Ethereum GPU mining?

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Leeea

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Wind turbines freezing is still a big part of the problem. They lost 60% of the wind generation from the week before which is still 10% -20% of the total expected power generation. The overperforming comment is simply based on expecting a greater than 60% power loss. If Texas was entirely powered off of wind and solar, the amount without power would have been way higher. I'm not against getting more renewable energy, but I'm also very aware of the issues with current renewable solutions as well.


From the link I already provided:
The majority of outages overnight were plants fueled by natural gas, coal and nuclear, which together make up more than two-thirds of power generation during winter.

The inherent unpredictable fragility of fossil fuels is what causes the problem. The behavior of wind turbines is not only expected, but can be planned for and mitigated. If Texas had a majority wind power generation system this disaster would not be happening. Over provisioned wind power results in strong interconnections to other time zones to sell electricity to them when local demand is low and remote demand is high. Those same interconnections would be able to sell the necessary power back to Texas to allow it avoid this disaster entirely.


Nobody can plan for the unpredictable and unreliable behavior of fossil fuel, making disasters like this inevitable when relying on it.
 
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Hitman928

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From the link I already provided:


The inherent unpredictable fragility of fossil fuels is what causes the problem. The behavior of wind turbines is not only expected, but can be planned for and mitigated.


Nobody can plan for the unpredictable and unreliable behavior of fossil fuel, making disasters like this inevitable when relying on it.

The percentage of fossil fuel failure was small compared to the percentage of wind turbine failure. The overnight power loss was due to fossil fuel loss because you had already lost 60% of wind power. The only way (currently) you can say we can mitigate the unreliable nature of renewable generation is by providing fossil fuel alternatives (or nuclear). If you had gone 100% wind/solar, you would have had ~15 million without power instead of ~5 million.
 
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Leeea

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The percentage of fossil fuel failure was small compared to the percentage of wind turbine failure. The overnight power loss was due to fossil fuel loss because you had already lost 60% of wind power. The only way (currently) you can say we can mitigate the unreliable nature of renewable generation is by providing fossil fuel alternatives (or nuclear). If you had gone 100% wind/solar, you would have had ~15 million without power instead of ~5 million.

That is simply false.

From my previous link:
He estimates that about 27 gigawatts of coal, nuclear and gas capacity is unavailable

From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_power_stations_in_Texas we see Texas has a total generation of 125,117 MW on an ideal summer day:
with wind being 17.3%
and nuclear, natural gas, and coal being 81.1%

81.1% of 125,117 = 101,469 MW = 101 Gigawatts on an ideal summer day
27* / 101 = 27%* unpredictable unplanned failure

A 27%* random unpredictable failure is impossible to recover from.

In the same time period we have wind power generation exceeding expectations/forecasts. Losing 60% in a planned and forecasted manner is easy to mitigate against, while losing 27% (or more*) in a random unexpected manner is devastating.

Where as the wind turbine seasonal reduction not only can be planned for, it is easy to mitigate. Strong interconnections with other power markets allow over production to be sold to other markets while simultaneously allowing for uninterrupted emergency power supply from other markets during climate change events.


*it was 27 GW yesterday, today the power failure seems to have climbed to 34 GW:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/vide...8e33f3-1676-489d-8427-f3220650ba5a_video.html
My speculative guess: the cooling towers** are freezing up + natural gas shortage

**https://www.process-cooling.com/art...-tower-operation-in-cold-weather-environments
odds are Texas is using the cheaper and easier to maintain*** counter flow design, which is vulnerable to freezing**.
***https://spxcooling.com/wp-content/uploads/AE-SK-18.pdf page 2 first paragraph
Keep in mind Texas is sometimes subject to increased levels of airborne particles, including airborne sand, which would likely make freeze resistant crossflow designs maintenance bears.

Odds are as this disaster continues, more fossil fuel plants are going offline and staying off line. A burst pipe stays burst when the weather warms up.
 
