Worth buying RX 570 4GB cards @ $129, for mining (NH, ETH, Grin, etc?) these days? Or a single GTX 1660ti?

[VirtualLarry]

Two questions: Is it worth investing in mining hardware (GPUs), at this point in time, since the card prices are really cheap nowadays, and two, if I did do that, should I spend the extra on 8GB cards, or upgrade to the RX 580 from the 570 (and also 8GB RX 580 or not)?

The ASRock Phantom Gaming 4GB RX 570 is $129.99, with the 8GB "X" variant $139.99, and the XFX RX 570 8GB is $159.99, with a $20 MIR (limit one, though). The advantage of the extra cost of the XFX RX cards, is that they have a "mining BIOS" on the secondary BIOS position, which gives 26MH/s on DH algo in NH, rather than 21MH/s for my other non-XFX-mining-BIOS cards (also 8GB RX 570 cards).

I'm thinking of splashing out for the XFX cards, to get the mining BIOS, and getting the 8GB included.

I think that, if there is any resale value in a couple of years for the RX 570-class cards at all, that the 8GB variants will be more valuable, so there's that.

My XFX RX 570 4GB cards are hitting $0.30/day on NH on DH, and my MSI RX 570 8GB cards are only hitting $0.26/day on same or Beam algo.

ROI would be faster for the RX 570 4GB ASRock PG card, being only $130, but I'm thinking that they might not have the greatest resale, and they don't have a mining BIOS that I know of, so MH/s would be lower by like 25%. I also wonder if the ETH DAG would exceed 4GB in size while these cards were still trying to make ROI, whereas an 8GB card wouldn't be hamstrung like that.

Edit: I was originally considering a 1660ti this month or the next, but, seeing recent prices on more RX 570 cards, and considering that 2x RX 570 cards are around the same performance or better than a GTX 1660ti for ETH mining, etc., I reconsidered.

 

[maddie]

At these returns, does mining really make any sense? Assuming you're not running 1000s of cards, $9/month/card with a 15+ month wait cover the investment, seems like a losing proposition versus many other ways to earn money.

What am I missing?

 

[Markfw]

Mining has always been risky, more so now than ever with all the prices plummeting. Bit coin has gone from a high of 20k to less than 4k in a little over a year ? Unless I had money to burn I would not touch it.

 

[ozzy702]

I wouldn't purchase GPUs for mining at this point and certainly wouldn't I purchase AMD cards if I did. Way too many of them out there mining. ETH just got a reduction in issuance today and we'll see further reductions with any move away from Ethash.

Turing has some decent performance in many algos, and is more energy efficient if you have to pay for power. Again, the return just isn't there and likely won't be worth the hassle.

I was considering picking up a Radeon VII but I couldn't justify it just for mining and desktop use. If Radeon VII had come out 18 months ago I would have picked up as many as I could get my hands on.

 

[VirtualLarry]

I wouldn't purchase GPUs for mining at this point and certainly wouldn't I purchase AMD cards if I did. Way too many of them out there mining. ETH just got a reduction in issuance today and we'll see further reductions with any move away from Ethash.

I guess I don't follow CC news much. Thanks for the info about ETH. So, most CCs seem to have extremely diminishing earnings from mining. There's a new coin, "Grin", or maybe that's the algo, that some people are mining with Turing, and Sapphire announced an RX 570/580 with 16GB of VRAM, specifically for that coin/algo.

I'm just using NH myself. So it can mine bunch of different algos, if one becomes suddenly unprofitable.

But the NH Profitability Calc shows RX 570 4GB cards making like $0.99/mo, after electricity costs, and the RX 580 $2.99/mo.

But, thankfully, my electric bill is included in my rent, and I have electric heat, which means, instead of running the heater to stay warm, I can run my PCs, at least during the colder / winter months, and it doesn't cost anything extra as far as electricity.

 

[Shmee]

I wouldn't buy any new cards particularly for mining, just use the ones you already have on the side. If you need a new card for something else as well (better gaming?) that makes sense.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Hmm, I had also fired up a rig with an i5-7400, 8GB DDR4, and a GTX 1060 3GB.

It was happily mining yesterday. This morning, it keeps trying the DH algo, and failing with a CUDA OOM error.

Did the DAG just cross the 3GB line recently? Seems like it is uncomputable on that rig. Unfortunately, if I click on Benchmark, there's no simple way to disable that algo, that I can see. I would like to set it on Beam for now. Unless that's uncomputable with a GTX 1060 3GB too.

It was a pre-built gaming rig by HP, I didn't intentionally set out to make a rig with only a 3GB card in it.

Sigh. This settles it, if I buy any more cards, I'm getting 8GB models (or 6GB, in the case of NVidia).

 

[Raduque]

GPU mining on a single card isn't worth it anymore.

