Teach this MORON to mine (may drift a bit)

[Vic Velcro]

I have begun mining about a week ago. Watched and studied for a while, but never actually built or used a rig prior to that.

I have mined scrypt coins using cgminer from CryptoSlax on a USB stick.

I had some hurdles with hardware along the way, which I think was helpful for learning purposes. I got some hardware working and then made adjustments in stages. Eventually, after 5 days of tweaking, I got an HIS HD 6870 from 2011 to has litecoins at a steady 355kh/s.

I have hardware. This includes my current HD 6870 (http://www.hisdigital.com/un/product2-663.shtml), an HIS R9 270 (http://www.hisdigital.com/un/product2-784.shtml) which will arrive on 03-20-2014 or the day after, an Asus Crosshair V Formula (with useless THUNDERBOLT), 16 GB DDR3-1600, a shoebox full of 8GB and 16GB and a few 32GB USB sticks, a few SSDs laying around, and a metric crap-ton of SATA HD spinners.

Now, I'd like to learn more mining. I realize there are other algorithms and that different coins require different algorithms. The software for each algorithm varies. The optimal operating system for each software may vary.

Another member here suggested I try the Groestl algorithm. I don't know anything about it. Never heard of it before. I'll try anything once, twice if I like it.

So, anybody want to teach this MORON how to mine something that is not SCRYPT? This would involve some hand-holding at times, and some things could be passed over pretty quick.

Anyone that reads this thread is welcome to jump in and drift, just please try to stay on topics that are somewhat related to the running discussion.

I won't get hostile or consider it to be thread hijacking. I'm pretty mellow.

 

[xsuperbgx]

Since you know cryptoslax you could mine one of the other algo's that are already included with that. Scryptjane and sha3 are included, but it wouldnt take much to figure those out. It would be easier to do groestl or others if you were on windows.

 

[Vic Velcro]

I can do Windows, at least from the hardware perspective. I have 13 PCs in my home running Windows from XP to 8.1, all PRO. Everything from single core Athlon XP to OctoCore FX-8150. 100MB/s bandwidth in and 20MB/s out.

The only two Intel machines are my laptops at dual core 2330 8GB RAM and they are stuck with the built in video. I can't remember what those are, but I can look - if it's worth bothering. One of those has 750GB spinner and the other is 128GB SSD.

Oh, yeah... I got a few netbooks laying around. Atom N450's and N455's. Just mentioning, on the off chance those could do anything.

 

[ZL1]

Vic, dont bother with the CPUs, atm you cant mine much with them thats worth the hassle/power consumption

regarding unorthodox algos, like super mentioned slax has a few extra miners integrated, so you could in theory mine others, but are they worth it ? again atm I personally do not believe its worth it, scrypt on litecoin or a good auto-trading pool like clevermining should be the way to go
note litecoin is also smart to hold, it seems to be on a rise

 

[Vic Velcro]

I'll set aside any daydreams of CPU mining to get feelthy rich then )

I have been looking at another thread all day today, which is why this post is so late. The other thread was about using GPU to mine a CPU coin. I can't wait until I know enough to be able to do something like that.

Yes, Litecoin jumped quite a bit while my back was turned. I wish I had more of those. I want to put some funds on an exchange and start trading other coins then convert to Litecoin and hold those for a bit while I stock up. I'm having a new problem, in the next paragraph.

I am in the United States. I can't figure out how to get my ca$h onto the exchange except by international ABA which is not rapid but is a bit pricey. That means I will have to look farther ahead to forsee what trades to plan for, while I wait days for money to go on balance. No sudden trades on short notice until I have a decent amount on account with an exchange. Which also means I can expect withdrawing FIAT will also be difficult.

Any suggestions from anybody regarding US deposit and withdrawal to and from the exchange would be welcome. I don't mind paying taxes on the gain, heck that would mean I'm making money WOOT! This might make it easier for somebody to give me a solution (me not dodging 'the man', I mean).

