[How to] fund your cruncher's utility bill OR how to make money using bitcoin

[zalbard]

Also, I'm not sure, but do I need one worker per one device? What are they for?

OK, found that out:

You will need to create a unique username and password for each mining client (worker). Example: If you wish to generate coins with 2 videocards and a good CPU you will need 3 worker accounts. One for each device.

...

And btw, i'm getting 410Mhash/s with 5870@940. Is it about right?

Yep.

In 24 hours it did ~0.8 coin...

Around $8, then.

[jcool]

OK, found that out:
You will need to create a unique username and password for each mining client (worker). Example: If you wish to generate coins with 2 videocards and a good CPU you will need 3 worker accounts. One for each device.

Thats BS from what I can tell.
I'm running 8 cards on the same pool worker, no problems at all. Neither on the deepbit nor the BCT Guild pool.

[zalbard]

It does work either way. Hence why I was unsure. Could it be possible to get more Bitcoins this way, though? I mean, why would anyone need more than one worker in the first place, then? Or is that one per PC?

[Tom128]

I have my 5850 setup (did it on my lunch break lol). It's only getting around 210Mhash/s which seems low. Ah well. I have it on air still so I put the fan at 45%, hopefully that is enough.

I think once I get my first coin and see it turn into money I will probably drool and buy more video cards than I should lol.

I am still a bit confused on the wallet concept. It seems so...fragile almost. And if I want to use two different computers that means I have to have bitcoin running on both, which will result in two wallets? If I want to consolidate my coins would I sent coins to myself to one of the two machines? Or perhaps make a "savings account" wallet on one of them and put all coins from all machines in there? And do I have to be on that machine to use the coins?

I am mostly thinking out loud, i will be reading through all the wiki stuff and hopefully answer myself.

[Red Maw]

My poor gpu needs better cooling....hope this pays for a new before it dies

Probably going to stop until I can get it WC, more for the noise than anything else.

[Petra]

Could you elaborate?

Defense contractor work... and AES has no known backdoor.

I don't think I'd worry too much about legal ramifications as of yet. The author himself is seeking/allowing donations in his introduction. I would think as the author is just finishing up his law degree at Yale, I doubt he would jeopardize his becoming a lawyer if he thought there could be problems.

While I am inclined to agree that there isn't much to worry about currently since Bitcoin is still small and, therefore, of little interest to authorities... there is tremendous potential for things such as this to become a target of the government (as several of the arguments in that paper cover, as well as many issues which were beyond the scope of the paper). As for jeopardizing a career as a lawyer, when was the last time you heard of a lawyer being disbarred as a result of illegal activity that either wasn't particularly heinous or not directly related to the job?

[Sparky]

All I have is a 4870 and according to the wiki it sucks for this lol. Not even going to bother trying.

[Tom128]

All I have is a 4870 and according to the wiki it sucks for this lol. Not even going to bother trying.

Definitely not as powerful as the 5/6000's but it's still going to give about $90/month payout minus it's electricity cost.

[artemm]

This has bubble written all over it.. but if I manage to get this working and successfully cash out on the 5970s output, I may use this to justify a 2600K cruncher..

[OldChap]

Based on the $8 a day and the cheapest 5870 I can buy new (with warranty), the card pays for itself in 1 month, and for the electric 2 days later, after that this is just $$ for us crunchers with spare slots .... even those with small psu's can probably run 1 per rig. What's more, even at a lower amount, to be making after 3 months would still be a good producer of funds for new crunchers.

It is the beginning of the month too....mmmm tempting. and it was so quiet since the air rigs were turned off too

Any guesstimations on when the bottom drops out?

Something of a fillip for ati methinks.

[zalbard]

There is one small issue with this and crunching, though. In some cases each ATI GPU eats up to 25% of CPU resources. It's a bug and does not happen in each case (should be 0-1% if everything's well). So best check for that before running both WCG and BC. This is usually a driver & APP issue.

[OldChap]

There is one small issue with this and crunching, though. In some cases each ATI GPU eats up to 25% of CPU resources. It's a bug and does not happen in each case (should be 0-1% if everything's well). So best check for that before running both WCG and BC. This is usually a driver & APP issue.

