Topic: I have $5,000 to buy equipment and almost free electricity. Where do I start? (Read 3990 times)

I gave BitLendingClub a shot. On I think 7 Loans, 4 or 5 defaulted.

I would avoid.

My thoughts exactly. Defaulting on one loan would mean you have to make money on 20 others to cover that loss. But let us stay on topic.
Maybe you should save your money for the new S6. It should be out by the end of the summer.

Even with free electric, there are probably better miners out there, S3+?

S4+ available for shipping within a week.  2,570 GH/s (2.57 TH/s) @ 1,480 watts.  Stated .58 watts per GH/s.  PSU's are not the same.  They were designed by Bitmaintech.

946 USD ( 4.218 BTC )

https://www.bitmaintech.com/productDetail.htm?pid=00020150420021310934XOpI8PEw0689

I would guess a nonpayment would be hard to get from their FAQ: http://support.bitlendingclub.com/hc/en-us/articles/202164491-Does-BitLendingClub-collect-on-defaults-  They say "No, we do not collect on defaults. The lenders are responsible for arranging the collection of default loans after the borrower information is released."  So basically you are on your own.

I do find it interesting the spreading across so many loans to help with this.  I would have to get a heck of a ROI to risk someone defaulting on a loan.

This seems as an interesting alternative. What about losses, non paying loans?

As far as staying quiet I think S3's that are under clocked will be best.  They are just built like tanks to.  Very well made. 

If you go with S5 you will have more noise compared to under clocked S3.  But you also cannot put as much hashing power as it is not as efficient.  So it has pros/cons to both situations.

I'm in a similar situation and this is my thinking thus far:

Option #1: Buy used S3 or S5 miners since they seem to be the best deal for GH/$ - Using older miners are less efficient but if you are not paying for electricity this wouldnt affect you.
Option #2: Buy S5 miners for the best GH/kW - This option allows you to stay under the radar at your apartment complex just in case they are not happy with excessive electricity usage.

I was in the same boat sorta.  Im worried I'm not computer savy enough to get the most out of mining.  Instead I decided to get into the p2p lending.  I'm using bitlendding club.   Started with 2 btc spread across 12 loans.  I earned $34 in my first month and am now increasing my investments. 

The free electricity is nice but you will blow circuits with multiple miners imo.  I'd run just 1 miner and I bet you can slip under the radar.

If your goal... Which you state... Is to "learn" about mining. You dont need to spend $5000.

Buy some 750ti gpus. An Asrock BTC Motherboard. A 4770k CPU. And build a rig. A 6 GPU Rig that runs SGMiner and will also run ccminer for CPU coins. Learn how to build from scratch, and get it stable and so it runs, auto-reboots, auto restarts, etc... Maintenance free. Build 1 of these.

Then, buy 1 Antminer S5 used.

Then, using any cheap computer you have sitting around, learn to setup your own Stratum Proxy Server, and connect your 2 Miners (GPU Rig and your ASIC) to it, and get it to connect to your pool or client.  

All of what I have listed above you can do for far less than $5000 especially if you buy used.

After youve done the above, you will be well schooled in mining and can make an educated decision on if you want to expand it further.

And if you decide to not expand after seeing just how much work just doing what I have listed above entails- you can likely sell everything you bought for minimal loss if you look for good deals when buying originally.

Lastly, and this is just me, but looking back, it would have been far more profitable and efficient, saving me countless hours, days, weeks of trial and error, of finding an expert miner in this field, and paying them even $1000 for 1 full 10 hour day for in person on location training. If you can find someone in your area and willing.

Just saying, in 1 day the right person could save you what would take you weeks to learn by combing through forums, finding arcane information, etc.

Hope that helps,

Strato

I would suggest that you look at the USB class of miners. That would either be a "stick" type miner (i.e. a USB stick that runs kind warm, and has the SHA256 ASIC) or a small (e.g. R-box) class of device. None of these will generate too much heat, cost too much, or use too much power. None will generate much in the way of Bitcoin either. The costs won't be high, and you can decide the extent to which you want to improve your mining, or reach a state of satisfaction.