There are so many details that intertwine. Get the hardware. Set it up. Get the software. Set it up. Get a pool. Set it up. Get a wallet. Get the blockchain. Setup the wallet with the pool. Tweak the hardware. Tweak the software settings. Overclock. Undervolt. Pick an exchange. Figure out how to turn the numbers back into tangible FIAT. Do the Hokie Pokey and turn myself around (which would blow my mind if THAT truly is what it's all about). WOW, is what I am saying. Didn't quite expect all of that. I was expecting about 2/3 of it. And it seems the conversion to FIAT is particularly inconvenient for United States citizens and non-citizen residents. That's the 1/3 difficulty I wasn't expecting.

Anyhow, enough drift. Back to a relevant mind-set.

Now that I've got one algorithm fairly well understood and have figured out the disposition of two different GPU cards... I get to do the GPU all different when the R9 270 gets here soon. That seems like a good opportunity to try another algorithm, at least for a couple of days. I like learning.

It may very well be the wiser move to stay with Litecoin non-stop. However, since I will likely have some invalids and some HW errors while working with the new card, I don't want those on my regular pool statistic. I'd rather hiccup and burp in a different pool, like one of those anonymous pools where it won't truly matter. Or am I just thinking like an old lady about this?

 

[gungeek]

The easy way between fiat (USD) and crypto-coin in the US is coinbase.com. Once signed-up and setup, you can go between USD (via bank account) and BTC. With BTC, you can go to various crypto-coin exchanges and convert to almost any alt-coin. To do the reverse, change the alt-coin to BTC then convert to USD at coinbase.

The other option for USD to/from BTC in the US is via localbitcoin.com with associated higher risks and complications.

 

[Vic Velcro]

gungeek,
thanks for the tip regarding coinbase. Mostly looks good, so I signed up and began the verification process.

One thing that looks ***REALLY BAD*** is the part about instant verification. The whole thing looks seedy, in that regard. The biggest concern I have is that they want people to let THEM log in to the client's bank (we're supposed to just give them our login and password) and they promise they won't do anything nasty or ever ever ever accidentally leak our info (like 6 months from now sell it to the Russian underground after we've forgotten we gave them the info).

I run a business. The bylaws forbid any member from allowing that to happen.

Would coinbase give me or anyone else the admin login and password to their server so WE can verify that they even HAVE a server? Not likely. I think it's pretty ballsy for them to even ask for our bank login and password and we're going to just let them waltz right in.

So, I've created a limited sub-account isolated from the main business bank account, and went for the standard verification where they deposit a few cents and then withdraw a few cents and I confirm the amounts. I expect that will go alright. And if not, they can only steal what they deposit. The sub-account has ZERO balance until I feel I can trust them.

If that goes proper, according to them, it will take 3 days to complete and after that, I can transfer money with several days delay each time. Wow.

But hey, as far as I can tell, they're the only game in town. Fee seems quite reasonable and the general web concensus is that they are a reputable place.

They also have merchant services. So, when trust is established both ways, I might use them for processing crypto payments for people that want my LASER service. That just might bring me a fair bit more business.

 

[gungeek]

I thought they stopped the instant access option via bank login information. It was not an option when I signed up in December 2013. I did the account verification where they deposit/withdraw a few cents and you tell them the amounts. It took 2 days. I did not add a credit card to the account. Everything is setup, but I haven't actually bought or sold BTC using coinbase.

 

[Vic Velcro]

Well, when I signed up on 03-18-2014 in the wee hours of the morning EST, the option for instant verification was there and when I checked the requirements - it said all I have to do is give them my bank web address, my login, and my password - they would log in, see my account is real, and they would logout and afterward they would erase my bank login information from their server permanently. I'm thinking they probably have a bridge to sell me, too.

It further mentioned that if I chose the standard verification, any bank fund I used for purchasing on their site would take 3 days to process and baited me further with a note that if I let them login to my bank, instant verification would also allow instant transfers of funds for transacting.

Seems like they are trying a bit too hard to punish me if I play it safe and trying even harder to get my bank login.

While it probably isn't as seedy as it seems, they certainly went the wrong way around the bush to influence me and used a bit of undue marketing pressure. The kind of pitch that would work for customers on the Home Shopping Channel, but not work for life forms that possess more than 1/2 of one brain synapse.

Just sayin'

Bottom line is, I'm going to give it a go via the standard method and wait a few days for each fund transfer. I'm not really an instant gratification crack-head type of dude. A few days is not a big deal for me.

