How to start mining for beginners
- From the sandbox
- Tutorial
The idea and title of the article was suggested by Xao in a comment on a recent post What to do with us, ordinary people, as well as numerous questions on the Toaster. This instruction will help you start mining on ordinary computers and laptops running Windows or Linux as part of a cryptocurrency joint generation pool.
As dzzh correctly noted
Therefore, you will have to start mining with the choice of cryptocurrency. This instruction consists of 5 simple steps:
Quite a few forks of Bitcoin have already appeared, as well as cryptocurrencies based on their own source code. The main criterion for choosing is the profitability of cryptocurrency mining. A secondary criterion, for example, for me is its liquidity , i.e. ease of use of cryptocurrency in the so-called “Real money” (rubles, dollars, euros in your bank account).
The encryption algorithm used also matters . Bitcoin is based on SHA-256 ; mining bitcoins now makes sense to owners of expensive farms. But for example scryptintensively uses random access memory. This makes it difficult to use and create special ASIC processors for scrypt cryptocurrencies and makes it possible to efficiently use conventional computers with video cards for mining.
In other words, how much cryptocurrency can be earned per unit of computational complexity (as it can be taken as a hashrate unit, hash / s is measured).
It makes sense to evaluate profitability for yourself, for example, in the number of coins you receive per day or per month.
For example, my Nvidia GTX 770 graphics card allows me to mine Feathercoin at a speed of 210 khash / s, receiving from the pool ~ 6 FTC per day, which, depending on the exchange rate on the exchange, gives me a profit of 60-100 rubles per day.
The following resources will help to assess profitability:
The following resources with timelines for the courses of forks will help to evaluate it:
Or you can simply choose from those forks that are traded on the Russian-language exchange btc-e.com , where we will "cash out" mining earnings. This will avoid an additional step on the path to obtaining profit from mining. If you still choose a fork that is not traded on the exchange, welcome to the cryptsy.com exchanger .
The key value for your profit from mining is the pool commission - the percentage of the amount of the block that the pool gets during mining, the rest of the block reward is shared between the miners of the pool. You also need to pay attention to the commission from transactions on the withdrawal of coins from the pool to your wallet. The additional features provided by the pool for monitoring workers and viewing their statistics are important.
On the selected pool, you need to register, create logins and passwords for your workers. It is advisable that there are as many workers as there are computers that will mine cryptocurrency. However, you can run mining on several computers with one worker, then their computing power and results will be summarized.
To mine cryptocurrencies using SHA-256, scrypt algorithms, you can use any of the popular miners:
If you are using the cgminer miner, for example, for Linux without a graphical interface, type in the command line:
An example implies that the pool supports the stratum protocol , which is the de facto standard for all modern pools.
In the absence of a video card, you can mine on the central processor.
If the authorization parameters and the pool URL are correctly configured, you will see a window with information about mining in the pool after launch.
Download the wallet from the official site of the selected fork.
Create an address in your wallet to receive coins earned in the pool and enter it in the Account - Payments section of your pool.
Payments are allowed directly to cryptocurrency exchanges, for example, btc-e.com, there you must first register and create an address to replenish the cryptocurrency of your choice.
Do not forget about the commission from transactions to withdrawal - the more often you withdraw cryptocurrency from the balance of the pool, the more often you pay this commission.
UPD January 1, 2014 at 02:40 Thanks citius for the comment.
Skip the 1st step and reduce the 2nd will help multiples, such as Middlecoin or Switchercoin.
Happy New Year, good luck and profitable mining in 2014!
As dzzh correctly noted
It makes no sense now to mine bitcoin. Generate some small coins and withdraw via bitcoin to exchanges - yes.
Therefore, you will have to start mining with the choice of cryptocurrency. This instruction consists of 5 simple steps:
- Fork selection
- Pool selection
- Miner Choice
- Mining launch
- Conclusion to your wallet
1. Fork selection
Quite a few forks of Bitcoin have already appeared, as well as cryptocurrencies based on their own source code. The main criterion for choosing is the profitability of cryptocurrency mining. A secondary criterion, for example, for me is its liquidity , i.e. ease of use of cryptocurrency in the so-called “Real money” (rubles, dollars, euros in your bank account).