I just want to learn some basic mining with my computer.
Not really looking into serious mining at the moment.

Eventually this could cause a limit.  Maverick is very right.  If you want a general idea BE safe but look at breaker and see if it has 100 amp or 200 amp main breaker.

I got lucky I have a 2 lines coming in to my place.  One main has 200 amp, and other main has a 100 amp.  So I am able to expand quite large if I want to.

you have the founds to do some ''serious home mining'', so why not ask around and see how much power you can use without problems....

I would like to learn more about mining though!
Where do I start if I want to mine with my computer?

I will learn more about it and see if it is for me or not.

We have never exchanged messages on here or on skype.... 
I think you are mistaking me for someone else

You will almost certainly see a positive ROI sooner than if you had bought $5000 of actual hardware. If BTC never gets above $250, then your mining would have a failure as well (IMHO).

I think sub $200 will be the price to start buying... and given the fact that summer is coming up - I think an ease in price moving forward may be likely. The traders say - sell in May and Go Away!

Strato

I'm wondering if the OP has managed to get his unit online ok.  He was asking me a few questions via skype last night but given the time difference and the language barrier I'm not sure if alot of what I was trying to convey got through to him.

A lot of ROI depends on electricity price.  I normally say mine.  But BTC is at a attractive price to buy.

Even buying holding a few weeks and then buying gear I think might be best way.  I think we will have a least a small upwards motion in next few weeks.

In all honesty I would skip the mining and just buy BTC straight up.
Mining is hot, noisy and takes maintenence and upkeep to be profitable.

I owned 2 s1's and the only time I got ROI on it is when I sold the damn things.

Undoubtedly the smarter play at this point if you still believe.

BTW, for future reference, you would be lucky to be able to run 1x or 2x units in your apartment before you would likely blow your circuit out.  These ASIC's definitely suck down a heck of alotta juice.

Yup. Just bought $4,000 worth of coins at 217

Avoid the headache and drama, the prices are plummeting so its better to buy now at this point.

As for the remainder of the money do a 50 split between it, since the btc price is so low, then sell some off when it goes back $100 difference then use that to buy into a legit cloud mining service like genesis mining..as for free electricity I highly doubt its for free.

Nothing to worry about and then one day they run away with your money.
I agree with the second part, Bitcoin is really close to this years bottom, so if you wanted to buy in cheap here's your chance. If Bitcoin follows its typical pattern it will jump at least 10% by the end of the year. Less risky than being stuck with hardware if you ask me.

this is the reason why cloud are better, no electricity to worry about, and no anything else you mentioned, basically the risk are the same with physical HW but the cost are much less

and another thing good to do now is to buy bitcoin and forget about mining completely

Chances are you will get shut down by your landlord/university... and then you will be stuck with a bunch of hardware you have to move.

Regardless of free AC; there are most certainly very vague clauses in your agreements with your landlord/university regarding reasonable use of ameneties; ethics; etc - they will come down on you if you are pulling 10 kW of power (which you could with $5,000 in gear).

Secondly; you are going to have to exhaust the heat - and $5000 worth of ASICs is going to put of some real heat.

Third, Law Enforcement Agencies; the DEA, actively monitor areas around colleges using helicopters with IR cameras. This is done passively by all police copters now. The cameras are always running - and the images they capture are IR - which show heat exhaust from buildings. The images are simply run through a software system (all on auto) - and anything out of the ordinary and you will get a knock on your door.

They are searching for "growers". Bitcoin miners have, on more than one occasion had DEA show up for a bust.

Just some things to think about.

Strato

I too would suggest a stick miner as the starting point for learning about mining. It's so much faster than the CPU, or a GPU, that it will keep your interest a bit. It also lets you figure out what kind of speed delivers what kind of return. Stick miners are really cheap compared to a GPU, and draw little power and generate little heat compared to a GPU. You will not get rich, but you won't go broke spending $50-100 for the hardware to run a1-3 stick miners. Think of it as a learning investment, and then decide what kind of effort and risk you are willing take with Bitcoin mining.

