Cryptocurrency is as popular as ever whether the market is rapidly growing or tumbling down due to recent global-scale regulation. Despite recent events, the cryptocurrency market still has lots of potential as it has already proven to reward its investors. Apart from buying cryptocurrency, digital coins can also be mined. The mining process is the way through which crypto coins come into existence.
For a regular consumer, mining cryptocurrency can be a great way of earning a few digital tokens for spending online. After all, many coins were made to be used in online transactions instead of being held and sold off when they rise in value. One can also hold on to their coins if they believe that their crypto coin will surge in value in the future.
Bitcoin is the perfect example for this, those people who have been mining cryptocurrency since 2009 have reaped the most benefits from the mining process. Even though the market recently crashed causing the value of the coins to drop massively, those who mined the coins instead of buying them still made a bit of money.
For our mining purposes, it’s best to mine altcoins. The more you mine a cryptocurrency, the harder it gets to mine. Bitcoin is the oldest and most popular cryptocurrency, therefore, it’s at that stage where mining it with consumer-level tech is not a feasible option. The energy and overall cost is too big and not worth it. Bitcoin mining is usually done on a large-scale level by large companies, simply because it’s not worth it on a small-scale level.
Therefore, it’s best to forget about Bitcoin unless you’re willing to splash lots of cash for the hardware required (it’d be better to just buy the actual coin at this point). Altcoins, on the other hand, are relatively new compared to Bitcoin and are much easier to mine. Some easy-to-mine coins include Dogecoin, Feathercoin, and Litecoin.
The profits one can earn through mining totally depends on the popularity of a currency and how well it’s currently doing.In the above three currencies, Litecoin has the highest value.
Therefore, if you mined Litecoin then perhaps you could make a decent amount of money per day given your equipment. It’s best to choose cheap, easy-to-mine currencies with low costs attached to them. It’s also best to make sure the currency chosen is a popular one which also has future potential. That way, simply holding on to the cryptocurrency mined will result in much better returns in the future.
What you need
Mining is increasingly becoming a difficult task therefore, a high-powered computer is required. A PC with preferably multiple GPUs. To break it down, here’s what you need to focus on the most:
- The Graphics Card
- The motherboard
- The Power Supply
- A cooling system
What about the processor or the CPU? Yes, people either invest in high-end CPUs for mining as well. However, it’s been proven that GPUs are far better and more efficient in mining, which is why this guide will solely be focused on GPUs.
The GPU is very important, it needs to be efficient in order for you to gain from the mining process. Power is not everything, if the GPU takes a lot of electricity then your costs will likely be greater than the profits. When selecting a GPU to buy, keep in mind the memory the card has and the power consumption as well as its cost. You won’t earn lots of cryptocurrency tokens unless you invest heavily into multiple good GPUs. This list keeps in mind all the tools required to make a good mining GPU. Here are few of the best GPUs for mining.
- AMD Radeon RX 580
This GPU is very popular and considered one of the best options out there for mining. It offers a great hash rate of 29 mh/s while also consuming less electricity. Overall, this card performs really well and is one of the cheaper options on this list. The only problem about this card is its lack of availability since its a highly popular product for mining. You can purchase it from here.
Image: Amazon PROS: good cooling, cheaper option with regards to mining.
CONS: gets sold out fast due to immense popularity, only available in the UK and US.
Key Specs: Core Clock: 1257 MHz. Memory: 8 GB GDDR5. Memory clock: 8 GBPS. Power consumption: 185W.
- Nvidia GeForce GTX 1070
Already known as one of the best cards in the gaming community, it’s also a great GPU for mining as well. It also has a high hash rate of 30 MH/s with less power consumption. It’s costs slightly more than the AMD Radeon RX 580 but it’s a good option for those not living in the US or UK since the AMD isn’t available there. The Nvidia 1070 is a great option if you’re looking to stick to mining for the long run. You can purchase it here.
Image: Nvidia PROS: High amount of memory, good ratio of hash to power
CONS: More towards the expensive side.
Key Specs: Core Clock: 1506 MHz, Memory: 8 GB GDDR5, Memory Clock: 8 GBPS, Power consumption: 150W
- Nvidia GTX 1070 Ti
As established already, the GTX 1070 is a great card for mining. The GTX 1070 Ti is an updated version of the card as Nvidia looks to improve on the already great card. Nvidia does so by bumping up the base clock and the card overall does a great job. There’s only one major tradeoff here that this card consumes more power than the original. Apart from that, it’s a great choice. Not only is it more powerful, but currently it’s cheaper than the original 1070 too. You can purchase it from here.
Image; Nvidia PROS: great hash rates, very powerful, cheaper than the original.
CONS: higher power consumption compared to the original.
Key Specs: Core Clock: 1607 MHz, Memory: 8 GB GDDR5, Memory Clock: 8 GHz, Power consumption: 180W
- Nvidia GTX 1080 TI
Hailed as one of the most powerful and one of the best GPUs out there for gaming especially 4K gaming, you can expect this card to be a mining beast as well. You can get a hash rate of up to 32 MH/s with this card. The only drawbacks about this GPU are that it’s really expensive and consumes a lot of power. It would take a longer time to recover the initial investment through mining but it’s a great choice if you’re in for the long run. You can purchase from here. -
Image: Nvidia PROS: Extremely powerful, great hash rates.
CONS: very expensive, consumes a lot of power, requires overall better hardware to function properly.
Key Specs: Core Clock: 1480 MHz, Memory: 11 GB DDR5X, Memory Clock: 11 GHz, Power consumption: 250W
- AMD RX 480
It may be considered an old GPU now, but it’s still a pretty decent one for mining. It’s slightly an older model to the RX 580 but just like the latter, this card is in high demand so it becomes hard to find it in stock. It’s also cheaper than the RX 580 so that makes it more attractive for an option. It boasts a decent hash rate of 28 MH/s and uses less power. It has cheaper versions (with less memory) too if you’re looking to cut costs even further. You can purchase the RX 480 here.
Image: Bit-Tech PROS: Cheap, excellent performance.
CONS: Hard to find, also seems to be available only in limited countries.
Key Specs: Core Clock: 1120 MHz, Memory: 8 GB GDDR5, Memory Clock: 8 GBPS, Power consumption: 150W.