Topic: What are some tips on selecting an appropriate bitcoin/ASC-anything mining pool? (Read 1089 times)

Sorry... I should have provided a link for you.  A good site is http://www.bitcoinwisdom.com/difficulty.  On the top right of the page you can put in different values and see the results.  For example, if you put in "1" in the "TH/s" box, you'll see the numbers adjust and find that expected earnings in BTC for 1TH/s are 0.0106BTC per day.

Unfortunately, I can't think of any step-by-step guide out there for you to peruse, other than the pool threads here on the forum.  I can give you personal experience, though.  I've mined on Slush, BTCGuild, GHash.io, kano, p2pool, Eligius, etc.  If you're looking for responsive pool operators, here's my list:

Eleuthria (BTCGuild)
DrHaribo (BitMinter)
kano (kano.is)
-ck (solo.ckpool)
wizkid057 (Eligius)

These folks are ALWAYS on the forums and either directly answering user questions or providing updates on pool happenings.

Other pools and operators have different methods of interaction.  For example, Slush uses IRC, email and a support website.  P2Pool has great community support and a ton of knowledgable and helpful users to answer your questions (you'll find me in that thread quite a bit, along with windpath, PatMan, jedimstr and a bunch more).

I suggested you go to the alt coin forums because they are more knowledgable about their pools, switching algorithms, payouts, etc than you're likely to find here in the BTC side.  It was to help you research and educate yourself so that you might make a well-informed choice on where to mine, not a predisposition of choice.

Thanks you for your reply.

Where is this calculator? A link would help.

And also, how to find and compare various pools' stability? A step by step guide, baby step by baby step would help.

No, really, I have not decided if I want to mine altcoin or bitcoin. I care about stuff like stability and profits. Where to start? Going to the altcoin forum would imply I have already chosen a route - this is not the case.

Stability of the pool, low-to-no fees, etc.  All things being equal, a pool is a pool and there's no magic bullet that says, "pool A is guaranteed to be more profitable than pool B".  Looking at an online calculator will provide you with expected earnings, and a pool that pays at or near those expectations is good.

Regarding your alt coin question, there are a number of pools out there that claim to have super secret algorithms for picking the most profitable coin.  There are also pools that will mine X coin and pay you out in Y coin.  You'll be better off asking about these options in the alt coin subforums.

I either was recommended MiddleCoin (https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/ann-profit-switching-auto-exchanging-pool-wwwmiddlecoincom-259649) which mines or mined(?) the altcoin of the day selected by a secret algorithm.

Yes, I read that this topic should be about bitcoin mining, not altcoin mining, but where should people post who doesn't care if they mine bitcoin or altcoin, just want to profit?

Otherwise, I was advised Ghash.io, which was said to be the biggest - but now out of order. I don' t know, if the difficulty/electricity cost ratio is not favorable for the moment for some, others may still want to speculate that bitcoin price will increase, hence, mine. Is it not profitable to run the service for them? I don't know.

Ghash.io may not be the biggest, either: https://blockchain.info/pools

All in all, how to choose a bitcoin/altcoin pool (ASIC), if the main thing I care about is profit?