Too late to start mining?

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Mr. Baz

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Just looking at the prices of hardware and running some metrics through a profitability calculator, I don't see how starting mining at this time is profitable. Even if I were to drop $10k on hardware (I've known people to spend such money on desks ;) ) I don't think it would be profitable.

GPU mining ROI too low (or negative).
ASICs -- many crypto currenccies make it difficult to impossible to profit off purchasing an ASIC unit.

Am I missing something?
 
Nope. Unless you are getting free / very cheap electricity, are using hardware you already have on hand or are just in it for the science / chuckles ... it probably isn't a good idea to jump in from zero.
 
Yeah I lot of GPU's seem to be 6 months+ on ROI now, and that's now. In 2 months that could turn into 9 months.
 
you CAN get GPU's are MSRP if you hunt and give it time.
you will NOT get an ASIC in time for it to generate a crazy profit. If you are going to buy an ASIC you will want to ensure its FAR away from any signs of life for they are LOUD.

as dvsman said... unless you already have the hardware it's not worth it WHEN you factor in your time your search for MSRP GPU's.

If I may suggest.. a better way to get into this little thing called crypto is to str8 up BUY it. Hold it. Sell it. Use the profits to buy into the hardware. This-way your UPFRONT price is locked and not re-accruing until you have the capital to cover.
 
I got started by filling the slots up in my computers with decent video cards, it took some patience to find decent cards at a decent price. After I found the 5 I needed I continued until I had 8 more. I paid an average of $225/card for the 8 1060's in my mining rig. The mother board was $150, PSUs were another $150, Memory $75, I had an SSD sitting around and riser cards were another $60. I overspent on my CPU so I could mine scrypt:n but you can get a g4400 for another $50

That machine is currently making about $12.50 a day profit on Nicehash, so the payoff is 6 months. It's fun, but not really worth it right now.

Do you have a desktop with some empty slots?
 
The other thing that got me was the rumor that Nvidia is going to release the 2080 cards in April, which is what - 6 weeks away? If you sink a load of cash into cards & rigs now (@current crazy prices), and get a month - two months of time in mining, it will be even slower going to ROI when the new cards get released and all the miners buy them up (which will increase mining difficulties for everyone else).

If you have some spare rigs sitting around not doing anything (or leftover parts to put together one / some rigs), I'd power it up and see how the numbers work out vs. electricity costs just for fun. As Orddie said, if you are in it for the money, you might be better off buying the crypto with fiat then holding ...
 
If you're buying the last GTX 1089 Ti's at the store, then "yes", you are too late... give up.

Remember, these are arbitrarily created virtual limited resources. Thus, bitcoin might be effectively "mined out", but there's always the new coin-of-the-day.

As a kid I used to shave off the edges of pennies so that machines would think they were dimes... this whole crypto currency mining thing seems to be much easier and seems to be "approved".
 
I do not suggest buying video cards now to get into mining. The difficulties of the popular and profitable coins are rising daily, and prices for video cards are inflated to the point of costing double MSRP in some cases. Someone who pays $450 for an RX 580 or $400 for a GTX 1060 is going to have a difficult time breaking even.

If you already own some hardware that is capable of mining, you may as well use it. That's the only case I'd suggest someone just start mining now. Their only cost will be electricity, and in that case they are guaranteed to make some money. Not a lot, but some.

As Orddie said, a good option if you want to get into crypto is to buy currency. There are members who sell it in the forums here, or you can buy directly from private individuals (LocalMonero for example). Or you can send fiat to an exchange and buy that way. If you don't already have an account with an exchange that can be another barrier, though. There's been a huge influx of traders, and many exchanges are not accepting new accounts.
 
darrpara said:
Whats wrong with a 6 month ROI? That still seems quite good compared to other uses of money (although it is risky).
Click to expand...

Because that's 6 months today, a month from now your ROI could push back to 9 months.
 
I can think of several easy to find cards with 5mo ROI that others ignore.
You just have to know what to do with them.
 
yowen said:
Because that's 6 months today, a month from now your ROI could push back to 9 months.
Click to expand...

what's wrong with a 9 month ROI

or a 12 month ROI?

Tell me what other medium can you make 100% return in 6 months.

I'll check back..........


2017 was my best year in my company's 401k since I started my job in 2003. I made about 15%...
did you catch that? 15%

The majority in this thread are saying making 100% back in six months takes too long.

you fools.



---- I suspect there are two kinds of people replying in this thread:

A) Miners who are trying to discourage competition.
or
B) Know nothing types who think they know it all.


If you can get actually get cards it's still VERY profitable -- even right now. (WHICH OF COURSE IS WHY YOU WILL STILL HAVE TROUBLE SOURCING CARDS) And if Crypto goes back up, like I expect it will, it'll be even more profitable once again. Volta/Turing release in the next few months might be worth waiting for --- but if you are willing to buy a few cards and just set your expectation to mine with them for a year or two at a reasonable power level (say 66 or 70% power target (undervolting)) --- I can't see any way you don't win. (unless you live someplace the electricity is ridiculously expensive).

