AMD destroys Nvidia at Bitcoin mining, can the gap ever be bridged?

[BallaTheFeared]

I'd be interested in folding again, I tried the latest client and my 7950 was getting a bit over 4k PPD @ 800 core so I turned it off.

 

[Chiropteran]

People are using USD to buy bitcoins to they can ride the wave and make more USD. Not so the they live off bitcoin.

How do you know?

 

[blastingcap]

I agree that BTC ain't going nowhere and GPU mining all the same.

But that stuff blastingcrap wrote... dear TFSM... that's the most retarded load of crap you can read around.

Your entire post history (http://forums.anandtech.com/search.php?searchid=1168380) is littered with 1-2 liners that don't offer a rebuttal but rather your opinion plus an insult. Sorry if you hate my post and yet can't rebut it. Maybe you live in Europe or something. Sorry if I got a little carried away in how harsh I was towards the EU. But I've read persuasive arguments about just how much European wealth can ultimately be traced back to the proverbial end of the barrel of a gun, and my opinion of most of Europe took a big hit after that. Also, this thread is a candidate for merger with the bitcoin thread at this point considering how off-topic we are now in discussing BTC rather than the article.

I wrote:

Then you quote me and write:

plus a whole wall of ranting that in fact more agrees with me than argues against what I said.

The fact that I have not done any of this is speaks volumes, does it not? In fact I do not think BTC has reached critical mass, which you do.

And regarding your OT paragraph: The money printer in US is running glowing hot these days. China is investing in other currencies because their savings are in USD. Do you really think they would do that if USD was so stable and the currency of the future?

Okay sorry, I thought you were True Believin' based on your contempt for fiat. And yes I think we do agree more or less. By "critical mass" I think I have lower standards than you do. I agree about the USD--if I didn't, why do you think I wrote about how I'm hedging even against the USD? But the USD may take much longer to fall than you might think. China is addicted to it and it doesn't want to wean itself off too early and spark a panic, considering how much of their reserves is in T-bills. And in any case my point with that tangent was that if the USD fell, I wouldn't want to be holding BTC. That's about the last place I'd go for cover. And yes we're off topic, and no, I wasn't talking about people already owning GPUs and using them part-time for gaming, part-time for mining, I am talking about people going out and buying GPUs for the sole purpose of mining, which is silly imho.

 

[x3sphere]

If you were mining a year ago with a 7970 and held your coins to sell at the top of $200+ you'd make like $5k+ by now

I'd guess some people are doing just that. Unless you have exorbitant electricity costs it's low risk, high rate of return given how volatile BTC is.

There's a point where it won't be worth it to mine on GPUs anymore, but we're not there yet. ASICs haven't flooded the market yet.

 

[Imouto]

It's like gold fever, either it hits you or it doesn't.

I'm not giving away a room to place a noisy and hot PC and omnipotent TFSM knows that I'm not going to explain to my GF that I raised our electricity bill by $40 to make $17. On top of that I could tell her that I'm going to spend $400 in a gaming card that will make money for us to make sure that she chops off my ding-dong the very same night.

 

[Elfear]

Oh my god, you buy a GPU to occupy it 24/7 for mining (so zero entertainment value), and only make $65/month? I would give up $65/m just to keep my room quiet and at a comfortable temperature.

It doesn't have to run 24/7. You can game to your heart's content and then mine when you're surfing or when the machine is idle. The entertainment value doesn't change.

Depending on prices, you can easily make $300-400 per month in profit with 3-4 GPUs. I've made enough to cover my three 7970s and three waterblocks so anything now is pure profit. Plus I get the added benefit of gaming with three cards.

My open computer sits 3-4 feet from my head and it's very quiet. Temp wise it works out great for 8 months of the year because it heats my basement a few degrees. The summer will be a different story but even then my basement hovers around 68-70 degrees with no A/C.

Bitcoin is nothing more than a hobby, if you want something that's actually profitable, purchase some equity or real estate.

This is true for the most part. I don't think many miners are looking to get rich. But if you can make ~$80/month with a $280 card, why not?

 

[Eureka]

I think what we can take home is that most users (who mine bitcoins) are there just to make money on their hobby. They don't care about BTC as a currency, and I don't think most people will ever.