 

[VirtualLarry]

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150803&ignorebbr=1

Mining card prices on the rise again? Here's an XFX XXX RX 580 8GB for $449.

Edit: The reason that I ask is, I was looking at a number of cards, some RX 570 4GB and 8GB models, and the 4GB ASRock Phantom Gaming D RX 570 stayed at $129, but the price of the 8GB Phantom Gaming X went from $139 to $219. The XFX RX 570 8GB went from $159 with a $20 MIR, to over $200.

Abrupt price changes like that, and such wide swings (more than $10-$20), make me think that mining is on the rise again (new coin / algo 'Grin', designed to be mined by GPUs and ASICs alike), what with Sapphire coming out with a 16GB RX card specifically for that coin, and Newegg wanted to get a pre-emptive jump on price increases.

 

[Markfw]

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150803&ignorebbr=1

Mining card prices on the rise again? Here's an XFX XXX RX 580 8GB for $449.

There are 4 under $200 on newegg, yes 8 gig cards. An a LOT under $300, so no, I say a pricing error.

 

[VirtualLarry]

https://www.overclock3d.net/news/gp..._as_they_prepare_16gb_rx_570_-_a_mining_gpu/1

The ASIC Friendly form of Grin will require around 11GB of VRAM, while the GPU-friendly form will require more than 5.5GB of VRAM, though larger banks of VRAM are expected to boost mining performance further. VRAM use could also grow over time as the digital currency is utilised.

Well, that explains why the 4GB RX 570 cards are so cheap, but the 8GB cards took a really huge price hike. Mining prices again!

Wow, over $7-8 USD / day, per GTX 1080ti card. Not too shabby!

https://cryptoage.com/en/1426-grin-coin-calculator,-how-to-calculate-mining-profitability.html

 

[maddie]

https://www.overclock3d.net/news/gp..._as_they_prepare_16gb_rx_570_-_a_mining_gpu/1



Well, that explains why the 4GB RX 570 cards are so cheap, but the 8GB cards took a really huge price hike. Mining prices again!

There are 8GB cards under $200 as Mark said. Where are you getting this huge price hike?

 

[gorobei]

most of the amd polaris cards are on a downward trend price-wise. if nothing else than the performance of the gtx1660 cards coming out pushing vega56 down the price/perf scale. AdoredTV had an offhand comment a while back about navi sampling better than expected, so that and the 1660 pricing suggest that the nextgen amd consumer parts may be closer than the late '19 early '20 guidelines. current prices seem like the early start of clearing out inventories.

with new parts coming with more memory onboard than previous gen, any new alt-coin looking to be successful is unlikely to target older gen cards for mining. the 51% attacks on the smaller alt-coins makes investing in mining a plain and simple gamble. at that point you would be better of just buying said cryptocoin directly than mining, same as it was with btc. i dont know that any altcoin has anywhere near enough consensus in the mindset to be a sure enough thing to even justify thinking of spending on old or even new cards to build a new farm.

 

[2is]

https://www.overclock3d.net/news/gp..._as_they_prepare_16gb_rx_570_-_a_mining_gpu/1



Well, that explains why the 4GB RX 570 cards are so cheap, but the 8GB cards took a really huge price hike. Mining prices again!

Wow, over $7-8 USD / day, per GTX 1080ti card. Not too shabby!

https://cryptoage.com/en/1426-grin-coin-calculator,-how-to-calculate-mining-profitability.html

For someone with nearly 43k posts dating back nearly 18 years, you sure are pretty clueless when it comes to hardware. Not only did someone mention, before you doubled down and made this post, that there are several 8GB 580 cards for under 200, but a simple search at either Amazon or Newegg would have revealed the same. Instead you decide to pick out the anomaly, present it here as the norm and proclaim mining is on the comeback.

Personal attacks are not allowed in
the tech forums.

AT Mod Usandthem

 

[VirtualLarry]

that there are several 8GB 580 cards for under 200, but a simple search at either Amazon or Newegg would have revealed the same. Instead you decide to pick out the anomaly, present it here as the norm and proclaim mining is on the comeback.

Do you deny that Newegg auto-gouges prices based on short-term demand spikes?

Not only that one XFX 8GB RX 580 card for $449, from Newegg themselves and not a third-party, but also the ASRock Phantom Gaming X RX 570 8GB went from $139 to $219, as well as the XFX RX 570 that was $159 with a $20 MIR, went to $219.

The cheapest 8GB RX card that I could find, is a different RX 580, for $189.

So, anyways, if the reason is NOT mining, then what explains the short-term price spikes from $139 to $200+ for 8GB RX 570 cards, while the 4GB RX 570 cards (useless for mining Grin) remained at $129, there was no price spike.

Instead of belittling me, just apply Occam's Razor - it seems like an uptick in mining to me.

 

[NTMBK]

Larry, it's definitely not worth spending your money on. You'll just end up with another pile of outdated hardware that you'll struggle to offload.