There are all kinds of calculators to determine profitability and ROI. Look at whattomine.com for instance.

A 1080Ti probably makes about $4 a day average since I started mining in June 2017. I've seen lows of $2.25 per day. I've seen highs of $12 per day since June. The most profitable time was NOT last June, it was actually this December and January...

Say you pay $800 for a1080TI -- a bit over MSRP. That's 200 days ROI at average payback. (less 5-20% profitability to pay for electricity). At worst you have a free 1080TI, at best it makes you a bit of profit over the next 2-3 years.
 
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^^ Username does not check out

Also:
---- I suspect there are two kinds of people replying in this thread:

A) Miners who are trying to discourage competition.
or
B) Know nothing types who think they know it all.
Click to expand...

;)
 
Archaea said:
what's wrong with a 9 month ROI

or a 12 month ROI?
Click to expand...

There's nothing wrong with 6, 9 or 12 months. But we have to be careful when we throw things around like 4, 5 or 6 month ROI's. Because some people may buy into this thinking that they can count on this. With the volatility of crypto and the increases in difficulty, you could jump around anywhere from a 3 month to 24 month ROI. The ROI today is not the ROI of tomorrow, or 3 months from now. It's a snapshot in time.

Do I want to discourage anyone from mining? No, I just want to caution people. People that are hoping for a quick buck. From a business standpoint, for actual businesses, a 12+ month ROI is fine. For someone that is hoping to generate income within a shorter timeframe, mining may not be for them! That's all I'm saying.

I may have come across a little negative and as someone that thinks these ROI's are too long, i don't think that. You certainly bring up great points as to why we should still be mining today!
 
the more people join in on the mining means the more we all will push crytocurrency forward. the more people leaving the mining world means more for the remainders. regardless, block chain is here to stay, for good. :)
 
yowen said:
Because that's 6 months today, a month from now your ROI could push back to 9 months.
Click to expand...

I suppose it depends on your appetite for risk and your goals. If you are a miner with a small rig (4 cards maybe?) or a single/double GPU miner than this means you get free GPU upgrades every year. My coworker bought a whole new threadripper setup with his earned money because that was one of his goals: Make ROI and then enough for a new rendering computer.

TBH I still think if you have the available cash for a 4+ GPU rig that you might just be better off BUYING cryptocurrencies. I won't deny that helping my coworker build his rigs up was pretty exciting though :)
 
darrpara said:
I still think if you have the available cash for a 4+ GPU rig that you might just be better off BUYING cryptocurrencies.
Click to expand...

Yep, I simply went the mining route because it was an excuse to build a computer. I had a laptop, gaming PC and htpc, so i had zero reason to build one until mining came along. I could justify a new PC build!
 
You have to look at it as a game of chance, and putting your mining profits into another coin _can_ yield a faster payback time. I'll give an example of what I did. So, I have two cards that I got mid-last year. (1080 + 1080 Ti) I was mining Zcash making decent payout with an ROI of 8 months. But then I saw some market signals and started dumping mining profits into another coin which yielded a payback of 23x my ROI in half the time. This was somewhat luck, but also a calculated move I made intentionally. But, I could have just as easily lost it all if it didn't pan out. Case in point, cryptocurrency = nerd casino.
 
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yowen said:
C) I just want to caution people that they should do this with money they can afford to lose, all of it.
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if you buy crypto -- yes.

if you mine for crypto - you'll have your hardware assets (which of course devalue over time)
But hedging that crypto risk with hardware assets is preciously why I mine instead of buy crypto. I consider it less risk to mine than to buy crypto.


Also -- consider tax laws -- it's no longer wild west - if you live in the U.S. the IRS wants their money in 2018.
 
Archaea said:
if you mine for crypto - you'll have your hardware assets (which of course devalue over time)
Click to expand...

Even then I would caution people to only do it with money they can miss. This isn't like picking up a second job for extra income. It's more on par with the risks of investing, even with the value of the assets. The risk is certainly mitigated though! Someone that may not have the stomach for straight-up crypto investing may feel a lot better investing in mining.

Tax laws are another good point!
 
Archaea said:
what's wrong with a 9 month ROI


2017 was my best year in my company's 401k since I started my job in 2005. I made about 15%...
did you catch that? 15%

.
Click to expand...

This is why I am starting to mine now. The upside potential is quite good and it is a hedge against a lot of things.
 
I threw $175 at mining with an old computer I had, and just bought a couple risers and 2 R9 270X mid january. I make .001 BTC thru Nicehash every 3 days so I get an ok payout every 6 days. It's not a lot but it's actually covering bills and it's small enough amounts that I can track it for 2018 taxes.
 
At current scalper pricing of GPUs, probably not. If you can find cards at MSRP, it may still be worth it. You have to think of it more like a hobby, and only use money you'd be willing to burn if things go south.

