Ethereum Community Forum
Home› Mining
Vega Finally Unleashed! Fine-tuned performance and power consumption in a single chassis.

Should I start mining, to experiment and maybe make a profit?

lamellalamella Member Posts: 3 ✭
edited August 2016 in Mining
I have been reading a bit and I realize that soon the transition to POS will effectively kill mining (correct me if I'm wrong), but let's say that I have some hardware lying around (nothing that good, a gtx 960), is it worth using it to do a bit of mining?

Here is my reasoning. Please tell me if I'm missing something really important here:
I have a GTX 960 which supposedly has a hashrate of 7 mh/s (others have said 10 mh/s but I'll go with the more conservative number)
I used a calculator, according to which I can mine 7.7 ETC or 1.6 ETH per month.
TDP for my rig would be around 120w (estimating based on benchmarks), and I pay about .10/KW/h for electricity. At the current exchange rate 50% of the profit would go to electricity, still leaving me with 50%.
If I have 4 months or so before POS replaces POW, I should be able to mine about 6 ETH (or 31 ETC).
This wouldn't be close to enough to enter POS, but it would still be possible to hold on to it if it seems like it's going to keep increasing in value, or trade it (for BTC on Poloniex, then to a crypto wallet, then to my Canadian bank ... somehow, I'm still a bit fuzzy on the details of this).

Does this make any sense? Am I not taking difficulty increase into account sufficiently? Should I be mining ETH, or ETC? Solo or pool? Anything else I'm missing?

I'm a complete n00b just looking to experiment so please be gentle.
Post edited by lamella on
· Share on TwitterShare on Facebook

Comments

  • agent412agent412 Member, Moderator Posts: 293 mod
    My personal opinion, I wouldn't start mining now, especially with only 7 mh/s. You would be better off buying ETH with what you'd spend in electricity.
    · Share on TwitterShare on Facebook
  • TimboSliceTimboSlice Member Posts: 76 ✭✭
    I would say yes, try it out. It's a fun hobby and tweaking card settings and figuring out software can be enjoyable. You already have the hardware and the power increase will be negligible in your monthly power bill, so why not? Don't worry about the money part of it, and in a few months you may have enough to buy a small upgrade for your rig, assuming the primary purpose for the rig is gaming.
    No one really knows when POS will come for sure, so you may have more time, or less, but four months seems reasonable.
    Difficulty will likely increase steadily, but price may as well. It's impossible to tell what the profitability will be in the future. No one saw the DAO hack coming, no one saw ETC surviving, it's quite the rollercoaster.
    I would stick with ETH as it has maintained the most backing from devs and miners and is the most likely to have the most value in the future, but again, no one really knows.
    With that hashrate, definitely pool. I think you need multiple GH/s to be able to mine solo effectively. I've had good luck with nanopool and ethermine.

    It's quite addicting though, so be careful, otherwise you'll suddenly find $1,000+ worth of gear in your Newegg cart :D
    · Share on TwitterShare on Facebook
  • lamellalamella Member Posts: 3 ✭
    edited August 2016
    Thank you for your advice, agent412 and TimboSlice! I'm not sure now whether I'll buy or mine; I'll have to do more research. I'm leaning towards mining, just because it sounds more fun and I'd like to experiment with it (and the profit is small in either case). Lots to consider. Thanks again!
    Post edited by lamella on
    · Share on TwitterShare on Facebook
  • retherrether Member Posts: 258 ✭✭
    I have a 960 in my desktop PC. I can hit 10mh/s on Win10 with the 347 drivers. The newest drivers will hit only about 3 mh/s.

    You don't have much to lose if you already have the card. If you're considering holding it for long term speculation you'd be better just buying some and holding on to it and save the wear on the hardware and heat/power issues.
    · Share on TwitterShare on Facebook
  • lamellalamella Member Posts: 3 ✭
    Thanks rether. What's your TDP, if you don't mind me asking?

    Also, any recommendations for reliable sources commenting/predicting ether's long-term growth?
    · Share on TwitterShare on Facebook
  • AmphAmph Member Posts: 106 ✭
    edited August 2016
    agent412 said:

    My personal opinion, I wouldn't start mining now, especially with only 7 mh/s. You would be better off buying ETH with what you'd spend in electricity.

    sure, in this way you can dump on him...lol

    buying will not earn you anything unless you can day trading and gain tiny % every day, which is ubelievable risky and not for everyone, instead with mining you will see profit each day and if everything go wrong you just sell your gpu, mining altcoin is the best investment nowadays it has a very low risky and a high reward, i would not invest in anything else at the moment
    · Share on TwitterShare on Facebook
  • retherrether Member Posts: 258 ✭✭
    lamella said:

    Thanks rether. What's your TDP, if you don't mind me asking?

    Also, any recommendations for reliable sources commenting/predicting ether's long-term growth?

    My 960 pulls 90 watts when mining measured at the wall.
    · Share on TwitterShare on Facebook
Sign In or Register to comment.