Topic: Bitcoin mining and alternatives (Read 2642 times)

i don't think it's possible anymore, right now you can do at best $2500 a month with 2300 of watt, 150 sounds something out of 1 month ago, now the profit on the altcoin is way less

What are you mining to earn 150 a day using 2800 watts?

exactly this.
note that the backlog of gpus you mentioned are a bit inefficient now.
if you want to go into mining, mine altcoins and convert to btc.
if you want to invest in btc, buy it and hold it, but ask lots of questions first in the relevant parts of the forum about how best to do that.

on no account should you trust genesis mining or anything like that

@ op  you are in the wrong part of bitcointalk.

and here is the deal  you want to mine an alt coin with a gpu gaming style rig then trade the alt coin  for some btc coin.

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.19405111


if you really want to learn   spend the time  and read for a few hours

newest thread

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/fourth-alt-coin-thread-last-three-got-oversized-1877588


Link to thread 1

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/my-1-gpu-now-11gpus-5rigs-for-ethereum-45-days-of-mining-photos-thoughts-1429151

Link to thread 2

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/my-1-gpu-now-11gpus-5rigs-for-ethereum-45-days-of-mining-photos-thoughts-1429151

link to thread 3

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/third-alt-coin-thread-last-two-were-too-big-builds-links-thoughts-etc-1799555



if you can use some power where you work legally .  1 k-watt  is enough.

I earn 150 a day using 2800 watts of power. with gpus I then trade the alt coins for btc. I sell some btc I keep some btc.

read the threads

Mining is definitely speculative - like ANY investment, it is a gamble.

 The trick is to maximize your odds of achieving a positive net return.

Thank you for the information. I am not convinced that this mining is not a form of gambling. I read what Warren Buffet said. I Think he is both right and wrong. I think buying shares in the transfer service is what you are doing by mining bitcoins. The same result can be achieved by buying the coins outright. The hot gear and high electricity usage is not something that suits my lifestyle. Perhaps if these companies advertised for people to mine with gpus and other equipment it would feel less like gambling. A friend of mine is making real cash trading alternative money.He bought in I think he said in 2013. So he was able to mine with his home system.  Genesys mining is probably a good alternative if you want to invest in bitcoin and these companies. What I read is the closer they are to the 21 million the harder the coins will be to mine. So using Genesys is a good alternative for me to mining if I want to invest in virtual currency.

no it can only do one thing, if it is designed for sha256 and bitcoin miningit can only mine bitcoin until it will be not profitable to do so

then you are wasting electricity and nothign more, and you can't use it for anything else like GPU, this is the first reason why asic is bad

they are also bad because they force you at soem point to acquire a new asic, because your last one is obsolete and this process is must faster in the asic envyronment than gpu one

with gpu you have plenty of years  to adapt before changing for the better one, soem times more than 4 years, some old gpu are still relevant today

 1) No. ASIC are specifically designed to do one thing well, with NO excess circuitry for doing anything else (except perhaps chip temp and power usage monitoring). GPUs are designed to be a lot more flexable, which needs a lot more circuitry to do the same thing and limits their performance on that "one thing" compared to an ASIC.
   The only reason GPUs are viable on most altcoins is that nobody thinks those particular altcoins have enough of a market to support an ASIC (or in the case of ETH the question of "when it will go POS and no longer be mineable at all" seems to have killed any interest in making an ASIC for that algo, expecially coupled with the rather high amount of RAM needed to mine it at all which would lead to an ASIC for it being somewhat less of a performance jump vs GPUs than on algos that currently DO have ASIC options).

 2) Bitcoin isn't really out of the reach of most single users, but it IS somewhat less expensive to built a low-end GPU-based (or dual purpose) rig that can be effective at mining Altcoins at this time.

 3) It depends on the altcoin - if one of them gets big enough long enough (ZEC looks like the best current candidate, then probably XMR) someone MIGHT build an ASIC for it eventually.
     I expect to see someone build a ZEC ASIC at some point, and I'll be a little supprised if one DOESN'T show up before the end of the year.

What is an ASIC machine? A mini computer with an XBOX like powercell GPU/CPU hybrid designed for bitcoin mining? Does it serve any other function?

Absolutely not to no. 1

I have recently been reading up on the process of obtaining bitcoin and other alternative currencies and had a few questions. These questions have probably been asked already so try and go easy on me because I'm new. Im a computer superuser. I basically repair and service hardware at all levels (except large supercomputers) . I have worked in a data center from the lowest level of starting batch runs to late night repairs on vital government computers. That basically means I have installed server racks, built computers, serviced computers, and every type of laptop imaginable. I was looking for a hobby one that would generate some income for me. There you see where this is going.

My questions are;

 1) Is it possible to build a GPU machine capable of reaching ASIC levels with the same energy costs? So what I am saying is it possible to convert a GPU into an ASIC miner with software? I don't understand the concept of ASIC miners and don't understand why an energy efficient GPU modified with software can't do the same job. The cost of a couple high end video cards is much higher or the same as a good ASIC miner, but if I lost interest in the hobby I would still have a high end GPU to show for it. If thats not possible and someone can explain that would be interesting as it is my profession.

2) Bitcoin is out of the reach of most single users. Even if I joined a pool the money generated would be low. I don't really want to buy an ASIC machine because it serves only one function. Which are the best alternatives to bitcoin?

3) Are the alternatives to bitcoin going to go to ASIC miners?

I would really enjoy setting up a system that could be used for gaming and bitcoin mining. I have so much spare equipment including old video cards from old Nvidia GTX cards from 2008 to an R270 in a spare computer that might function mining coins though I think they are closer to fire hazards with PCI express expander/add on cards. So if anyone can help me out on where to get started and answer my questions. I would jump right in, but an ASIC miner is going to end up as a doorstop once the 21 millionth bitcoin is mined so I would like to hear about alternatives if there are any.