If you honestly believe BTC will replace money in day-to-day transactions, I think you're deluded.

I won't argue it's a nice way to make a bit of money. But it's like any fad. Hell, MTG cards can turn you quite a profit, all you had to do was hold on to your original cards. It's the same with BTC.

I don't think anyone is arguing about the profitability of it short-term. I think people are just laughing at the tin-hatters who think it'll replace real money.

 

[Chiropteran]

I'm not giving away a room to place a noisy and hot PC and omnipotent TFSM knows that I'm not going to explain to my GF that I raised our electricity bill by $40 to make $17. On top of that I could tell her that I'm going to spend $400 in a gaming card that will make money for us to make sure that she chops off my ding-dong the very same night.

If you don't own a video card, why are you in the video cards & graphics forum?

I don't think anyone is arguing about the profitability of it short-term. I think people are just laughing at the tin-hatters who think it'll replace real money.

If completely worthless paper fiat dollars can replace real gold-backed dollars, then there is no reason why bitcoin couldn't replace worthless paper dollars.

 

[Imouto]

If you don't own a video card, why are you in the video cards & graphics forum?

Where the hell did you pick that from? I have a HD5850 and I'm done testing this.

 

[Chiropteran]

Where the hell did you pick that from? I have a HD5850 and I'm done testing this.

You said "On top of that I could tell her that I'm going to spend $400 in a gaming card that will make money for us to make sure that she chops off my ding-dong the very same night."

So you were being dishonest. You already own a card you could use to bitcoin mine.

 

[cmdrdredd]

If you don't own a video card, why are you in the video cards & graphics forum?




If completely worthless paper fiat dollars can replace real gold-backed dollars, then there is no reason why bitcoin couldn't replace worthless paper dollars.

Gold is a finite resource to begin with. There are many history lessons you can take on why we rightfully dropped the gold standard.

 

[Chiropteran]

Gold is a finite resource to begin with. There are many history lessons you can take on why we rightfully dropped the gold standard.

All resources are finite. There is something wrong when you need an infinitely inflatable money supply to handle transactions in a finite world.

 

[cmdrdredd]

All resources are finite. There is something wrong when you need an infinitely inflatable money supply to handle transactions in a finite world.

The whole key was central control out of private hands that can manipulate it on a whim.

 

[Imouto]

So you were being dishonest. You already own a card you could use to bitcoin mine.

And I said I won't cuz it's noisy, hot and would raise my power bill for a minimal return.

I was just using your HD7970 example, don't get so mad.

 

[JAG87]

I'm not giving away a room to place a noisy and hot PC and omnipotent TFSM knows that I'm not going to explain to my GF that I raised our electricity bill by $40 to make $17. On top of that I could tell her that I'm going to spend $400 in a gaming card that will make money for us to make sure that she chops off my ding-dong the very same night.

Lol that was effing funny. Thanks

All resources are finite. There is something wrong when you need an infinitely inflatable money supply to handle transactions in a finite world.

Look dude, the basic idea here is that until my FINANCIAL INSTITUION (perhaps you don't know what that is, look it up, it's that thing that your first world life basically revolves around) recognizes bitcoins and will back me up on my purchases, bitcoin is WORTHLESS. Paper money is not worthless. When I walk into my FINANCIAL INSTITUTION and deposit paper money (whether a flat paper bills or cheques), they will back me up when I want to buy something. Same with equity or real estate. My FINANCIAL INSTITUTION will back me up if I put those up as collateral. So go ahead, walk into your FINANCIAL INSTITUTION and try to give them your bitcoins. See what happens.

 

[blastingcap]

So you were being dishonest.

Dude, most people in the world pay way more than you do for electricity, and many countries don't even have that stable of power grids in the first place. Ever see Hawaii electric rates? It's closer to 50 cents than 20. Yeah well that's what a lot of Europeans pay. Ever see how much gasoline costs in Europe? Etc. So he is not necessarily being dishonest.

