Silk Road forums

Discussion => Off topic => Topic started by: crazycanadian on October 25, 2012, 01:03 pm

Title: How to learn how to mine for bitcoins/mining for bitcoins??
Post by: crazycanadian on October 25, 2012, 01:03 pm
I been around for a bit but trying to figure out how to mine for bitcoin or how that all works, can you send me in the right direction or show me how? I have tried looking around on the forums and searching and have not really found anything concrete on how to mine so, I am willing to compensate if I have too.. Oh, and please either email me crazycanadian@tormail.org or msg me on SR marketplace... same screen name crazycanadian .I dont check here regularly..... Thanks
Title: Re: How to learn how to mine for bitcoins/mining for bitcoins??
Post by: deep987 on October 25, 2012, 07:09 pm
Mining for bitcoins doesn't make a lot of sense for most people, unless:
1) You already have a new/fast ATI graphics card in your computer.
2) You have inexpensive electricity costs OR you don't pay your electric bill.
3) You don't need bitcoins now - you certainly won't be mining enough to buy drugs unless you wait 6 months.

New specialized hardware is close to being released that will probably eclipse any casual mining from graphics cards, so I DEFINITELY wouldn't buy any new graphics hardware now just to start mining.

BUT, if you want to give it a try it's pretty easy.
1) Chose a mining pool such as 50btc.com. Sign up and get pool info.
2) Install mining application onto PC that will be performing the mining. An easy to use one is guiminer.
3) Put pool login info into mining application, hit go.
4) Come up with explanation to tell people why your computer sounds like a vortex and is +10 degrees warmer than the rest of the house (graphics cards running at 100% are loud and kick out a lot of heat)
Title: Re: How to learn how to mine for bitcoins/mining for bitcoins??
Post by: androd3 on October 26, 2012, 10:31 pm
As deep987 says, it's not that efficient to start mining with GPUs .. even if you have all the requirements he said.
Given the case you do, and/or you want to try, you should be careful and search a miner wich you can tweak the " agresivity "  , so the GPU is not that stressed.
That's something you should really pay attention to... because if you start mining and there's and the fan doesnt  cool down the GPU propertly (dust on the fan) , you'll fry the GPU.
The best is to start slowly, underclocking the GPU (really easy in AMD cards) and setting agresivity to low, and setting the fan to 100% so it cools down better.. and then rising the agresivity little by little... and if you can rise the clock to the normal rates too. That way you'll reach a point where te temperature is constant in time. It's a matter of tweaking.. and in most miners it's really easy.
Title: Re: How to learn how to mine for bitcoins/mining for bitcoins??
Post by: masterblaster on October 27, 2012, 02:26 am
Dont bother, asic will be here soon and will push out all but the biggest players. Unless you want to mine at a loss.
Title: Re: How to learn how to mine for bitcoins/mining for bitcoins??
Post by: crazycanadian on October 27, 2012, 02:34 am
asic?
Title: Re: How to learn how to mine for bitcoins/mining for bitcoins??
Post by: masterblaster on October 27, 2012, 02:45 am
https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Mining_hardware_comparison#ASICs