The encryption algorithm used also matters . Bitcoin is based on SHA-256 ; mining bitcoins now makes sense to owners of expensive farms. But for example scryptintensively uses random access memory. This makes it difficult to use and create special ASIC processors for scrypt cryptocurrencies and makes it possible to efficiently use conventional computers with video cards for mining.
Mining profitability
In other words, how much cryptocurrency can be earned per unit of computational complexity (as it can be taken as a hashrate unit, hash / s is measured).
It makes sense to evaluate profitability for yourself, for example, in the number of coins you receive per day or per month.
For example, my Nvidia GTX 770 graphics card allows me to mine Feathercoin at a speed of 210 khash / s, receiving from the pool ~ 6 FTC per day, which, depending on the exchange rate on the exchange, gives me a profit of 60-100 rubles per day.
The following resources will help to assess profitability:
- Energy and Profitability Calculator www.coinwarz.com
- Calculator with a table of comparison of popular forks (enter your speed below) dustcoin.com
Cryptocurrency Liquidity
The following resources with timelines for the courses of forks will help to evaluate it:
Or you can simply choose from those forks that are traded on the Russian-language exchange btc-e.com , where we will "cash out" mining earnings. This will avoid an additional step on the path to obtaining profit from mining. If you still choose a fork that is not traded on the exchange, welcome to the cryptsy.com exchanger .
2. Pool selection
The key value for your profit from mining is the pool commission - the percentage of the amount of the block that the pool gets during mining, the rest of the block reward is shared between the miners of the pool. You also need to pay attention to the commission from transactions on the withdrawal of coins from the pool to your wallet. The additional features provided by the pool for monitoring workers and viewing their statistics are important.
On the selected pool, you need to register, create logins and passwords for your workers. It is advisable that there are as many workers as there are computers that will mine cryptocurrency. However, you can run mining on several computers with one worker, then their computing power and results will be summarized.
3. Choosing a miner
To mine cryptocurrencies using SHA-256, scrypt algorithms, you can use any of the popular miners:
- cudaminer - for mining on Nvidia graphics cards (GPUs)
- cgminer - for mining on ATI video cards (GPUs)
- pooler cpu miner (minerd) - for mining on processors (CPU)
4. Starting mining
If you are using the cgminer miner, for example, for Linux without a graphical interface, type in the command line:
./cgminer --scrypt -o stratum+tcp://хост_пула:порт -u Weblogin.Worker -p Worker_password
An example implies that the pool supports the stratum protocol , which is the de facto standard for all modern pools.
CPU mining
In the absence of a video card, you can mine on the central processor.
- Download the Pooler CPU Miner 32bit or 64bit for Windows .
- Unzip the archive and go to the created folder.
- Create a text document with the following contents:
minerd.exe --url stratum+tcp://хост_пула:порт --userpass Weblogin.Worker:Worker_password
where Weblogin.Worker is the name of your worker and Worker_password is his password - Save the document, then rename it, for example, to miner.bat, and run it
If the authorization parameters and the pool URL are correctly configured, you will see a window with information about mining in the pool after launch.
5. Conclusion to your wallet
Download the wallet from the official site of the selected fork.
Create an address in your wallet to receive coins earned in the pool and enter it in the Account - Payments section of your pool.
Payments are allowed directly to cryptocurrency exchanges, for example, btc-e.com, there you must first register and create an address to replenish the cryptocurrency of your choice.
Do not forget about the commission from transactions to withdrawal - the more often you withdraw cryptocurrency from the balance of the pool, the more often you pay this commission.
UPD January 1, 2014 at 02:40 Thanks citius for the comment.
Skip the 1st step and reduce the 2nd will help multiples, such as Middlecoin or Switchercoin.
Happy New Year, good luck and profitable mining in 2014!