Look dude ... snip

I would go one step further: the power of fiat comes from the fact that governments demand taxes be paid in fiat. If you do not comply, you get put into prison. Even if you don't like it, you must have fiat to pay property taxes (or if you rent, to pay your landlord so he or she can pay taxes). You need fiat to pay income taxes. Etc. Is it unsustainable? Probably yes. I can't say 100% yes because it is not literally a printing press, and the Fed can also draw money out of the system and not just pump it in. It's been done before, as a matter of fact. It's a two-way street, not a one-way street.

 

[Chiropteran]

And I said I won't cuz it's noisy, hot and would raise my power bill for a minimal return.

I was just using your HD7970 example, don't get so mad.

There is no reason to be mad, I am merely correcting your mistakes.

You can mine with the card you have, no need to buy a $400 card.

You can mine at rates which don't stress the card or require excessive fan speed, no need to create noise.

While mining does cost electricity and does produce some additional heat, the value of bitcoin produced exceeds the electricity cost by about 4X if you are paying .20 per kwh, as you claimed earlier. And if heat is an issue, running the A/C to counteract the heat will still allow you a net gain. If the heat is unbearable and you have no A.C, it makes me wonder why you have a computer & video card at all, because it's going to produce similar heat any time you use it.

Nobody is going to force you to bitcoin mine if you don't want to, but you should at least just admit the true reasons.

Dude, most people in the world pay way more than you do for electricity,

I was simply referring to his line that he couldn't mine because he would have to go buy a $400 video card. That isn't true.

When I walk into my FINANCIAL INSTITUTION and deposit paper money (whether a flat paper bills or cheques), they will back me up when I want to buy something. Same with equity or real estate. My FINANCIAL INSTITUTION will back me up if I put those up as collateral. So go ahead, walk into your FINANCIAL INSTITUTION and try to give them your bitcoins. See what happens.

I'm afraid you are dearly confused.

Your bank or FINANCIAL INSTITUTION has nothing to do with your ability to buy things with dollars. For any transaction, it's the sellers choice to accept currency of his choosing. If I wanted to sell my house and decided I would only accept payment in the form of marshmallows, I could do so and your FINANCIAL INSTITUTION(sic) couldn't do anything about it.

Banks do not give currency value. Actually, banks remove value from pretty much any currency they touch. Just ask the people of Cyprus.

 

[JAG87]

I'm afraid you are dearly confused.

Your bank or FINANCIAL INSTITUTION has nothing to do with your ability to buy things with dollars. For any transaction, it's the sellers choice to accept currency of his choosing. If I wanted to sell my house and decided I would only accept payment in the form of marshmallows, I could do so and your FINANCIAL INSTITUTION(sic) couldn't do anything about it.

Banks do not give currency value. Actually, banks remove value from pretty much any currency they touch. Just ask the people of Cyprus.

I'm afraid it's you who is dearly delusional. Just check how many houses are on the market for marhmellows. Or bitcoins.

Oh and just in case you do sell your house for marsmellows, let me know. Of course you would probably desire lots and lots of marshmellows in return for a house, which I couldn't possibly gather without using some of my "devalued" currency that sits in my financial instution.

 

[Imouto]

Nobody is going to force you to bitcoin mine if you don't want to, but you should at least just admit the true reasons.

By the way this conversation looks it's almost like you're pointing a gun to my head lol. That or you really should get down your high horse as not everyone has the same priorities.

And I already told you, I'm not buying a new card since this one is all I need for light gaming, GPU mining looks EOL and I won't bother mining for peanuts.

 

[Chiropteran]

I'm afraid it's you who is dearly delusional. Just check how many houses are on the market for marhmellows. Or bitcoins.

Oh and just in case you do sell your house for marsmellows, let me know. Of course you would probably desire lots and lots of marshmellows in return for a house, which I couldn't possibly gather without using some of my "devalued" currency that sits in my financial instution.

Here are 3 houses for sale for bitcoin:
http://costarica.es.craigslist.org/reo/3707526002.html

http://fmls.fusionmls.com/DotNet/Pub/EmailView.aspx?r=666262059&s=FML&t=FML

http://gma.yahoo.com/blogs/abc-blog...5706957--abc-news-savings-and-investment.html

There were others, but they have already sold.

As far as your devalued currency, I can buy it with my bitcoins anytime I need any. Just transferred $1000 out of mtgox to cover a new bed & mattress I'm planning to buy this weekend. My bitcoin savings grow daily as the USD falls lower and lower

By the way this conversation looks it's almost like you're pointing a gun to my head lol. That or you really should get down your high horse as not everyone has the same priorities.

