ethpool.org VS ethermine.org

hasher

Just a curious question. My little baby farm is hashing at around 400MH at the moment. Currently using ethpool and am happy so far, but would there be any benefits in me moving my miners to ethermine, apart from the frequency of payments?

MrYukonC

@hasher

No benefit. In fact, due to the way ethpool pays out uncles, it's better to stay there. It's where I and a bunch of other semi-large to large miners are. They essentially treat uncles like random bonuses, which is super nice.

hasher

@MrYukonC awesome! Thanks

kwoth

What exacts is the big difference in the way uncle's are paid? Because at ethmine the uncle's are also rewarded.

I've tried to seek out the answer myself, but can't find it.

hasher

I've yet to receive an uncle.. but my block payments range from 4.95 to 5.1 ether on ethpool

dlehenky

@kwoth On every other pool that pays uncles, including ethermine.org, uncles are shared among everyone in the pool. With ethpool.org, where the top miner gets the full block reward, if the current block mined is an uncle, the top miner gets it AND gets the next full block as well (because his credits don't reset after the uncle).

anonymous95

I am interested if ethpool.org is with auto withdraw or personaly withdraw I am searching around and cant see.
Because I am with nanopool with auto withdraw and I am interested to go on ethpool.org

kwoth

@dlehenky thank you for your explanation. I understand how it works now.

So if your have a low hashrate but are patient it might be more interesting to mine on ethpool.org because the uncle is all yours.

dlehenky

@kwoth The uncle *and* a full block.

zorvalth

No mate, the uncles in ethpool goes mostly to the big guys because they spent more time on top of the line. Imagine a small miner with 50mh how much time spends on top? Almost non, every week he goes there for a few moments and when he got payed a block and need another week to get on top for a few moments. But for example this miner with 15gh/s he is on top every 20 minutes and he spends time there because nobody can pass him and if there is an uncle he gets it. Also if you are small miner you start mining on X difficulty and you got the block on X+Y because the diff is mostly increasing. These two pools by my opinion are the best running and most transperent if not completely, but my opinion small miners(less then a 0.5-1GH) should be in ethermine. Big miners are completely fine in ethpool. And as far as i see ethminer is already over 40gh/s and got only a couple miners over a 1gh.

bluebox

@dlehenky My curiosity is how low a hashrate can you go before it takes longer to mine/work enough and get rewards on ethpool vs. a steady payout on ethermine? There's probably some calculation somewhere but I'm too lazy and don't have the time (kids.... ) to go through figuring it out...

dlehenky

@bluebox Depends on what "low" is, and that is getting higher everyday with the difficulty increasing, but a small rig should probably go to ethermine. With the diff rising as fast as it is, and a small miner taking days to mine a block, you'd be better off.

bluebox

@dlehenky Yep, my guess is more like 200MH or more now...

kwoth

@dlehenky yup, understood. And @zorvalth thanks for your explanation too. In a way it makes sense.

I'm a noob still and started on ethpool. But after getting the block reward on ethpool I switched to ethermine. I'll stay there for a while and see how it goes.

The rewards in the rounds with the same work differ from time to time. I guess those differences are uncle payouts. Or is it something else?

dlehenky

@kwoth Yes, uncle payouts. Full blocks can have an uncle component to them as well, usually .15 - .16 ETH, and transactions fees, but they're tiny. So there's always going be some variance in the payout.

Biodom

@dlehenky
I am a biologist, not a math wiz, but, intuitively, ethermine would provide better results during periods of fast network growth and etherpool would give better results during "flat" growth periods because of extra "uncle" income. Am I completely wrong about this?

zorvalth

Biodom said:

@dlehenky
I am a biologist, not a math wiz, but, intuitively, ethermine would provide better results during periods of fast network growth and etherpool would give better results during "flat" growth periods because of extra "uncle" income. Am I completely wrong about this?

yes, very! Just: If
mh/s<500 do ethermine
500<ms/s<1000 do ethpool or ethermine
mh/s>1000 do ethpool

Biodom

@zorvalth
Besides your respected opinion, is there some math behind this assertion?

bluebox

@Biodom @zorvalth Perhaps a comparison is due; reported payouts vs. hash rate on each pool over, say, a week's time. My piddling 75MH is collecting about 1.5ETH/day on ethermine, I'd never get anything close to that on ethpool.

Biodom

@bluebox
This is strange...you should get EXACTLY that in one week on ethpool (and maybe more)

bluebox

@Biodom Well, then maybe I'll test it. Made enough already, it's more hobby/geek curiosity now. I can be the "guinea pig" to satisfy the latter.

