work done for long blocks
    Easy payout improvement with pool hopping
    Risk from withholding is distributed among miners

And the pros and cons of SMPPS:
    Fixed rate of payout for work performed, limited overall by actual miner performance
    Never overpaid based on pool earnings; underpaid only when overall work performed has failed to deliver
    No benefit for pool hopping
    Risk from withholding is distributed among miners
    Non-reward credits carry over for future payment, regardless of future work

More discussion of various payment methods:
http://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=21999.0

Right, it won't run at an actual deficit, but it could have a negative buffer, which means it can't afford to pay out the PPS value of all of the shares submitted yet.

Actually, no: Pool hoppers have less risk and more reward than anybody else with proportional.

No: The pool won't run at a deficit. With MaxPPS, that's impossible (unless the implemenation wasn't done correctly).

10,000,000+ share blocks are possible but not probable.  BTCG has over 1,460 blocks solved and, as such, shows a wider range.  I'd be curious to see their stats averaged.

Basically, the break even point for the pool would be roughly 1,380,000 shares per block.

I understand spreading the risk out and the perks associated.  Boiled down, it's insurance.  I just don't like the idea of the pool taking on the risks and limiting the users possible rewards.  Personally, I don't mind the risks if everyone gets paid for their share of the work.  That's just makes the most sense to me as everyone equally shares the risks and rewards.  It just throws another cog into the chance wheel.  Eventually the pool will run a slight deficit or a surplus.  It's not going to be perfectly even.

Bah. I'm not going to quibble about the change as: a) it's not my pool b) you're not charging me to use it and c) I support anything that provides competition to the big pools.

but..

I liked the completely random payouts. The main reason I switched was (well OK, that was for the block bounties, but the other main reason was) just for a bit of a gamble. Days after day of nothing and then days where it came pouring in. Being a small pool the randomness was even more wonderful.

I can understand the change, and my love of variance isn't quite enough to drive me to mine solo..

How about bolting on something interesting to separate yourself from the other pools (I'm sure you're just twiddling your thumbs with nothing better to do). Opt in a lottery - say donate 10% of profits to a pool and then randomly give the pool (less admin costs naturally) to somebody in the round (each share gets one ticket).
 

If you want to see pool stats over time, Lego399 and myself have created some graphs with the API:

http://stats.nuradu.com/showstats.php

1)  A 1,839,526 share block is not "unusually" long.  BTC Guild has seen 10 million + share blocks.  66.68 BTC is the correct amount to pay for this block length.  If a block is double average length, then the pool pays 100 BTC, etc.
2) Our longest round was mostly completed at a difficulty of around ~800,000, which means that the PPS value would have been significantly higher.  That, PLUS the fact that we have been REALLY LUCKY mean that yes, the total payout so far would have been smaller.  However the pool would now have a large buffer (it has a 0 buffer now since we just converted) to pay out more for longer rounds.
3) Once again, the goal of SMPPS is to provide fair, constant payouts.  If you prefer to chase luck, then you are better off at some other small proportional pool, or solo mining.

I guess this won't make sense to everyone until we hit a 3+ million round block

I do appreciate it tom!  I sent you 0.5 BTC a while back.  If the pool becomes a net positive for me, or we request some work, I can send some more Others are of course welcome to donate too if you like the stats page!

Hi,

Tom Lightspeed here, did some stats work, if you like it please donate: 1LYjJCtP8RFJ6zz6orxf5ym9CrvxPS4pDr

I could do some of the things you guys want too from what I am reading

May the force be with you

I'll try out the new SMPPS method, but, I'm not sure I'll be a fan.

I realize it gives steady payouts but at the same time, I very much liked the chance of getting 3 blocks in a day and didn't mind the risk of it taking a day and half to finish one block.  As of right now, I'm limited to an estimated 1.277BTC/day based on the current fixed share rate.  That would basically cut my earnings in half.

Sure, we're going to have a day where nothing is solved, but then the days where 3 blocks are solved offset this.  In my "lifetime" with the pool, I've been paid roughly 12BTC (over about 6 days).  Using my actual lifetime share count of 147,351, under the new SMPPS rate, I'd have only been paid 5.33BTC.  Granted, we've been lucky as of late but I don't think we're going to be so unlucky as to take a huge hit like that.  With the pool growing from ~50mhash to ~85mhash over my stay, the chances of turning blocks faster is better, albeit at a cut in proportional rates.

Like I said, I'm going to see how it goes over the next 2 days and re-evaluate from there.

Update: READ BELOW

Just to run some numbers by everyone:

Take a recent long block, completed on July 3rd at 12:00:03am.  Consisting of 1,839,526 shares, it took roughly 49.5 hours to complete.

The SMPPS on those shares, based on the current rate, would have been ~66.688525BTC paid out.  Hmm, that's a substantially lower figure for an unusually long block.

Let's average this out.  In the history of this pool 13,594,099 shares have been submitted, solving 18 blocks (900BTC).  That averages out to 755,277.72 shares per block.

Now, what if this policy been in place from the start of the pool?  At the current rate of 0.000036253103 per share, only 27.379BTC would have been paid out to miners PER BLOCK!  

Just a 54.75% payout.

Please help me wrap my head around this as I didn't expect the figures to look this bleak...