Has the ship sailed on mining profitability?

Gameover211

newbie

Activity: 4

Merit: 0

Quote from: matt_b on June 24, 2011, 01:47:06 PM

You might not be able to retire from BC mining. However, if computers are your hobby and you're buying equipment that you'd use for other purposes (e.g. gaming) where is the downside? Just don't buy equipment that you can't afford, and it'll work out.

This is my approach, stick within your means and it should work out. Plus you get to watch a new form or currency grow and succeed or die.

lateminer

newbie

Activity: 22

Merit: 0

Don't you wish you purchased a godly rig in 2009? Cha-Ching, early adopter status. Cry

ahitman

sr. member

Activity: 302

Merit: 250

The problem with starting now is that if the exchange rate stays around where it is now, and even if the difficulty slows its rise, you will still not pay off your rigs. You will get less and less BTC each difficulty increase, which means less $ to pay for your hardware.
If starting today, its possible you will never pay off your hardware. There is always a chance that BTC value will rise, but don't expect difficulty to ever go down, too many people doing this on paid off rigs and as a hobby to make that happen.

lateminer

newbie

Activity: 22

Merit: 0

I think my username speaks for itself :\

wamatt

member

Activity: 85

Merit: 10

Definitely think its cyclical. Today Botnets are "winning" cos cheapest to run. As input costs are almost free:

Stolen electricity
Compromised hardware supply the infrastructure

catcherintherye

newbie

Activity: 19

Merit: 0

I think the ship has sailed but not quite yet. Still some profitability left.

kokojie

legendary

Activity: 1806

Merit: 1003

I disagree, we will never see 10M difficulty, as long as BTC price stays below $20. You have to remember difficulty is a lagging indicator of BTC price, we already see that difficulty has leveled off, at the current rate, the next difficulty will just be a 10% jump, and then it's possible that we will be seeing a difficulty decrease (IF price stay below $20).

Quote from: itxbc on June 24, 2011, 09:53:58 PM

The problem I see in all of this analysis of bitcoin mining is that you cannot predict the price of BTC that you need to sell to pay for your mining costs. I'm mining with 6950s (stock because I ended up with cards I can't unlock the shaders on - oh well Sad

) I'm getting around 355MHash/s each (900MHz which is as high as I can go locked)

Right now at ~$15/BTC and paying .1/kwh in electricity, mining ceases to be profitable at a difficulty of 10000000 for a single stock 6950. That's over 7 times the current difficulty! Are we headed there? Yes we are. Will BTC stay at $15, crash to $1 or go up to $100? Nobody knows. But right now? I'm earning $$$ to pay off my rigs, and at the very least should be able to recoup enough to break even if I sell my stuff used. But if I pay the rigs off, then it becomes a pure equation of power costs.

So will I pay off my rigs? Only time will tell and it all depends on the market and $/BTC.

But lets say difficulty skyrockets in a month's time and profits vaporize. We actually see a drop in network processing. Then BTC jumps to, say $50/BTC. Miners will pile back in.

Bottom line is NOBODY can predict difficulty, GPU advances, or $/BTC. Just like the day traders, mining has risk. As it should be.

WillMitchell

member

Activity: 98

Merit: 10

The days of profiting from mining are over. There is still great opportunity in other Bitcoin Methods, you just have to be creative. Ride the wave people.

smoothie

legendary

Activity: 2492

Merit: 1473

LEALANA Bitcoin Grim Reaper

You forgot to mention in your list:

4. Current Difficulty
5. Current amount of bitcoins per block (now is 50, but in a few years it will be 25).

Once it hits 25 i believe the price will have to at least double from its current value at that time.

Twice less bitcoins on top of the difficulty increases, gosh...

Thinks (suit cases of cash and laptops full of bitcoins)

helmetedwarrior

newbie

Activity: 14

Merit: 0

One day validating transactions will become ubiquitous. Bitcoin miners will become the equivalent of banktellers...they can make a living but not a good one.

I wouldn't be surprised if one day the process of validating transactions is done by the same client that you check your bitcoin balance with. This would effectively put Bitcoin miners out of work.

