A case study in entry-level mining - page 11.

xTachibana

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Quote from: Thylacine on August 10, 2013, 10:49:55 PM

For all the naysayers whining about how obviously unprofitable this set up is - don't forget that it's not all about profitability for many people.

I'm in a similar situation. I overspent on a couple of USB Erupters that were being sold in my area in-hand, and am comfortably hashing away at a measly 660MH/s. I knew it would never be profitable, and I would barely make my money back on the hardware costs (a Belkin USB hub thrown in as well).

However, I'm interested in the BTC ecosystem and hardware, and wanted to have a try at getting everything set up as a hobbyist. Hobbyists are good for the network, and good for general adoption and uptake by the public. For what it's worth, for a while there I also ran a Tor relay via a small AWS instance at a loss, simply because I think the network has value.

I'm getting so sick of pre-orders and PCB diagrams on websites, the draw of hardware that was actually delivered was too strong!

Solid thread OP...

naysayers :O were there some of those? havent read through them all, tbh, its not all about profit, and most of it is just for the fun of it, but making some nice money on the side mining TRC to BTC is <3 (trc on average over 1 month is 20% more profitable, and up to 400+% iirc)

Thylacine

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For all the naysayers whining about how obviously unprofitable this set up is - don't forget that it's not all about profitability for many people.

I'm in a similar situation. I overspent on a couple of USB Erupters that were being sold in my area in-hand, and am comfortably hashing away at a measly 660MH/s. I knew it would never be profitable, and I would barely make my money back on the hardware costs (a Belkin USB hub thrown in as well).

However, I'm interested in the BTC ecosystem and hardware, and wanted to have a try at getting everything set up as a hobbyist. Hobbyists are good for the network, and good for general adoption and uptake by the public. For what it's worth, for a while there I also ran a Tor relay via a small AWS instance at a loss, simply because I think the network has value.

I'm getting so sick of pre-orders and PCB diagrams on websites, the draw of hardware that was actually delivered was too strong!

Solid thread OP...

xTachibana

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its a real shame that you cant mine scrypt with block erupters Sad

davewr2013

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Bitcoin For All

This is a great thread. You went about it in a logical ordered way.

You might be able to churn some coin in small amounts -- but you really should find some "high horsepower" units. As I said in another thread -- I think the Terra-Hash will be the new starter unit -- probably by December -- certainly by January 2014. The ASIC chips should be there by then.

There will be fewer ASIC/FPGA chip providers and the field will get a little more complex. The ASICS will likely be the only profitable chips -- the slower ASICS will likely be reduced to "Hobby Configurations".

200 GHash/sec should be OK through November -- minimum 400GHash from November on with 600-800GHash possibly being profitable-- with a TerraHash being the starter for January February.

This is based on two weeks of digging though all the technical specs I could find and doing a little work with the difficulty equations as related to Bitcoin mining. Today and for the next few weeks chip supply of Avalon and others will determine market direction -- and it ain't great at this moment -- but that could change by morning -- or not.

Feel Free to remind me of my predictions in January should I prove wrong.

Just my opinion -- YMMMV.

batt01

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I have some BTC in Activemining, and Addiction shares. Right now I am putting the BTC made by my 5 Block Erupters into Activemining, I also think LabRat mining looks attractive. You can do your own due diligence. I may buy a few more Block Erupters, but It may make more sense to buy mining shares. I have decided to do both, with more fund going to mining shares and a lesser amount into BEs.

LogicalUnit

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UPDATE!! 2013-08-06

My first CD has matured, and I have paid out all my mining profits. Not as much as I'd hoped, but now I have some liquidity. What will be my next move?

Buy more AMUs? Buy alternative hardware? Another CD? Cash out to fiat? Invest in shares or derivatives?

Give me a suggestion with a rationale and I will consider it!!

ooeygooeygold

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Have you thought about investing in an asic stock on btct or bitfunder? Probably would get a better return then a CD

bondfire

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Quote from: batt01 on August 01, 2013, 04:17:44 PM

Quote

The d-link outputs up to 3A which is enough to power 6 ASICs, but not an additional fan. It's also very physically difficult to get the fan to fit when it's plugged into the hub. I recommend getting an extra USB power supply for the fan.

My D-Link ran ran with 6 block erupters and a usb fan. However I did notice that if I rebooted the R Pi with the 6 BEs and fan, only 5 of the erupter would start up. I would have to pull and reinsert the 6th, then it would start up. Or start up the BEs, then add the fan last. That tells me I was at the upper limit of the power available. I moved the fan to a second usb hub and now I can power down and restated without the need to hot plug. Even tho you can run 6 BE's and a fan, It may be best to run without the fan in hte seventh port.

Awesome details, thanks!

batt01

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Quote

The d-link outputs up to 3A which is enough to power 6 ASICs, but not an additional fan. It's also very physically difficult to get the fan to fit when it's plugged into the hub. I recommend getting an extra USB power supply for the fan.

