DIY Miner Update #4 - 4GB DAG Size Causing Trouble
This is an update to my project to turn my old computer into a DIY Miner. I got the old girl up and running and have been mining ETH for the last 4 months or so. But things are starting to get bumpy due to the DAG size for ETH mining now being greater than the memory in the GPU card I'm using (a AMD 570 RX) so I am looking to make some changes soon.
(My DIY Miner before I tidied it up).
Earnings
I'm using MinerStat OS to mine ETH using the Ethash algorithm on the 2Miners pool. To date I have mined just under 0.2 ETH (worth $240 with ETH's current price of $1200).
At this point I've essentially broke even counting the $170 I spent in equipment (mostly the GPU and power supply) and about $10 per month in electricity costs. So any earnings from now on will be profit.
4GB DAG Size Limiting ETH Mining
My miner is essentially a zombie miner at this point. It shouldn't be able to mine ETH, but due to some smart people, the Pheonix Ethash algorithm is still mining away but with lower and lower efficiency.
My miner had been hitting around 26 MH/s prior to the DAG limitation but is now down to around 14 MH/s. As the DAG continues to grow day by day, the hash rate will drop lower and lower. I would have already switched to a different coin to mine but I'm waiting on one more payout from 2miners (I just need to squeeze out 0.0002 more ETH to get my last payment of 0.05 ETH).
Short Term Option
Once I've gotten my last payment from 2miners I plan to switch over to nicehash. MinerStats OS can work with the nicehash mining system. I will be able to continue mining ETH for a little bit longer but should have better earnings than with 2miners.
My earnings never quite as good on 2Miners as MinerStat estimated and I recently realized why. On the 2miners pool, I need to earn at least 0.002% of the shares per block in order to earn anything. Prior to the DAG issue that wasn't that big of a problem, and I would only miss out on a few shares. But now that my hash rate has been cut in half, nearly all my shares are going to waste with me needing a bit of "luck" to get enough shares per block to make any earnings. With NiceHash, I will get paid for every share I mine.
Longterm Options
At some point the DAG size will grow to the extent that my 4GB card just won't be able to mine ETH anymore. At that point I will either have to upgrade my GPU to a 8GB card or switch to a new coin to mine.
I have been looking at the 8GB cards and trying to convince myself that it would be worth the investment. Since the 4GB DAG size has become an issue, the prices of 8GB cards have gone up a lot with a AMD 580 8GB card running around $300 in the aftermarket. While my adventure has been interesting, I'm not sure I'm ready to buy another card just yet.
So that brings up mining alternative coins. MinerStat has a estimator for earnings for all the coins I can mine with my current card. Mining ETH is still the best option even with the lower hashrate. But their are some interesting coins that currently have low exchange volume that might be worth mining. Three that I want to explore more include Kyanite, Pegasus Coin, and Turtle Coin.
Any other DIY miners out there running into the 4GB DAG limitation? How are you going to deal with it?
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