What about big memory coins, like IMACredit use to be? It was n-scrypt based with N=16 requiring 16MB of memory per thread back in 2014. The best scrypt ASICs back then (like the advertised but never delivered GAW Vaultbreaker) could only handle N=14. IMACredit was tested to work with an N up to 20, although that reduced it to hashs per hour back then instead of hashs per second.
It is my understanding that most ASICs excel because of the parallelism they have, with each chip running lots of threads. Use an algo that eats memory and the ASIC becomes impossibly expensive, since memory is not cheap. Right?
Well, this approach could work (although there's nothing stopping manufacturers from developing ASICs for any cryptocurrency), if the cryptocurrency becomes extremely popular and valuable across the market. So far, memory-intensive PoW cryptocurrencies have been resistant against ASICs. But, they would need to keep increasing their RAM requirements over time in order to maintain themselves away from said hardware.
Nonetheless, coins like cryply, Turtlecoin, and Hodlcoin seem to be the best bet for CPU mining these days.
Turtlecoin plans to fork for argon2id at block 1.8M
Cool. Let's hope that Turtlecoin remains ASIC-resistant, as well as, other cryptocurrencies which make use of ASIC-resistant algorithms. It's hard these days for the small miner to actively support a specific cryptocurrency's network, given how ASIC have dominated the industry for quite some time.
Despite this, even if mining CPU-only coins are considered a hobby, they serve as great learning tools for anyone who's new into the world of crypto. So far, Electroneum (phone mineable), cryply, and Hodlcoin are my favorite CPU-only coins to mine. Magi (XMG) used to be good, but it seems to be abandoned in development now.
Hopefully, more cryptos which are ASIC-resistant would emerge in order to further decentralized the mining industry.
I think verus coin is a good coin to mine for CPU mining and the difficulty is still low
Thanks for the tip. I'll have a deeper look at Verus for CPU mining. Komodo cryptocurrency seems to be actively promoting this coin, which means that it might be worth mining after all.
Its not exactly 'hot' right now. But on my gpu mining rig, I also mine with the cpu JSEcoin.
Its browser cpu based mining and is easy enough to set up. Doesnt use much electricity. But don't expect to get rich quick I'm talking maybe 10 cents a day as an estimate.
This new coin looks interesting to mine, especially on phones while you're on the road. Of course, this venture is not profitable at all. But at least, it's something. If it remains active in development, then it'll last for long.
Still, I'm on the hunt for new CPU-only coins with active development and innovation. It would be a better alternative than most popular coins out there which can only be mined with a GPU or an ASIC.