To re-aim the thread a bit:
My R9 270 arrives in about 15 hours. Will anyone be around to help me fine tune the settings (the ones that I haven't tried because they don't apply to the 6870 I've been currently using)? I wanna try a different algorithm, and a sherpa would be helpful. I also wanna try xintensity or rintensity and maybe powertune, again - a sherpa would be handy. Or maybe somebody can tell me that I should ignore all that stuff and just go with the common settings and live with it.

 

[xsuperbgx]

There is a thread had had a bunch of info just for 270s.

 

[Vic Velcro]

Thanks. Found it.

 

[Vic Velcro]

I'm back.

After about 50 hours of reading everything I could find in the provided thread and chasing google will-o-the-wisps, I managed to filter out all the FUD and got about 50% of what I needed. With a few lucky guesses and many unlucky guesses, I'm getting just over 500KH/s script mining LTC on this R9 270 (not X).

I have attempted to figure out Myriad, Vertcoin, Ultracoin, and a few others. I can't get anywhere with any of those. The "getting started" info at the pools is very vague and/or assumes that the reader has already been doing the same thing elsewhere and has actually already "gotten started" long ago.

I could really use some decent coaching, if anyone is willing. I'm having a lot of difficulty developing any kind of understanding by reading ***-tons of incomplete and/or outdated info. Probably has a little bit to do with how my brain processes data. I learn by being shown, not so much by trial and error. I understand by observing the results, not by deleting faulty info from my brain.

Please.

 

[Silver_Pharaoh]

I'm back.

After about 50 hours of reading everything I could find in the provided thread and chasing google will-o-the-wisps, I managed to filter out all the FUD and got about 50% of what I needed. With a few lucky guesses and many unlucky guesses, I'm getting just over 500KH/s script mining LTC on this R9 270 (not X).

I have attempted to figure out Myriad, Vertcoin, Ultracoin, and a few others. I can't get anywhere with any of those. The "getting started" info at the pools is very vague and/or assumes that the reader has already been doing the same thing elsewhere and has actually already "gotten started" long ago.

I could really use some decent coaching, if anyone is willing. I'm having a lot of difficulty developing any kind of understanding by reading ***-tons of incomplete and/or outdated info. Probably has a little bit to do with how my brain processes data. I learn by being shown, not so much by trial and error. I understand by observing the results, not by deleting faulty info from my brain.

Please.

I got you covered:

Ultracoin:
-w 256 --thread-concurrency 24576 -I 16

Vertcoin:
--thread-concurrency 16000 -I 17 -w 256 -g 1

Myraid (Using Skein algorithm):
--lookup-gap 2 --thread-concurrency 8193 -g 2 -I 12

These all need their own miners:

Ultracoin, get the "sj" version there.
https://sites.google.com/site/rmdavidson/

Vertcoin:
https://vertcoin.org/#mining
Get the GPU miner windows build (or linux if you use that)

Myraid coin, using Skein:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=483515.0

I have a 270x, so those should work just fine for your 270

 

[Vic Velcro]

Thank you.

I have options, regarding which O/S to use. Since it is likely I'll have some other questions for you... Which is easier for you to help me with? Win7, Win8, Win8.1, Ubuntu, or CryptoSlax?

I have no idea how to do anything with drivers or software installation in any of the 'nix systems. Everything points toward some type of package manager. That means nothing to me, so if we go that route, I'll need a clear set of instructions for that.

I've always managed my own "package" with either my left hand or my right (depending on which one wasn't tingly when I woke up).

Because of all the slang and cute names for everything in 'nix starting in the '90s - I pretty much gave up on it. In the mid '70s through the early '90s, it was much clearer how to do things with 'nix. It wasn't 'trendy' yet and therefore discussion and lessons used plainer speech.

I don't like Win8+ much better, but it is a bit more familiar to me.

I will follow your links and do some studying while I wait for your advice.

 

[Silver_Pharaoh]

Thank you.

I have options, regarding which O/S to use. Since it is likely I'll have some other questions for you... Which is easier for you to help me with? Win7, Win8, Win8.1, Ubuntu, or CryptoSlax?

I have no idea how to do anything with drivers or software installation in any of the 'nix systems. Everything points toward some type of package manager. That means nothing to me, so if we go that route, I'll need a clear set of instructions for that.