I have a 6x GTX 1060 6GB rig mining ETH which is, now, only pulling in $200/month. At the height, I was getting close to $600/month off of this (late last year). I also have a single Titan X Pascal machine bringing in a bit over $100/month.

If you could find a 1080 Ti at MSRP, $700, you would have a ROI in about 6 - 7 months, which is not horrible.

My 6x 1060 rig was paid off in 6 months. I cashed out, paid for the hardware and electricity and still made around $300. I've since mined for another 2 months and have about $900 in crypto. So all in all, after like 7 - 8 months, I've only really made $1,200 but I'm playing with house money at this point. Everything is paid off.

Granted, $1,200 isn't big money, but it's much better than you can find with traditional investment options. Savings accounts are giving less than 2%. In stocks, with "safe" index funds, a 10 - 15% gain in a year is pretty good. If things stay decent with the market, I would have just about doubled my money in one year.

So I still think it can be worth it, but don't buy GPUs at the scalper prices. Find like 1 or 2 1080 Tis at MSRP, you can put them in a second rig and make a little money on the side. With 2 1080 Tis and a decent multi-core CPU you can make like $250/month on NiceHash, which is not bad. And if crypto completely crashes, you could still sell the cards and recoup most of the investment.
 
What Archaea said. I'm still snatching Nvidia GPU's when I can find them at or below msrp. In the last week alone, I have picked up 13 cards (1070's, 1070 Hybrids, 1070Ti's, 1070Ti Hybrids, 1080Ti's and 1080Ti Hybrids) all for what turned out to actually be less than msrp. Primarily EVGA and MSI. I pretty much cleaned out Phil's stock over on bitcointalk.org. He downsizes every spring. He sold me some 1070Ti's at 1070 prices because that's what he thought they were until he took them out of service, hehe. I paid for all of them with earnings from my existing rigs.

I plan to continue to buy GPU's at or below msrp when I have to opportunity, to continue to build out my farm. The only coin I'm mining and hodl'ing long term atm, is Burst. I was mining and holding Zen when it was at $6. I cashed out when it hit $14. If only I had waited another couple of weeks... Still, it ROI'ed several of my rigs in less than 4 months!

I don't see a mining bubble bust coming anytime soon.
 
Dont forget to factor in your power. Where I'm at it's cheap but I've seen folks with crazy prices
 
IMO know one can tell you for sure if it is too late or not. Market is way too volatile. Your probably not going to get rich quick, but you can still mine and make money, or lose money on power and hardware. It's all a big gamble.

I started mining the last time BTC was way up.

I mined LTC even though everyone told me it was too late. I shut down the rig when value of LTC went from $20 to $4. it hovered there for a long time and was costing more in power than it was worth. Then durring the last boom those 12 coins were suddenly worth over $3k. If I had just kept mining at a loss I would have made a killing.

So really the future is hard to predict. So is the future of any particular cryptocurrency.

I'm mining garlic coins currently, and will HOLD them at least until they get onto a better exchange. It might not be wise to invest in a huge mining rig right now, but if you just buy a couple high end video cards, the worst is that you get stuck with a crazy gaming machine.
 
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If you can get in CHEAP it's worth it. Like I put in above. I'm in for about $200. I mine my gaming computer with it's 1060 6gb and X5670 processor, and I used my old gaming computer + a pair of R9 270X that I spent $175 on. $20 on good risers.. I even had the setup shut down for a while. It was cold when the market crashed but I fired back up when the market blipped. But I've still made back $70 of my investment, within less than 1 month. Power is unknown right now but it might add a month or so. $200 profit pays off everything. I just hooked an extra riser and old PSU ( via paperclip ) up to my Optiplex 755 plex server with my old Radeon 7790. The old 7790 is running 90 SOL/S equihash. That is a $40 video card in today's market with an 85W TDP.. so probably 2 months ROI with power if yo were to buy one. I have 2 extra GPU slots between the computers but I'm not growing due to market volatility right now. It pays some bills and it's good enough.
 
quiktake Care to explain your rationale?[/QUOTE]

At current video card prices you are better off investing the money in coins directly. Most of the profit off my mining since May 2017 has been due to coin prices jumping. I realize mining is a safer investment, however. With summer coming in a few months mining becomes much more of a hassle to deal with heat.
 
You might be better off just buying, or you might not be. If you buy crypto you can lose but if you buy a high end video card to mess around with, at worst you will be stuck with a high end video card. If your talking about creating an expensive mining setup, then things get more questionable, but no one knows if it is too late or not, for all anyone knows crypto is still in it's infancy. Getting rich quick will probably require investing either in mining or purchasing the right crypto and some crazy high risk, but mining could still be profitable in smaller ways without getting into big investments.
 
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It's probably not too late, just don't invest too much into inflated hardware prices. Start off small, learn, then expand (if that is what you want) after you know more what your doing. I started off with just my desktops titan x around November. Since then I have added 6 x 1070 TI's, 1x 1060 6GB, and spent between $3-4k on gpu's, motherboards, risers, etc.
 
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