And I already told you, I'm not buying a new card since this one is all I need for light gaming, GPU mining looks EOL and I won't bother mining for peanuts.

Well, I apologize. That wasn't intended. Just a tip though, I'd avoid bitcoin threads in the future, you may upset yourself if you look in 10 years and find that the peanuts you could have mined are now worth $100,000.

 

[MrK6]

To this day I've cleared over $20,000 with my mining farm.

There's a lot of nonsense arguments in this thread, but there's a lot of opportunity in bitcoins. The facades thrown up in these treads by those who missed out just kind of hammers home that point.

 

[blastingcap]

To this day I've cleared over $20,000 with my mining farm

Past is not present or future--difficulty was way lower back then and difficulty is super high now and will get even higher as ASICs keep streaming in. Prices also not guaranteed to stay this high.

Revenue is not profit.. how much did the graphics cards and electricity cost you in dollars as well as time and effort?

Lastly, opportunity cost is everything. Your mining profits pale in comparison to what people made over the same time period buying and holding BTC. Instead of spending $thousands on GPUs, if you had bought BTC directly you would have potentially gained $263 on every single coin. ($266 - $3). Say you blew $10k on GPUs and electricity over the last year and a half, if you had bought BTC instead at $3 with that $10k and sold at $266, you'd be sitting on ~$860k. That's a best-case scenario but even if you didn't have perfect timing you still would have cleared many more times what you did mining. And that's without leverage.

 

[Chiropteran]

Past is not present or future--difficulty was way lower back then and difficulty is super high now and will get even higher as ASICs keep streaming in. Prices also not guaranteed to stay this high.

Jan 2013, bitcoin was $20
Difficulty: 3,249,550

Today, bitcoin is $120
Difficulty: 7,365,409

Value increased by 500%, but difficulty only increased by 126%

Difficulty per dollar is lower now than it was 4 months ago. It's actually a great time to mine.


I agree that we don't know how things will be in the future, though. That is true. I suggest to only mine with cards that you would use for gaming anyway, unless you know the risks and are fine with them.

 

[blastingcap]

I agree that we don't know how things will be in the future, though. That is true. I suggest to only mine with cards that you would use for gaming anyway, unless you know the risks and are fine with them.

Yeah, I have never disagreed with using a gaming card to mine bitcoins part-time; I just think going out and buying GPUs for the sole purpose of mining is kind of crazy when ASICs are already proven to be streaming in, and there is no guarantee prices stay this high. And historically, these numbers are sky-high. BTC was what, $20 back in February, which was only two months ago: http://bitcoincharts.com/charts/mtgoxUSD#rg360ztgSzm1g10zm2g25zv

Looking at the chart I linked to (above), it looks not so different from this classic chart (below), except the "Denial" phase's sell-off was much sharper in the bitcoin graph (above). So I don't know if this is a bull trap or not, but it makes me nervous:

But past performance is not indicative of future performance, so bringing up early-adopter-mining profits is irrelevant going forward.... I mean it's like Nokia bringing up its past successes while being killed by Android and iPhones. Past is not the future. You can temporarily make some money GPU mining, but it's clear that ASICs are the future.

Your numbers hold true not for today, but for a split second in time. Bitcoin values are extremely volatile and can halve or double in less than 24 hours. It's a calculated risk, but as with anything risky, don't invest more than you can afford to lose.

 

[SlowSpyder]

To this day I've cleared over $20,000 with my mining farm.

There's a lot of nonsense arguments in this thread, but there's a lot of opportunity in bitcoins. The facades thrown up in these treads by those who missed out just kind of hammers home that point.

At this point I think it is better to simply let the haters continue to hate. They're arguing about if they consider bitcoins to be real currency vs. what you and I have already done and will continue to do while profitable - sell bitcoins and made money in doing so.


What they fail to realize is that something has value if someone is willing to pay you for it or accept it in a trade for other goods/services. I cannot think of one good reason to not mine in your downtime, assuming a GPU that can provide a decent hash rate and bitcoin trading prices and electric cost continue to make it worthwhile.