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Accord99

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That's the fragility of the Texas system. Alberta in Canada had no problems making it through a much colder period of nearly two weeks, as its natural gas and coal power plants and natural gas distribution system are well-prepared for winter, even though there was little wind and no solar power.

With proper engineering and preparation, one can make a natural gas/coal/nuclear/hydro system survive just about any weather. There's nothing you can do when the wind isn't blowing and the sun isn't shining if you have a mainly wind+solar system.
 
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Leeea

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Guys, this thread is about mining with GPUs. Not power or politics...

I hear you.

But on the flip side we just had 4 years of what happens when people just ignore the misinformation and allow it to spread. It seems the time to allow falsehoods go unchallenged in the name of politeness and order are over.

( attempts to resist the urge to respond to the errors in Accord99's post )
 
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Hitman928

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That is simply false.

From my previous link:


From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_power_stations_in_Texas we see Texas has a total generation of 125,117 MW on an ideal summer day:
with wind being 17.3%
and nuclear, natural gas, and coal being 81.1%

81.1% of 125,117 = 101,469 MW = 101 Gigawatts on an ideal summer day
27* / 101 = 27%* unpredictable unplanned failure

A 27%* random unpredictable failure is impossible to recover from.

In the same time period we have wind power generation exceeding expectations/forecasts. Losing 60% in a planned and forecasted manner is easy to mitigate against, while losing 27% (or more*) in a random unexpected manner is devastating.

Where as the wind turbine seasonal reduction not only can be planned for, it is easy to mitigate. Strong interconnections with other power markets allow over production to be sold to other markets while simultaneously allowing for uninterrupted emergency power supply from other markets during climate change events.


*it was 27 GW yesterday, today the power failure seems to have climbed to 34 GW:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/vide...8e33f3-1676-489d-8427-f3220650ba5a_video.html
My speculative guess: the cooling towers** are freezing up + natural gas shortage

**https://www.process-cooling.com/art...-tower-operation-in-cold-weather-environments
odds are Texas is using the cheaper to maintain*** counter flow design, which is vulnerable to freezing**
***https://spxcooling.com/wp-content/uploads/AE-SK-18.pdf page 2 first paragraph

Odds are as this disaster continues, more fossil fuel plants are going offline and staying off line. A burst pipe stays burst when the weather warms up.

You say what I wrote is false but then you're math shows that I was right. The loss, as a percent change, was much higher for wind than fossil fuels.

The 60% turbine loss was from just last week, not from the summer. They were not predicting that loss. Again, I'm not against expanding renewables, but you can't ignore their issues either.
 
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aleader

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The bigger issue with the 3080s and hot memory IMO is that the fan curve is based on core temp (at least until the memory throttles) and most miners are running undervolted and downclocked cores with overclocked memory. At least prior to putting my waterblock on, with just my 3080 FTW3 installed I had no problem keeping memory cool just by manually setting a 70% fan speed. Wasn't crazy loud either.

Right, you can see the 3080 & 3090 memory temps now in HWInfo, I forgot. Is that because the cards are built with the sensors or is it just that the software is catching up? I'm selfishly thinking of my 3070 and the fact I can't see the memory temp. What are your actual memory temps compared to your card temps?
 
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aleader

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Guys, this thread is about mining with GPUs.

Seems the whole windpower/politics issue was started by one of the moderators here...so, maybe he needs a ban? 😉

Make no mistake, that even in jest, it is a bad idea to post in this manner.
Consider this some sage advice.

Iron Woode

Super Moderator
 
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IEC

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And on that note:

https://www.pcgamer.com/nvidia-not-limiting-gpus-already-sold/#comment-jump

Looks like Nvidia is trying to curb mining at least a little bit.

Good, it's about time this gross misallocation of resources gets curbed.

The sooner Ethereum PoW mining dies, the better.