 

[ozzy702]

So, anyways, if the reason is NOT mining, then what explains the short-term price spikes from $139 to $200+ for 8GB RX 570 cards, while the 4GB RX 570 cards (useless for mining Grin) remained at $129, there was no price spike.

Instead of belittling me, just apply Occam's Razor - it seems like an uptick in mining to me.

Supply. Also, nobody is mining GRIN on AMD and nobody is buying an AMD card to mine GRIN. Widespread demand for GPUs to mine isn't a thing, and certainly not for algo-saturated cards like the 570 and 580. If you want to mine GRIN, pickup a 2000 series NVIDIA card and have fun.

 

[VirtualLarry]

most of the amd polaris cards are on a downward trend price-wise.

I agree with that. That's why I thought it so unusual that the prices on the 8GB RX 570 cards that I had been looking at, had spiked so hard. That seems to point at an "outside influence", possibly, and IMHO likely, to be related to mining Grin. (Incidentally, that's why 3GB GTX 1060 cards are available so cheap, but the 6GB ones are holding on to their price.)

 

[ozzy702]

I agree with that. That's why I thought it so unusual that the prices on the 8GB RX 570 cards that I had been looking at, had spiked so hard. That seems to point at an "outside influence", possibly, and IMHO likely, to be related to mining Grin. (Incidentally, that's why 3GB GTX 1060 cards are available so cheap, but the 6GB ones are holding on to their price.)

Or maybe gamers don't want 3gb and 4gb cards? Oh, nope, must be mining. I've been selling 4gb and 8gb 570s and 580s. I'm practically giving away the 4gb cards, nobody wants them. One person out of maybe 20 was mining and it was ETH, not GRIN.

 

[whm1974]

Or maybe gamers don't want 3gb and 4gb cards? Oh, nope, must be mining. I've been selling 4gb and 8gb 570s and 580s. I'm practically giving away the 4gb cards, nobody wants them. One person out of maybe 20 was mining and it was ETH, not GRIN.

That is very true, many gamers already have 4GB cards like the GTX 970 which is what I have.

 

[2is]

Do you deny that Newegg auto-gouges prices based on short-term demand spikes?

Not only that one XFX 8GB RX 580 card for $449, from Newegg themselves and not a third-party, but also the ASRock Phantom Gaming X RX 570 8GB went from $139 to $219, as well as the XFX RX 570 that was $159 with a $20 MIR, went to $219.

The cheapest 8GB RX card that I could find, is a different RX 580, for $189.

So, anyways, if the reason is NOT mining, then what explains the short-term price spikes from $139 to $200+ for 8GB RX 570 cards, while the 4GB RX 570 cards (useless for mining Grin) remained at $129, there was no price spike.

Instead of belittling me, just apply Occam's Razor - it seems like an uptick in mining to me.

I don't know what Newegg's pricing policy is. I do know that searching for a 580, finding multiple options for under $200 and making the conscious decision to find the most over priced ones to post on a forum and declare "look guys, mining is back!" is worthy of a double facepalm meme.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Ok, I'm happy to report that I was WRONG, and Newegg (if you filter out 3rd-party sellers), has PLENTY of RX-series cards, most all under $200.

Except for this one:

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814202331&ignorebbr=1

The Sapphire 16GB RX 570, "Grin Coin Miner Edition", for $349.99.

I'm going to assume that this is pretty-much MSRP for the 16GB model??? At least, it's not being gouged up to $500 or something.

Something to consider, but it might end up as obsolete as 2.88MB floppy disks did, back in the day.

Edit: Reviews suggest 16GB RX 570 card "Not worth it":
https://cryptomining-blog.com/tag/11266-70-21g​/

 

[alcoholbob]

Unless you are getting all your power from solar panels, I wouldn't waste money trying to get rich mining at this point.

 

[whm1974]

Ok, I'm happy to report that I was WRONG, and Newegg (if you filter out 3rd-party sellers), has PLENTY of RX-series cards, most all under $200.

Except for this one:

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814202331&ignorebbr=1

The Sapphire 16GB RX 570, "Grin Coin Miner Edition", for $349.99.

I'm going to assume that this is pretty-much MSRP for the 16GB model??? At least, it's not being gouged up to $500 or something.

Something to consider, but it might end up as obsolete as 2.88MB floppy disks did, back in the day.

Edit: Reviews suggest 16GB RX 570 card "Not worth it":
https://cryptomining-blog.com/tag/11266-70-21g/

Larry, the last time I checked, you can buy a Rx580 w/ 8GB for about half that or less.

 

[IntelUser2000]

Unless you are getting all your power from solar panels, I wouldn't waste money trying to get rich mining at this point.

Maybe not even. You are potentially sucking power from other more useful things in the house. It would have to be solar panels, and only when it generates excess power.