Hedghog

Hugo St Angelo

newbie

Activity: 4

Merit: 0

Quote from: harik on June 25, 2011, 04:44:24 PM

Quote from: Hugo St Angelo on June 25, 2011, 04:37:30 PM

I found this cool pooled mining club that allows you to MINE WITHOUT RIGS!!
And helps you stay ahead of the difficulty curve!
The address is www.bit39.com
ref. # 0238-404

Hay look another ponzi scheme. Hint: It's a scam and there's no mining going on.

Hey look, how do you think I got my 3 coins to pledge to begin with you idiot?
Of course there's mining going on, we are just extrapolating our efforts with this club is all.
As far as Ponzi, no one is promising rewards that are not already there and earned you dumb Barney Madoff faggot!

Join me once your brain clears itself of banker propoganda and you begin to see clearly the difference between the power of ancient technology and those that would like to sully your brain with foolishness, fear and mental incapacity. My ref # is 0238-404

harik

newbie

Activity: 26

Merit: 0

Quote from: Hugo St Angelo on June 25, 2011, 04:37:30 PM

I found this cool pooled mining club that allows you to MINE WITHOUT RIGS!!
And helps you stay ahead of the difficulty curve!
The address is www.bit39.com
ref. # 0238-404

Hay look another ponzi scheme. Hint: It's a scam and there's no mining going on.

Hugo St Angelo

newbie

Activity: 4

Merit: 0

I found this cool pooled mining club that allows you to MINE WITHOUT RIGS!!
And helps you stay ahead of the difficulty curve!
The address is www.bit39.com
ref. # 0238-404

George Carmack

newbie

Activity: 33

Merit: 0

Quote from: itxbc on June 24, 2011, 09:53:58 PM

.... Right now at ~$15/BTC and paying .1/kwh in electricity...

.1 ? I have to pay .22 € ~ .3 USD Huh

BR
GC

neversleep

newbie

Activity: 1

Merit: 0

And to make matters WORSE. In about 37 weeks, when total blocks reach 210,000; profitability is cut in HALF (The reward drops to 25BTC / per found block.)

itxbc

newbie

Activity: 5

Merit: 0

The problem I see in all of this analysis of bitcoin mining is that you cannot predict the price of BTC that you need to sell to pay for your mining costs. I'm mining with 6950s (stock because I ended up with cards I can't unlock the shaders on - oh well Sad

) I'm getting around 355MHash/s each (900MHz which is as high as I can go locked)

Right now at ~$15/BTC and paying .1/kwh in electricity, mining ceases to be profitable at a difficulty of 10000000 for a single stock 6950. That's over 7 times the current difficulty! Are we headed there? Yes we are. Will BTC stay at $15, crash to $1 or go up to $100? Nobody knows. But right now? I'm earning $$$ to pay off my rigs, and at the very least should be able to recoup enough to break even if I sell my stuff used. But if I pay the rigs off, then it becomes a pure equation of power costs.

So will I pay off my rigs? Only time will tell and it all depends on the market and $/BTC.

But lets say difficulty skyrockets in a month's time and profits vaporize. We actually see a drop in network processing. Then BTC jumps to, say $50/BTC. Miners will pile back in.

Bottom line is NOBODY can predict difficulty, GPU advances, or $/BTC. Just like the day traders, mining has risk. As it should be.

percymate

newbie

Activity: 18

Merit: 0

If you have free equipment lying around, then yes, it would still be profitable. Unfortunately, jumping into the game now could spell disaster for people trying to make a quick buck.

jollyjim

newbie

Activity: 21

Merit: 0

Most people concentrate on the price when considering when to stop mining or if it'll be profitable. IMO, that's only a small part of it. What few people fail to consider, and is much more important right now, is the difficulty. Sure, if you're not paying for electricity, you'd always be making a profit... if you don't consider anything else. When the difficulty goes up so high that you'd be spending a month to get 1BTC with your 5GH/s setup, would you keep on mining, even with free electricity and rigs you've already paid off? If you still are, you're risking damaging a few hundred/thousand dollars worth of equipment for $100 in profit (I doubt the price of BTC will be that high any time soon). You'd make more selling that equipment.

If the difficulty keeps on going up at a 33% rate every 10 days, you're probably looking at 4-5 months before you should consider throwing in the towel, unless the price was astronomical. The difficulty has been going up much more than that and the halving of a block to 25BTC is coming much sooner than expected.

You'd only want to start mining with new rigs now if you believe that the difficulty will slow down or reverse course very soon.

arashd

full member

Activity: 134

Merit: 100