I would just invest $5,000 traditionally, then use the investment to buy 1 btc instead.

And buy more when you see the price movements to pick up or not. Its not good to just buy and expect to just shoot up, its better to earn other areas of profit then using that free capital to your advantage.

he should mine first using his computer. so that he can learn more about mining and not just jump in on it.

like most of us are saying mining now really isnt that good and it is better to trade.

if he mines with his gpu he can have estimates on how much he would earn if he buy an expensive miner and see if he really wants it.

As far as just mining to learn it I would suggest getting a stick miner if you are not wanting to spend much.  I consider it much better then CPU/GPU mining.   Some of the old block erupters are pretty cheap.

It's not that hard. Most miners come with their own programs where you just enter the address of the pool and boom, you're mining.
Mining with your GPU is usually harder than that

Im not saying he will earn.  Im just saying to mine first with his computer to familliarize how mining works. Before you invest 5k dollars on mining.  You should study it first.  Not just buy right away

This means he'll have to mine some new altcoins preferably CPU ones, which basically drops 99% of coins out of the equation. It can also mean he won't earn anything as some of these coins are scams or fail to reach a significant market cap.


This might be a good idea. Although PoS is not considered "mining" by all it's probably the only way if you can't profit from traditional mining. It's by far better than cloud if you ask me.

how about trying to mine with your personal computer first so you can familliarize how mining works. i would still recommend trading over mining now

The question shouldn't be "where do I start?" It should be "when should I have started?"

And the answer is... you should have started in the fall of 2103. You're way too late to the game unless you're just in it for the "fun"!

This.

5 S5 suck a lot of power and someone will notice, 100%. If I were you, I would go either cloud or invest into some PoS coins.

they will release jack shit cause knc is dead, bitfury is b2b, spondoolies is out for few months... they have no need to rush something new to the market atm!

@Tabata11 i would go with good ventilation and underclock if&when necessary..... an 12kbtu ac will die in summer time because of too much heat!
it's about adapting to your room and electric capabilities...

You have no any proofs, right?  They promised to release new generation of their antminers soon (about one mnonth ago!) but still nothing has been released.

Obviously you could inquire of your landlord regarding the electrical capacity for your apartment. My bet is that is when they will make clear your terms of usage, and I'll bet that a "money making enterprise", such as Bitcoin mining is prohibited.

If you want to "fly under the radar" your electrical capacity will run out long before your $5000 budget does in terms of mining hardware. While your electricity appears low cost, or nearly free, it isn't. If you get cross-wise with the University over electrical usage, you could have much bigger problems with your education, than just Bitcoin mining. I think learning is fine, but maxing out your electrical usage and budget won't bring you any great riches.

One last item. What if 20% or more of the other students in your housing complex followed your lead? Do you think the University still wouldn't notice? Do you think they would condone and/or ignore you running a long extension cored out the window and selling recharges for Plug-in electric car?

Just my $.02.

I would like to give you my personal suggestion, don't start to "mining" not it is not more convenient and you will lose only money and (especially) time. Maybe you should start to trade altcoin and bitcoin, you can make (easily) 20-30 bucks per day.

The University will notice that you are sucking down a large amount of electricity. They will come down hard on you. Your mining career will end well before you experience ROI. They may even press criminal charges against you as well. If you don't think so, go ahead, no skin off my teeth.

new fans can help with the noise, those miners are all very loud, they can also help with cooling them, as long as they move a good amount of air, you should see about CFM when purchasing a fan, the higher the more air it moves, and bigger the fan the less noisy is

for electricity usually those apartment can support 3kw, now i don't know if you are with 120/220, but amperage should be around 15 or 27

Do I need to purchase a set of fans to keep the miners cool? What do I need to purchase to keep them cool? Also, running the AC low wouldn't be sufficient enough to cool them right? I usually run my AC below 70 degrees all summer because my bill doesn't change or anything.