The amount of power being used worldwide for crypto is ludicrous. If Bitcoin miners were a country, they'd rank somewhere in the top 20 for power consumption. More than the entire country of Greece.

I imagine once you include all the altcoins and ETH it's even worse.
 
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Shmee

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...Again with the power and politics.

That said, should be interesting seeing PoS, I expect higher prices then for ETH.
 
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aleader

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Good, it's about time this gross misallocation of resources gets curbed.

The sooner Ethereum PoW mining dies, the better.

The amount of power being used worldwide for crypto is ludicrous. If Bitcoin miners were a country, they'd rank somewhere in the top 20 for power consumption. More than the entire country of Greece.

I imagine once you include all the altcoins and ETH it's even worse.

I don't disagree, it's a massive waste of power, especially the giant mining farms. I'm torn as I am very environmentally conscious (moreso than 95% of the people I know), but when my Gen-X greed kicks in... Not as bad as the boomers, but we're not much better ;)

I estimate that I used roughly an extra $35 of power in a month mining with 2 cards 24/7 (5700XT and 3070), and my son's 1660 Super off and on in 7-8 hour stretches. Gaming uses quite a bit of power too, though not obviously 24/7...unless you really have no life.

The way I see it, this is short-term, and the idiots all around me have their air conditioners running 24/7 in the spring, summer, and fall (while my windows are open) even when it's only 15C outside! I shake my head . We only got AC in 2015 when close-by forest fires that summer made it so smoky outside when it was 34C that we had to close the windows and almost suffocated. Mine only gets turned on when it is really hot and humid, and usually after a battle with the wife! Those things use WAY more power, and are arguably just as pointless.

I don't like thinking this way, but I don't know that humans are evolved enough to dig ourselves out of the hole we're in.
 

aleader

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...Again with the power and politics.

That said, should be interesting seeing PoS, I expect higher prices then for ETH.

I just noticed today for the first time when using WhattoMine that Nicehash is making more than mining straight Ethereum. I don't know if that's normal and happens off and on, but it's the first time I've seen that since starting this.
 

Leeea

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I just noticed today for the first time when using WhattoMine that Nicehash is making more than mining straight Ethereum. I don't know if that's normal and happens off and on, but it's the first time I've seen that since starting this.

A few thoughts about mining non-eth from a non-expert: the fees destroy non-eth mining

It appears to me that mining non-eth is kind a icky, because of the transaction fee incurred when creating the original currency, another transaction fee incurred when moving to a currency convertible to USD, and another transaction fee when selling the eth.

When mining directly to eth on ethermine, that creation transaction fee is included in the token ethermine pool creates, effectively making the creation transaction free. This is not true for all pools. This leaves only paying a transaction fee when selling the eth for USD.

To me, mining to a currency that cannot be directly be converted to USD is to be double hammered or triple hammered with fees. With eth fees being $5 to $20 a transaction, that is quite a lot of money for small timers.

It also means that mining to a wallet, then transferring it to brokerage address is a bad idea. The best approach seems to be to mine directly to the brokerage address, to avoid making unnecessary expensive transactions.

edited 2021-02-21
 
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aleader

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It also means that mining to a wallet, then transferring it to brokerage address is a bad idea. The best approach seems to be to mine directly to the brokerage address, to avoid making unnecessary expensive transactions.

This is the question I've been asking on 'expert' youtube videos and the Bitcointalk forum but can never get a straight answer. I convert to CAD, not USD, so I'm using Shakepay as it only takes about 20min to get into my bank account from my wallet, but yes (as in my previous post here) there are fees. I've been told there is no way to avoid those fees though. From Coinbase:

To ensure that transactions are processed on cryptocurrency networks, outgoing transactions to external cryptocurrency addresses typically incur a "mining" or "network" fee. This fee is paid to cryptocurrency miners, which are the systems that process the transactions and secure the respective network. Coinbase incurs and pays these fees directly. Accordingly, Coinbase will charge a fee based on our estimate of the network transaction fees that we anticipate paying for each transaction. In certain circumstances, the fee that Coinbase pays may differ from that estimate. All fees we charge will be disclosed at the time of your transaction.

