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I don't know about altcoins but I doubt learning about new ones and setting them up is worth your time. The electricity mining Bitcoins costs with a normal CPU

by freech 9y ago

I don't know about altcoins but I doubt learning about new ones and setting them up is worth your time. The electricity mining Bitcoins costs with a normal CPU/GPU though is definitely more then you're going to make. (Even if your PC is on anyway, just the added cycles.) EDIT: This is a good place to remind everyone that most people in the original gold rush lost money, their health and years of their lifes for nothing.

Klathmon 9y ago
Bitcoin is far past the point of being profitable with CPU or GPU, but there are many coins out there that are more than profitable for most americans (it has to mainly do with electricity cost in your area how much it will be profitable)
- cryoshon 9y ago
  can you provide any examples? i'm very skeptical because generally any coins that are viable with GPU mining are very quickly made not so by an influx of miners...
  - Klathmon 9y ago
    Ethereum is still more than worth it for me. At my electricity rates (which are a hair above the national average), it costs me very roughly $1 a day (I calculated actual usage numbers a bit ago for various algorithms but I don't have them on hand) to run an old R9 390 I had laying around (and the 390 is a VERY power hungry card). Hashing Ethereum, i'm making around $2 USD per day from that card. Hashing ZCash I'm making about $1.70 USD a day from that card. (both without any real optimizations). Also that's pre-power-consumption-cost, so the "profit" is $1/day and $0.70/day respectively. There are others which cut it even closer, but there are other people who live in areas with cheaper power that make even those worth it. It's not the cash-cow it was in it's hayday where people were making $5-10 per card in some cases, but for me it's still a nice $200 a month in profit in my bank account from just older equipment I had laying around and about $100 in parts and stuff to run it in my garage. Accounting for the several hours I put into setting it up makes the money less worth it, but it was fun for me to do so I'm happy with it.
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
    - pbhjpbhj 9y ago
      In theory you can invest that 200 and make 400 next month, what's stopping you; 6 months down the line you're in theory making 6400 per month (3200 gross profit) and have paid off your equipment?
      - Klathmon 9y ago
        In theory, but if the most profitable coins take a downturn, I could be left with a bill and a lot of very hot GPUs that would sell for a fraction of the price I bought them for. I'm okay with my lower gains for less/no risk.
    - dspillett 9y ago
      > o the "profit" is $1/day and $0.70/day respectively > it's still a nice $200 a month Even if you can do both concurrently, that doesn't add up (1.7*31 = 52.7, not $200).
      - Klathmon 9y ago
        That's only my one card, i've got a handful of other cards that I'm mining with (most fulltime in my garage, one in my main desktop PC that mines only at night when the AC won't need to cool it). My whole "setup" makes me about $200 in profit a month right now (down from roughly $500 in Ethereum's hayday)
    - _joel 9y ago
      Have you done the sums compared to if you just put $200 into BTC and watched the price increase?
      - Klathmon 9y ago
        I have, and depending on how you do it I could either be ahead or behind. If I would have "invested" only the $120 that I've spent on equipment so far, i'd be significantly worse off than I am with mining. (Remember, I started this process with a handful of older/unused GPUs, so the only stuff I bought was an extra PSU, some risers, and a few odds and ends here and there). If I factor in the selling of the unused GPUs that I had laying around that I'm using for mining, I'd still be at a bit less than I am now (assuming I got the "market rate" and sold them at a good time). Realistically I wouldn't have sold them, since I didn't already and had some of them for a few years. They would have just collected dust in my closet like they were. If I "pretend" that I invested as much as I'm spending in electricity each month into bitcoin and sold it off in a manner similar to how I get paid mining (in other words, "buy in" a few $ per day, selling all of that back at the end of the month), i'd be slightly better off, but that's only because bitcoin went from $2700 to like $4000 in a few freakin days!
  - laken 9y ago
    Most modern altcoins are designed to not be able to be mined with ASIC miners, so GPUs are the only efficient way of mining them. ETH is an example of one.
- muninn_ 9y ago
  What coins do you suggest?
paulpauper 9y ago
the problem with mining is the high initial cost outlay for hardware , which becomes obsolete rather quickly
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]