Also, how do I check to see if the electricity power in my apartment is strong enough to support multiple mining equipment? I see that the maximum is 125 amp or not to exceed 110 amp per branch circuit stab... I don't know want to purchase mining equipments if my apartment electricity can't support them.

Cooling becomes huge in summer.  During winter you can run easily more then you can most places.  The trick is venting exhaust and getting new air.

I personally got rid of a few miners including the A1 Dragon.  Some miners just are not good for summer.   You might look into underclocking as-well it really can help depending on miner with the heat it puts out.

cooling and/or ventilation will be an issue in the summer time. keep that in mind when you reach the ''maximum'' number of miners
also test your electric to see how much you can suck before u cause a fire/ breaker tripping...
maybe you need more concentrated power than s3, sp3x may be your answer; but you will need to make some mods to keep it's noise down
using the ventilation built into the building may be an alternative, or not. look into it

you want s-3's  here is a legit seller


http://zoomhash.com/products/antminer-s3-bitcoin-miner-453-gh-s


buy 3 and use this psu to start your mine


http://www.amazon.com/EVGA-SuperNOVA-1300G2-ATX12V-120-G2-1300-XR/dp/B00COIZTZM/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1428291999&sr=8-1&keywords=evga+1300+g2


you can run 3 machines on that psu. 

you may find a better price for  s-3's  as low as 85 here and there.

trust just get 3 of them they will be hot.

3 s-3's = 1350-1500gh  and pull  1100-1250 watts     the psu = 169 if you find 3 s-3's for 300 you are at   469 out of pocket

If power is truly cheap 2 cents a kwatt  you will be ahead 44 to 171 dollars by Jan 1st 2016.

I live in an apartment that is owned by a large university so I don't think they monitor electricity usage or anything like that.

Also, how long does it take to set up the mining equipment? I have little knowledge about computer systems and mining equipments. and I would like to mine to earn bitcoins and learn about them at the same time.

The best bang for your buck would probably be farms of S3's being liquidated for almost nothing at the moment.  Seriously, like 50 of them.  Just try not to burn down the neighborhood.

i'm with adaseb on this!

buy in bulk s3 or s3+ and keep in mind the future upgrades when you buy the psu

s2, dragon is also a good choice if cheap

s1 is too much work and too little reward

spondoolies is also a good choice, and sp10 is very cheap if noise is not an issue!

You guys are giving him bad advice with the S5. Its overpriced and pointless if he has free electricity.

Best to get inefficient miners like the KNC Jupiters or the S3. Which are almost "free" these days.

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/bitmain-antminer-s6-and-s7-speculation-1003216

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/antminer-s5-1155ghoverclock-potential-in-stock-0319gh-051wgh-902305

Where can I find more information about the s6 miners? Is there a thread or a website I can look at?

after looking this hardware comparison chart. https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Mining_hardware_comparison u should find a miner suitable for u.

it may seems so, but with some calcualtion you can easily tell that it's not worth it even with free electricity(he said almost, which is worst btw)

you need 4-5 months ROI with antminer S5(0.36 a month and they cost minimum 1.5 btc), not worth it

better to buy bitcoin instead or you can wait for antminer s6(it should come soon) which is about  1.5 times better, this mean less than 3 months roi

Almost free electricity ? Nothing more beautiful it if you own a mining equipment . s5 is great for you now.

S6 we really don't have a date forsure on.  It really depends on if you want to mine now, or wait till next generation.

Also a lot of companies are out of stock on this gen miners. 

with the amount of fund you have, i would consider s5 miners or wait a little till the s6 miners are out in june-july.

I want to get into mining but I don't know where to start. I believe I have all the right things to mine successfully. I have $5,000 to invest in mining equipments and almost free electricity. My rent for my apartment includes utilities so my electricity rate is constant every month. However, I don't know anything about mining so where should I start?