About a month ago I got quite intrigued by the idea that we can earn cryptocurrencies using the computing power of our computer (also known as mining). I did some research over the internet and found out that it is quite possible to mine few fractions of coins every day using the computer I already have.
This computer has RX 580 GPU, which is quite good for mining Ethereum. I don't use GPU most of the time so I can run the mining software all the time even when I'm working,
What platform am I using?
I'm using https://minerstat.com/ to mine Ethereum. In fact, it is quite easy to get started. All you need to do is go to their website, create an account, do some basic configuration. You will then need to download Minerstat desktop software and connect it to the web platform using an API provided to you.
Minerstat Web Platform
Minerstat Desktop Mining Software
Problems faced
At first, I was getting very low Mega Hash(MH) from my Rx 580. I did some research and tried few overclocking settings and was able to achieve about 22 MH without pushing the GPU too much. That was still low compared to what other people were getting on the same GPU card. After hours of trial and error, lots of crashes, and blue screen of deaths I finally found a setting that was quite stable and got about 24-25 MH which is good.
AHA moments
- The first AHA moment was when I discovered that turning compute mode on actually increases MH quite a bit.
- The second was turning the memory timing to Level 1.
After all these struggles over two days, I was finally able to achieve 30-31 MH on my RX 580. I'm quite satisfied with these settings.
Was it worth it?
Right now my computer is earning 0.0007 ETH per day which is about 2.5 USD at the current rate. The electricity cost where I'm living is super cheap too. Also, the fact that my computer was already running all the time even before I started mining makes it feels like it is worth it.
Will I continue?
I might run it for a few more weeks before I get tired of it. There is a possibility of adding more GPUs and do it at larger scale, but GPUs are really expensive these days. Maybe if I find some cheap ones online I might give it a shot.
This was how much I earned in about month. lol. It was fun though.