Biodom

@bluebox
I am already a guinea pig of solo vs ethpool comparison:
solo with 75 MH ( 12 days of records): block at day 4, uncle at day 5, uncle at day 6, nothing so far since then. Total 17.5 eth 12.5 eth, plus "teeth grinding". Theoretically, it should be ~18eth. I know about unpredictability and all, so will switch over soon.

ethpool with 102, then 120 mh: got block+uncle (8.70eth) after 2.5d with 102mh, waiting now with 120mh.

EDIT: Got another block on solo, bugging out for ethermine or ethpool shortly. Will run node "just in case"

dlehenky

@Biodom Of course, the problem with the comparison is that the difficulty has been rising heartily during the whole period. That's why this stuff is hard to compare, unless you have 2 equal rigs running, one on each scenario, side by side.

MrYukonC

Biodom said:

@bluebox
This is strange...you should get EXACTLY that in one week on ethpool (and maybe more)

@Biodom, cc: @bluebox
I agree -- it should be exactly the same, if not better on ethpool because of the uncle distribution.

It amazes me how people simply cannot come to terms with ethpool's payment scheme. I don't mean that in a crappy or derogatory way, either.

Everybody will unanimously agree that solo mining is THE optimal way to go if variance wasn't a factor. Yet they will argue against ethpool, when it's exactly the same thing, except with the variance more or less removed from the picture. It's amazing!

zorvalth

MrYukonC said:

Biodom said:

@bluebox
This is strange...you should get EXACTLY that in one week on ethpool (and maybe more)

@Biodom, cc: @bluebox
I agree -- it should be exactly the same, if not better on ethpool because of the uncle distribution.

This is wrong. The uncles in ethpool are as much reward as penalty. Some got more then its supposed, the other less. In ethermine they are payed proportionally.

dlehenky

@zorvalth The entire reason for the ethpool uncle policy is this: so that smaller miners wouldn't spend days getting to the top to get nothing but an uncle. Yes, larger miners will get more uncles than the smaller miners, but that's not the point. The point is a smaller miner will not get to the top and get nothing but an uncle.

work

@zorvalth @dlehenky I like the game aspect of ethpool uncles. And, I agree it's way better to have your luck mean a chance at positive gains (block + uncle) vs negative gains (only uncle).

But, the current uncle payout system does ultimately penalize those who aren't lucky, and increases payout variance while steadily causing the required credits to climb. It doesn't look very sustainable.

I have half my hashing power pointed at Mining Pool Hub now, and the other half still on ethpool. I think I'll probably move everything to Mining Pool Hub once the web stats are a bit better.

dlehenky

@work Knowing @dr_pra , if it's best for the pool to drop the uncle policy, he will. Now with ethermine going, perhaps that's the best route for smaller miners, anyway.

bluebox

Biodom said:

@bluebox
I am already a guinea pig of solo vs ethpool comparison:

Was comparing ethermine to ethpool, not solo to ethpool. I'd never consider solo mining with 75MH these days...

@zorvalth @dlehenky
I think it's best to stick to ethermine PPLNS with lower hashrates. Been happy so far, ~1.4ETH/day — better than any other pool I've tried lately, and I've tried them all.

zorvalth

dlehenky said:

@zorvalth The entire reason for the ethpool uncle policy is this: so that smaller miners wouldn't spend days getting to the top to get nothing but an uncle. Yes, larger miners will get more uncles than the smaller miners, but that's not the point. The point is a smaller miner will not get to the top and get nothing but an uncle.

If you dont remember from the ethpool thread I'm the one who purpose the change of uncle paypout So I know what is the idea. I'm just saying that the way it is the big miners will get more lucky with uncles then them small miners. Check the top miners and their uncles payed. They are more then 7% (which is the pool uncle rate) And the small miners are with less then 7%. With my 600mh/s I got 30-40 payments and just one uncle(less then 3%). Thats why I advise small miners to move to etherminer. The other reason is if you are very small miner in ethpool you are starting on way less diff and finishing the block on way higher. In etherminer even the smallest miner got a portion of every block(every few minutes) and you dont get affected by the rise of the difficulty.

Biodom

@bluebox
yeah i know what the comparison was, i just wanted to show that with 75 mh you can still risk it on solo. after all (see my edit), I got two blocks and two uncles in 12 days, which is similar to theoretically expected, but waiting 6 days for the last one was kind of exhausting, so i am switching to either ethpool or ethermine. maybe ethpool first to 'help" my other rigs that are working on their credits.