Mining Hardware Tutorial
Posted on 7 April, 2018 by Administratoruk
Mining Hardware Tutorial
Here is some shared information on how to work with the hardware side of cryptocurrency Mining.
What really is hardware mining? Well it is the underlining equipment that you need to build a solid a mining system. You can do it three ways:
1. If you want to Keep your cost low by researching into ASIC and GPU hardware to do basic mining. This is fun and easy way to do. I recommend that you first research what you want to mine before buying a GPU, CPU or ASIC USB card solution. If you want to mine LCT or Bitcoin then this is a good way to do it. One way is to upgrade your old PC and let it run in the corner of your room 24/7 to learn how to mine. This format only requires add a few parts to make the system work. Here some ways you can do it. Refer to the links below:
a. For ASIC USB cards beginners link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fJSITD0sPVY
b. For GPU video card for beginners link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ad5ZqwR-d-0&t=53s
2. Keep your costs in check for greater results, this is done by adding a better motherboard, rows of GPU or ASIC cards and upgrading to a larger case foot print to hold it all.
a. Best motherboard for GPU handling currently is (4/6/2108) the ASUS B250 Mining board https://www.asus.com/us/Motherboards/B250-MINING-EXPERT/ Remember you just need a basic CPU and 8 GB of RAM for your system basic needs. Your real processing power comes from your Video GPU cards that sit in your second case rig. Here is a recommend style to build that is made from only wood. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uj6ylv68M38
b. GPU video cards that I use are NVDIIA Geforce base 1060 with 4 or 6 GB of RAM. AMD videos cards work as well. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0lt8Ohv-SnE) Start with two video cards or more and work up to as many as you want. With the recommend motherboard I gave that would be 18 GPUs. All of your costs will go into mining and not core hardware. Budget mining.
c. ASIC USB Cards and ASIC arrays This is a little more tricky to work with but can pay off and at a reduce cost. I like the USB ASIC cards for they are a lot of fun to work with and can be added to your GPU chassis rig or use a Raspberry Pie platform. Here is a link on those details with starting off using the Pie solution. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fJSITD0sPVY&t=12s Also please remember you can also use the USB ASIC cards (using USB 3.0 hubs) right off the back of your PC tower. You can do a lot with USB based ASIC platforms.
3. Lastly you can go hardcore. This is taking things to a higher level. (Only for eh experience users.) At this point you know what you want but need to know the best platforms to move to. This can be done in three area
a. CPU level, this is done by just growing out you CPU based mining alongside with your GPU or ASIC deployments. (this is my format.) To do this well you would need to move to the Intel Xeon 6400 series CPU with a large number of cores. The new CPU class can do GPU calculations like today’s GPU cards can. This creates a multiplier effect with the GPU or USB ASIC processing platforms you are supporting. Costs related to this is higher but offer a nice boost and a lot more flexibility for mining cryptocurrency. It will require that you rebuild/adjust your core system but everything else should still be good for GPU and / or USB ASIC platforms. These are known as large scale PC platforms but you may only have one to three of them in service. The nice thing is they work well with in a home and fun to work with. This is my favorite version that I recommend it to most for it works well with your resources and costs arenot really that high.
b. ASIC Array/s level arrays. This is not ASIC USB platform but instead is a self-standing ASIC platform that run costs wise in the thousands of dollars to buy and very power hungry. These platforms do a lot of processing but at a power cost. You set them up and walk away for the most part. Monitor them and reboot as needed but that is it. Here is how to start https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JqnbtFHlOsA
c. GPU racks level buildings. This format is very popular with hard core miners. They follow the basic Motherboard PC core system with 50 to 100 GPUs spread out over many rigs. This is just scaled up to a higher level (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5F8mPbce9o ) This solution costs in power and in money but has a good return. First off know what you want to mine as always, then follow the best foot model for your property (A big detail to plan out.) Keep in mind most US home have only a 200 amp power feed for power the home, so keep that in your design efforts. As shown in the link I provide that some builders use a large scale utility building. This is large scale cryptocurrency mining. You can use a even use stand-alone GPU arrays (Just like large scale ASIC Array platforms) that do not need a core x86 base intel or AMD motherboard to use them but the cost can get as high as hundreds of thousands of dollars in costs. Here is a link to the costs and type of GPU chassis I am referring to. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VAkupsKQlaY
Remember that hardware works below the software level so you can design just about anything but make sure you pay attention to what your hardware can do. This gives you more options down the road.
Now to understand the software. The mining engine that you pick must support the cryptocurrency you want to mine. Using a PC front end hardware platform is the best way to learn until you are ready to mine with arrays like ASIC and GPU alike. Have some fun with it as you learn. Start with the PC side first then grow into a format that best meets you needs. The OS is can be MS Windows 7, 8 or 10 or MS Servers OS. But you can also use Raspberry Pie OS or Linus / Unix if you want.
What software tool do you use for mining cryptocurrency? Well that is your choose. I recommend first to use GUI base miner. (Like Easyminer…) I like Easyminer for it is just a front end GUI interface that uses two CLI miner tools to use CPU, GPUJ and ASIC miner. (Plus you can customize the platform to your needs.) But find what works for your cryptocurrency needs and comfort level. There are other tools like Minergate and so on but I am using Easy miner for my needs. Do your research on the type of mining you want to do and a good rep tool to do you work for you. Once you get good with te tools move to CLI (DOS Command Line Interface) base cryptocurrency mining tools if you want. For me I use GUI for the easy use of it. CLI is over rated in my 28 years of working IT.
What about mining software being seen as a virus and being blocked? Well that is not correct. Virus tools may see many miner software tool as malware do to miss use of it with people place these mining tool on systems without the user permission using some form of malware to do it. So if your tool gets flag, just place an exception for the tool in your virus protection and you are good.
Writer :
Hardwaremixer_LD