I mine Eth on Ethermine to a Metamask wallet. Are you saying if I switched to Ethpool (what is 'Etherpool'?) and mined directly to something like Binance or Coinbase I would avoid those fees? Is Ethpool not just for solo mining? I thought that was pointless for someone like me with 2 - 3 cards?
 
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Leeea

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I mine Eth on Ethermine to a Metamask wallet. Are you saying if I switched to Ethpool (what is 'Etherpool'?) and mined directly to something like Binance or Coinbase I would avoid those fees? Is Ethpool not just for solo mining? I thought that was pointless for someone like me with 2 - 3 cards?

We are mining to the same pool, I just used the wrong name.

See:
https://support.bitfly.at/support/solutions/articles/8000060967-ethermine-org-payout-policy
All transaction fees related to pool payouts are paid by the pool, independent of the paid out amount
They do it for free by including the transaction in the Ethereum token they create. Some people feel this is unfair, and there are other mining pools that do not do this.

By mining directly to Binance, Coinbase, or equivalent on ethermine pool you avoid the wallet movement transfer fees, and only incur one transaction fee when you sell the ethereum to convert to USD. So you only pay once, instead of more then once.

In binance.us I was able to generate permanent address to mine to at wallet -> deposit -> eth after I verified my identity.


Before I closed my coinbase account I remember there was a similar method there. If you are using coin base, I would encourage you to do a search on google with the terms "coinbase black lives matter". Coinbase's fees are also much higher then Binance. Lastly, here in the usa binance.us is FDIC insured, a fiduciary, and does not charge an ACH fee.


This is the question I've been asking on 'expert' youtube videos and the Bitcointalk forum but can never get a straight answer.

The more times you transfer your cryptocurrency the more $ people on those forums make. It is in their and my financial interest to give you bad advice. Most of the profit in mining Ethereum these days is from transfer fees.

I mine Eth on Ethermine to a Metamask wallet. Are you saying if I switched to Ethpool (what is 'Etherpool'?) and mined directly to something like Binance or Coinbase I would avoid those fees? Is Ethpool not just for solo mining? I thought that was pointless for someone like me with 2 - 3 cards?

no.
I would suggest not solo-mining.
Where I used the words "etherpool" I should have said "ethermine".

I mine Eth on Ethermine to a Metamask wallet. Are you saying if I switched to Ethpool (what is 'Etherpool'?) and mined directly to something like Binance or Coinbase I would avoid those fees? Is Ethpool not just for solo mining? I thought that was pointless for someone like me with 2 - 3 cards?

yes
 
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aleader

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By mining directly to Binance, Coinbase, or equivalent on ethermine pool you avoid the wallet movement transfer fees, and only incur one transaction fee when you sell the ethereum to convert to USD. So you only pay once, instead of more then once.

Thanks for all the good info, much appreciated. Every video, blog, and forum post out there tells you in no uncertain terms what a 'bad idea' it is to mine directly to an exchange, so I didn't even consider it.

I've looked at Binance several times now but I don't like the fact that I have to hook up a bank account directly (no e-transfer). I'm not interested in holding anything until my cards are paid for. I'm also reading lots of complaints on how long Binance takes to verify accounts. Is this an issue?
 
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Leeea

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I'm also reading lots of complaints on how long Binance takes to verify accounts. Is this an issue?
yes, when I made mine it said up to 14 days

I've looked at Binance several times now but I don't like the fact that I have to hook up a bank account directly (no e-transfer).
It likely works different here in the US. They create a bank account here in the US for the user at Prime Trust, which is a FDIC insured bank.

Please note binance.US is separate from the rest of the world, because here in the US we have stricter/different regulations.

I created an account with Kraken, and they did not require a bank account. However, I think they were going to charge me a fee for bank deposits and with drawls.