If I could reasonably expect to fund a new cruncher from this it would be worth it in my view. With a new 2600K on WCG I could retire the core2's, drop the clocks, and just run BC on those, then, from the next tranche, fund more.

[MadHacker]

Question i have is what would be the best single slot videocard to use?

[Splave]

6990 is best performer but costs the most
I believe 58** are cost/performance kings

[Sparky]

Definitely not as powerful as the 5/6000's but it's still going to give about $90/month payout minus it's electricity cost.

Whoa... really?

[artemm]

Definitely not as powerful as the 5/6000's but it's still going to give about $90/month payout minus it's electricity cost.

LOL, that's sparky's total electrical for the month

[Tom128]

Whoa... really?

Close enough anyways. If you look at the performance of a 4870:
https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Mining_hardware_comparison

...and guess 90Mhash/sec and plug that into the calculator:
http://www.alloscomp.com/bitcoin/calculator.php

....you get

per Day - $2.81
per Week - $20.49
per Month - $85.43

Should at least cover some electricity bills! If I jump into this, and it works, I will use it to convert my Phenom II's to either Bulldozers if they seem good, or Sandy's.

[KaptainBlaZzed]

have been mining BTC for about 6 days now with my 5870 and have 5.5 BTC.
The core of my 5870 is OC'd to 940 and i am getting 400 M/hs per second.

At the current market rate of $13.70 they are worth $75. Right now a 5870 produces about $12.50 a day.

The difficulty is going to increase by about 25% and i believe this is going to happen around monday.

Real Time Bitcoin Stats
http://blockexplorer.com/q

Bitcoin Mining Calculator
http://www.alloscomp.com/bitcoin/calculator.php

[zalbard]

The difficulty is going to increase by about 25% and i believe this is going to happen around monday.

How does difficulty affect income, though? Less Bitcoins per day but they are worth more?

[KaptainBlaZzed]

How does difficulty affect income, though? Less Bitcoins per day but they are worth more?

That is the general idea but, we will have to wait and see if they are actually worth more after the difficulty increase.

[artemm]

How does difficulty affect income, though? Less Bitcoins per day but they are worth more?

Takes longer to get them.

Deepbit which is largest pool currently, IIRC more than doubled its output since May 17th (went from 800Gh/s to 1800 currently.) Since the max number of coins is capped, the more power that's thrown at mining, the harder it is to mine.

It's crazy, I think the stock of 5-series cards is almost exhausted and 5970s are going for as much as $700 on eBay when only a few months ago, I bought one for $350 WITH a water block. On regional CLs and forum B/S/T sections there are more WTB threads than FS threads. People are really taking this stuff seriously.

[kjeldoran]

I just tossed my 5770 onto Bitcoin. Based on that calculator it should generate ~$150 a month. Seems like a good investment since my fiance wasn't using it lol. The extra money I make is going to go for more WCG hardware. It might go to another 5 or 6 series amd video card IF mining remains profitable.

[jcool]

I just tossed my 5770 onto Bitcoin. Based on that calculator it should generate ~$150 a month. Seems like a good investment since my fiance wasn't using it lol. The extra money I make is going to go for more WCG hardware. It might go to another 5 or 6 series amd video card IF mining remains profitable.

Now this is exactly why I decided to share the knowledge I gained here on XS WCG. Crunch on people

[Tom128]

I would like to contribute a +1 to the statement that SDK 2.1 is better for a 5800GPU. I wasn't even paying attention to what I downloaded and had 2.4. I was getting 220-250Mhash/s. I downgraded to the 2.1 SDK and am getting 240-280.

[kjeldoran]

Now this is exactly why I decided to share the knowledge I gained here on XS WCG. Crunch on people

I heard about bitcoin prior to your OP, but there wasn't a decent guide to setting it up.

I guess I am more torn on what is the better investment in the long run.
1. If I invest into more WCG hardware I get more results done for WCG.
2. If I invest into a used 5870 I can generate an extra $250 a month. That makes it an extra $400 a month which means 1 2600k chip and part of a motherboard/ram/cooler/psu. I might just invest into another video card initially since it would allow more WCG hardware later on.

I did toss my gtx560 on bitcoin, but nvidia sucks at bitcoin. I took it off since it really wasn't worth running. Makes me wish I went with a 6950.