# Where to start with mining?



## MCD (Apr 25, 2021)

After browsing many guides on what mining is and how to get started, I’m at a bit of a crossroads and wanted to check with people who’ve been here before.

I’m starting from scratch, have no existing hardware so mindful of cost.

When I first started looking, the plan was GPU and mine Ethereum but the more I delve into mining, the more appealing solution is to buy a pre-built ASIC and mine Bitcoin or similar in a mining pool.

My question is, is it profitable to buy a couple of ASIC (Antminer S19 etc) and join a mining pool?

While I could pick up 2 or 3 ASICS for £1000, the GPU setup for that budget probably wouldn’t be powerful enough for mining? Am I correct?

What I don’t want to do is spend £1000 on hardware and struggle to get my money back. Is there any point dipping your toe in and buying only one miner to see how it performs? Then upgrade/multiply. 

I’ve used calculators to estimate how much  I’d make per day but what I don’t know is are you guaranteed to get into a mining pool and when you’re in, are you guaranteed regular mining? I believe some pools pay you whether your rig was used or not, so you have a predictable amount coming in each day?

The goal is longer term investment in Crypto but want to be sure I’m doing the right thing before spending any money.

Any help appreciated... 
Links to mining pools, groups etc would be great, and experience of GPU Vs ASIC for profitability and ease of use.


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## trog100 (Apr 25, 2021)

i just spent around £11K  on gpus to improve my mining hash rate.. i am using hicehash.. a couple of days ago i my estimated daily return was $90 dollars per day now its closer to $50 dollars per day.. whats its going to be next week i havnt a clue.. 

this is the wrong place to ask your questions.. a lot of the answers will have somewhat of a negative bias.. both coiners and no coiners post on here..

trog


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## Shrek (Apr 25, 2021)

trog100 said:


> i just spent around £11K  on gpus to improve my mining hash rate.. i am using hicehash.. a couple of days ago i my estimated daily return was $90 dollars per day now its closer to $50 dollars per day.. whats its going to be next week i havnt a clue..


At $50 a day that's a payback time of about a year, not including electricity; what do you estimate including electricity?


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## trog100 (Apr 25, 2021)

Andy Shiekh said:


> At $50 a day that's a payback time of about a year, not including electricity; what do you estimate including electricity?


 
i dont think that much about payback times.. i mine and hodle.. i am assuming that maybe in a years time both bitcoin and etherium will have gone up in price somewhat.. 

this make todays payback time somewhat meaningless to me..

trog

ps.. i mined and bought some coin back in 2017/18.. my biggest mistake was to turn my miners off when when the payouts got too low.. if i had have left them  running the coins mined during the slump period would now be worth around 100K.. basically turning off my seemingly profit-less miners has cost me about 30K a year..


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## Hardcore Games (Apr 26, 2021)

lots of miners i know say earnings are down


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## Khonjel (Apr 26, 2021)

EtherMining (reddit.com)


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## erocker (Apr 26, 2021)

Win a new ASIC miner coming out, I wouldn't bother with no hardware to utilize on hand.


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## Nuckles56 (Apr 26, 2021)

Hardcore Games said:


> lots of miners i know say earnings are down


My return for my 1080ti dropped from about $5 a day to ~$3 in the last couple of days, so definitely returns are dropping as BTC and a lot of the others have fallen off a cliff.


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## Hardcore Games (Apr 26, 2021)

Nuckles56 said:


> My return for my 1080ti dropped from about $5 a day to ~$3 in the last couple of days, so definitely returns are dropping as BTC and a lot of the others have fallen off a cliff.



I figure that if prices fall another 5% or so then many miners will start abandoning mining due to no profits


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## jboydgolfer (Apr 26, 2021)

trog100 said:


> i just spent around £11K on gpus


in UK?

how many GPU's is that?


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## trog100 (Apr 26, 2021)

jboydgolfer said:


> in UK?
> 
> how many GPU's is that?



prices are higher now but i ended up with 11 cards.. 8 x 3070 and 2 x 3080.. i already had a 2080ti.. this gives me around 730 m/sh..

i sold my 8 x 1070 cards to get some money back..

earning have dropped a bit but a couple of days ago they went silly high.. eth is due to go up again relative to bitcoin so earnings should go up again..

trog


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## MCD (Apr 26, 2021)

Thanks for your comments, I’ve been browsing the estimate payouts on nicehash and for £1000, instead of 3x Antminer S9 (which cane the power at 1350w each), Nicehash seems to think I’d make more profit with AMD Ryzen 9 CPU?

what’s more, NVIDIA GTX 1660 is calculating more profit than an s9 they are around the same price.

Can you mine BTC with GPU? I thought the algorithms were different, making ASIC mining inefficient with GPU?

If I could build a gaming PC for £650 with a GTX1660, Nicehash suggests the ROI is 1 year. Does that sound correct? £1.80/day. 

Is there a high power and high efficiency PSU out there? Is high power required where this is concerned?


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## Shrek (Apr 27, 2021)

That is where under-volting and under-clocking comes in, not just to extend the cards lifetime but to increase the mining efficiency.

The power
P ~ f V^2 (ohmic heating)​and frequency
f ~ V​where V is the voltage.

Put together we get

P~f^3​
i.e. 
half the frequency is one eighth the power and so the mining efficiency goes up by a factor of 4;
in reality one can't go all the way to half voltage, but the idea is most easily explained with such an example.


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## trog100 (Apr 27, 2021)

bitcoin is now at 54K and eth at 2525..  up around %12 on the day.. mining returns will go up again..  my nicehash return is now around $70 per day.. or $25,500 per year..

mind you a year is a long time away and somewhat of an unknown.. 

as i say i mine and hodl so the actual returns in a years time is a total unknown.. 

trog


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## Khonjel (Apr 27, 2021)

Mining profits are down cause some devs helped reduce gas price. Nothing to do with ETH prices. Just look at your daily income tab on your pools. Hashrate is same, ETH > USD rate is same or more. But ETH earning is down overall.

OMG PROFITS?? Why you're less profitable now and why it will continue to drop. : EtherMining (reddit.com)

TL;DR miners had been riding on profits off of high transaction fee (tied with high gas price). The people who actually would like to transact ETH more found ways to reduce gas price so fees become either low or at least consistent. This inevitably means miners get less profit/earnings. Good riddance.


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