I've always managed my own "package" with either my left hand or my right (depending on which one wasn't tingly when I woke up).

Because of all the slang and cute names for everything in 'nix starting in the '90s - I pretty much gave up on it. In the mid '70s through the early '90s, it was much clearer how to do things with 'nix. It wasn't 'trendy' yet and therefore discussion and lessons used plainer speech.

I don't like Win8+ much better, but it is a bit more familiar to me.

I will follow your links and do some studying while I wait for your advice.

I hate Win 8. It's like being dropped in a foreign country and expected to get by on your own.

Unix is great, but I have no experience installing drivers...
Which leaves my current OS, Win 7. That I can help you with.

I'm with you on Unix OS's, I get lost easily in them

 

[Vic Velcro]

Win7 it shall be, then. I'll grab an SSD and put a fresh Win on it, with all the proper hardware drivers. Should only take a couple hours (at most) to get that done and personalize it to where it is usable (decripple it, is what I mean).

Which coin do you want to help me with? So I can get the appropriate software.

I did go over and over and over the links from a few posts back. The info is still pretty vague and missing all the stuff somebody needs to know. the rmdavidson line, for example, says his -sj miner is like ya which is like older cgminer. Well, that's fine for anyone who knows what the h*ll that means. What about somebody like me who has never heard of the one and wasn't a user of the other? Somebody seeing his -sg thing for the very first time? This is pretty much what happens every link I chase. Everything says "this thing" is like "that thing" - instead of saying "if you've never seen this stuff before, do exactly these steps and we will learn as we progress". I don't find any explanations.

It kills me that I am mining scrypt just fine, yet two weeks have gone by while I still don't know how I am doing it or what exactly it is that I am doing. Magic Internet Money indeed.

 

[Silver_Pharaoh]

Win7 it shall be, then. I'll grab an SSD and put a fresh Win on it, with all the proper hardware drivers. Should only take a couple hours (at most) to get that done and personalize it to where it is usable (decripple it, is what I mean).

Which coin do you want to help me with? So I can get the appropriate software.

I did go over and over and over the links from a few posts back. The info is still pretty vague and missing all the stuff somebody needs to know. the rmdavidson line, for example, says his -sj miner is like ya which is like older cgminer. Well, that's fine for anyone who knows what the h*ll that means. What about somebody like me who has never heard of the one and wasn't a user of the other? Somebody seeing his -sg thing for the very first time? This is pretty much what happens every link I chase. Everything says "this thing" is like "that thing" - instead of saying "if you've never seen this stuff before, do exactly these steps and we will learn as we progress". I don't find any explanations.

It kills me that I am mining scrypt just fine, yet two weeks have gone by while I still don't know how I am doing it or what exactly it is that I am doing. Magic Internet Money indeed.

No worrys.

sj means "scrypt-jane" some coins use scrypt-jane instead of regular scrypt algorithm. This is to prevent the new scrypt ASIC's from killing the coin.

We can do Vertcoin if you'd like. The difficulty is quite high right now, but so is the price. (Plus it's easier to configure if it doesn't work right now)

All you need is the "vertminer" from vertcoin.org. Here's a direct link

Once you get that, we can get a batch file ready so you simply run it, and it mines

Oh, how many cards do you have? Just the 1 270 right?

 

[Vic Velcro]

Sounds good.

I have removed the 6870 prior to putting in the 270. I can put the 6870 back in and run both, but it would probably be more simple to run just one GPU for now.

Win 7 is installing right now, then the drivers. I'll get vertminer while the setup is still going, and have it ready to install when the drivers are finished.

 

[Silver_Pharaoh]

Sounds good.

I have removed the 6870 prior to putting in the 270. I can put the 6870 back in and run both, but it would probably be more simple to run just one GPU for now.

Win 7 is installing right now, then the drivers. I'll get vertminer while the setup is still going, and have it ready to install when the drivers are finished.

Your choice, I have a 6850 mining too so I also have configs for your 6870

Ughhh windows installs... hope ya got something to do for the next 8 years while it sets up!

 

[Vic Velcro]

Installing from high speed USB to an SSD. Takes the edge off the pain...

I'll stick with the 270 for now. Once that is set and stable, I'll get some info about the 68xx from you and see how far I get on my own. That will be the test of how much I understand.