Every video, blog, and forum post out there tells you in no uncertain terms what a 'bad idea' it is to mine directly to an exchange, so I didn't even consider it.

There are number of downsides/upsides to mining to an exchange depending on perspective:

Reduced fees - Every transaction made before cash out is beneficial to large mining operations so they can make more $.

Reduced marketing - an entire ecosystem of wallets, services, and fees are simply avoided if you mine directly to the exchange. Far less people have a chance to sell you anything.

Greater chance of cash out - When you sell your coin for USD, your decrease demand by fulfilling supply. This decreases the over all value of the coin and harms whales / larger holders with a vested interest in the price increasing. Mining directly to exchange makes cash out easy.

Increased security - These exchanges incorporated in reputable countries run better security then you can. This makes it very difficult to steal your coin. If you keep your wallet on your computer, there are a number of drive by malware programs designed to empty it.

Increased usability - Coin mined directly to an exchange is almost never lost. Coin printed on a piece of paper is lost all the time. Remember, large holders want supply to be restricted so demand and price increase.

Elimination of privacy - mining directly to the exchange (government regulated and tracked) disallows criminal activity / tax evasion

Increased traceability - mining directly to the exchange makes ownership of your coin more accurately tracked from day 1, even if resold. If it is later used for criminal purposes, there are firm data points for tracing the money on the blockchain making it more difficult to hide criminal transactions. It effectively narrows the search window.

Ideological failure - The libertarian ideal of cryptocurrency is to get the government out of the money supply. Mining directly to the exchange is mining directly into the government controlled financial system.
 
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aleader

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It likely works different here in the US. They create a bank account here in the US for the user at Prime Trust, which is a FDIC insured bank.

Please note binance.US is separate from the rest of the world, because here in the US we have stricter/different regulations.

I created an account with Kraken, and they did not require a bank account. However, I think they were going to charge me a fee for bank deposits and with drawls.

I did a little more research, and I would have to use Binance.com and they do require direct linking of a bank account. Now that I'm actually considering mining to an exchange, why not just directly to Shakepay? Surely I can avoid the wallet transfer fee in the same way? It's unclear (as usual it seems) whether or not I can do this. All I found was a few reddit posts asking the same question with no answers, and of course the Shakepay website is no help.

Bloody vested interests. Is that all the world is about now? Also, is mining in the Binance pool a bad idea?
 
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MrTeal

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I'm not sure how it actually works with Eth at a technical level, but at least with Bitcoin pools generally never paid transaction fees, because they would include their transactions in the blocks they mined. If you were already at maximum block size there would be some lost opportunity cost in not being able to include some extra lowest fee transactions, but it's still less expensive for a pool to send than for a random person.
 
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aleader

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The ETH price sure took a drop today...of course a day before I planned on cashing some out. It's still over $1,700, but it seems 'low' now after seeing it up over $2,000 for a bit :D
 
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Leeea

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Also, is mining in the Binance pool a bad idea?
I was not aware Binance had a mining pool :), I have no idea.


Is that all the world is about now?
I feel the world of cryptocurrency has always been a little extra scamy.


Now that I'm actually considering mining to an exchange, why not just directly to Shakepay?
While I am not familiar with shake pay, as long as they give you a permanent eth address to send to, I do not see why not :).


It's unclear (as usual it seems) whether or not I can do this.
In my experience it is just addresses. Eth is eth and it does not matter if it comes from mining or a wallet when sending to an address.


The ETH price sure took a drop today...of course a day before I planned on cashing some out. It's still over $1,700, but it seems 'low' now after seeing it up over $2,000 for a bit :D
Unlucky for you :(. I am not going to tell you to hold because I never do. Part of me just does not believe in long term viability of proof of work cryptocurrency.

But an Eth crash would be so awesome right now! Well, not for you, but I have very little eth in my name :) and want to buy a new graphics card.