by freech 9y ago

Klathmon 9y ago

Bitcoin is far past the point of being profitable with CPU or GPU, but there are many coins out there that are more than profitable for most americans (it has to mainly do with electricity cost in your area how much it will be profitable)

cryoshon 9y ago
can you provide any examples? i'm very skeptical because generally any coins that are viable with GPU mining are very quickly made not so by an influx of miners...
- Klathmon 9y ago
  Ethereum is still more than worth it for me. At my electricity rates (which are a hair above the national average), it costs me very roughly $1 a day (I calculated actual usage numbers a bit ago for various algorithms but I don't have them on hand) to run an old R9 390 I had laying around (and the 390 is a VERY power hungry card). Hashing Ethereum, i'm making around $2 USD per day from that card. Hashing ZCash I'm making about $1.70 USD a day from that card. (both without any real optimizations). Also that's pre-power-consumption-cost, so the "profit" is $1/day and $0.70/day respectively. There are others which cut it even closer, but there are other people who live in areas with cheaper power that make even those worth it. It's not the cash-cow it was in it's hayday where people were making $5-10 per card in some cases, but for me it's still a nice $200 a month in profit in my bank account from just older equipment I had laying around and about $100 in parts and stuff to run it in my garage. Accounting for the several hours I put into setting it up makes the money less worth it, but it was fun for me to do so I'm happy with it.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - pbhjpbhj 9y ago
    In theory you can invest that 200 and make 400 next month, what's stopping you; 6 months down the line you're in theory making 6400 per month (3200 gross profit) and have paid off your equipment?
    - Klathmon 9y ago
      In theory, but if the most profitable coins take a downturn, I could be left with a bill and a lot of very hot GPUs that would sell for a fraction of the price I bought them for. I'm okay with my lower gains for less/no risk.
  - dspillett 9y ago
    > o the "profit" is $1/day and $0.70/day respectively > it's still a nice $200 a month Even if you can do both concurrently, that doesn't add up (1.7*31 = 52.7, not $200).
    - Klathmon 9y ago
      That's only my one card, i've got a handful of other cards that I'm mining with (most fulltime in my garage, one in my main desktop PC that mines only at night when the AC won't need to cool it). My whole "setup" makes me about $200 in profit a month right now (down from roughly $500 in Ethereum's hayday)
  - _joel 9y ago
    Have you done the sums compared to if you just put $200 into BTC and watched the price increase?
    - Klathmon 9y ago
      I have, and depending on how you do it I could either be ahead or behind. If I would have "invested" only the $120 that I've spent on equipment so far, i'd be significantly worse off than I am with mining. (Remember, I started this process with a handful of older/unused GPUs, so the only stuff I bought was an extra PSU, some risers, and a few odds and ends here and there). If I factor in the selling of the unused GPUs that I had laying around that I'm using for mining, I'd still be at a bit less than I am now (assuming I got the "market rate" and sold them at a good time). Realistically I wouldn't have sold them, since I didn't already and had some of them for a few years. They would have just collected dust in my closet like they were. If I "pretend" that I invested as much as I'm spending in electricity each month into bitcoin and sold it off in a manner similar to how I get paid mining (in other words, "buy in" a few $ per day, selling all of that back at the end of the month), i'd be slightly better off, but that's only because bitcoin went from $2700 to like $4000 in a few freakin days!
- laken 9y ago
  Most modern altcoins are designed to not be able to be mined with ASIC miners, so GPUs are the only efficient way of mining them. ETH is an example of one.
muninn_ 9y ago
What coins do you suggest?

paulpauper 9y ago

the problem with mining is the high initial cost outlay for hardware , which becomes obsolete rather quickly

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]