My D-Link will run with 6 block erupters and a usb fan. However I did notice that if I rebooted the R Pi with the 6 BEs and fan, only 5 of the erupter would start up. I would have to pull and reinsert the 6th, then it would start up. Or start up the BEs, then add the fan last. That tells me I was at the upper limit of the power available. I moved the fan to a second usb hub and now I can power down and restated without the need to hot plug. Even tho you can run 6 BE's and a fan, It may be best to run without the fan in the seventh port.

bondfire

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Quote from: LogicalUnit on August 01, 2013, 04:07:46 PM

Quote from: bondfire on August 01, 2013, 02:18:39 PM

Since then I've ordered 10 more ASIC sticks, another DLINK hub and another fan. I'm planning to daisy chain the Hubs together and hopfully run 6 devices on the second Hub. Hoping it will support 6 sticks and a fan...

The d-link outputs up to 3A which is enough to power 6 ASICs, but not an additional fan. It's also very physically difficult to get the fan to fit when it's plugged into the hub. I recommend getting an extra USB power supply for the fan.

It looks like batt01 is using 6 sticks AND a fan.

bondfire

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Quote from: batt01 on August 01, 2013, 03:21:53 PM

D-Link does work nicely with the R Pi. I have six BEs and a USB fan, working without issue.

Awesome! That's exactly the info I was looking for! Thanks!

LogicalUnit

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Quote from: bondfire on August 01, 2013, 02:18:39 PM

Since then I've ordered 10 more ASIC sticks, another DLINK hub and another fan. I'm planning to daisy chain the Hubs together and hopfully run 6 devices on the second Hub. Hoping it will support 6 sticks and a fan...

The d-link outputs up to 3A which is enough to power 6 ASICs, but not an additional fan. It's also very physically difficult to get the fan to fit when it's plugged into the hub. I recommend getting an extra USB power supply for the fan.

batt01

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D-Link does work nicely with the R Pi. I have six BEs and a USB fan, working without issue.

Best Share
72763
MinePeon Uptime
13 hr 59 sec
Miner Uptime
13 hr 36 sec

bondfire

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Thanks for your post, I used this to determine that the DLINK DUB-H7 will indeed work. I was able to get a POC rig working with a Raspberry Pi, 1 ASIC stick, a DLINK DUB-H7 and an Arctic Breeze fan. Works like a charm!

Since then I've ordered 10 more ASIC sticks, another DLINK hub and another fan. I'm planning to daisy chain the Hubs together and hopfully run 6 devices on the second Hub. Hoping it will support 6 sticks and a fan...

Here is the diagram of the plan. Let me know what you think.

Code:

+-----+ +-------+
| | | v
+-----------+-+ | +------------+-+ +------------+
|DLINK DUB-H7 | | | DLINK DUB-H7 | |Raspberry Pi|
|-------------| | |--------------| |------------|
| | | | | | |
|1 2 3 4 5 6 7| | |1 2 3 4 5 6 7| | 3.5GHash/s |
+-------------+ | +--------------+ +------------+
+ + + + + + + | ^ + + + + + +
A A A A A A | | | A A A A A |
S S S S S S | +--+ S S S S S |
I I I I I I | I I I I I |
C C C C C C | C C C C C |
+ + + + + + | + + + + + |
1 2 3 4 5 6 | 7 8 9 10 11|
| |
+-FAN-+ +-FAN-+

xTachibana

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thats over a dollar from interest :O not bad considering its only 1 btc investment XD

LogicalUnit

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Mini-update:

I currently have 0.61370383 BTC balance in my primary mining pool, and 0.00073648 BTC balance in my secondary. The Certificate of Deposit will mature on 2013-08-06, and my return will be 1.02393825 BTC from a principal of 1.005 BTC. The plan is to pay out and reinvest everything when the CD matures.

xTachibana

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any new updates logical Cheesy

? how many bitcoins have you mined so far? and how many btc at the current market price of 85-88 btc to usd (around 95 AUD) to get your ROI

batt01

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This thread caused me to dust off my R Pi and basically duplicated your setup. Currently running exact same hardware, same hub. One diff is I have a small usb fan. Temp is a chilly 39c. This is likely to go up, when more stick are added. Only have one BE at the moment. I have five more on the way. Just got my tracking numbers today. I was going to buy some mining shares with the money, but this is much more fun. I will buy some mining shares next month. I like Addiction and LabRat.

Thanks

LogicalUnit

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Quote from: flipper on July 23, 2013, 03:04:04 PM

Have you consider increasing your cooling capacity? I heard these usb miners can run pretty hot.

They run hot indeed. Without cooling, they are too hot to touch. A few hours before the instability, I noticed that my fan was caught on something and had stopped spinning. This *could* be the cause of the problem. I'll keep an eye on it and keep you updated.

flipper

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Quote from: LogicalUnit on July 22, 2013, 10:51:52 PM

Had my first stability issue for over a month just now. cgminer was detecting ten AMUs instead of five. I unplugged/plugged the USB hub, and Quit and resumed cgminer with sudo screen -r, and that seemed to fix it.

Have you consider increasing your cooling capacity? I heard these usb miners can run pretty hot.

Topic: A case study in entry-level mining - page 11. (Read 53578 times)