I am looking at trying to find a good mining rig that I can mine with for awhile. One problem I am seeing is that ethereum is supposedly going to switch to pos as soon as June and that changes one option I was thinking of (innocilicon a10 pro 500m/h). The other option I was looking into was the “goldshell k2” for mining KDA. I guess my question is, would it be better to go with mining KDA since the other miners main income would be ethereum which will change soon? I only have a little money to start with so I can’t buy a bigger more expensive one, I was wanting to start small. Would anyone be willing to give me any advice?
A KD-pro or any of the goldshell light Asic miners are a good place to start because they don’t require 240V and can be used at home. The K2 is outdated and will have diminished returns with newer and more efficient mining rigs coming out. Some etherium miners have the ability to mine different coins on the same chain, so they won’t be totally useless next year. They can be expensive and there are a lot of variables when starting out. Hosting might be an easier option if you don’t want the noise, heat, and high electric bill. If you don’t have crypto already, purchasing miners will be more expensive through resellers compared to directly from the manufacturer. A budget amount is also helpful in determining what might be a good option for starting out.
Personally, I had 9 S9’s running out of my apartment, ran from both Dryer and Stove 220V. Not recommended!
This is just my personal view of running miners out of a Home, apartment, garage, or business. I would recommend doing your own research and seek professional help regarding the power supply.
First you really need to pick what algorithm you want to mine with a ASIC.
If you go small miners you could purchase a PDU (Power Distribution Unit) the linked is just for example. You might be able to run something safely!
If you go one or two big ones, you will need to find a way to run them safety on 220V!. Most of the larger miners will ONLY run on 220V.
If you can run off 220V not 120V, you can reduce the Amp and Watt usage (which also reduces the load on the cheap wiring inside some of these walls these days).
To run any kind of ASIC miner, you will need to think about how you are going to get that heat out of the room/garage you are using the miner in.
Personally I designed and printed 3D Printed ducting that attaches to the miner fans and enables you to connect a 5/6/7/8" ducting to the miner, Then you have a vent in your window. This way the heat is blown out the window away from your miner. The cooler you can keep the room the Safer it is, but it’s also beneficial to the equipment as well.
Now if you attach the Flexible ducting you can find at Home Depot or Lowes. The kind that has the insulation around it. you use this to connect to the miner and the window. The higher the R rating on the ducting the higher reduction you will also see in sound proofing. Ive seen miners <80 decibel.
You would be wise to keep the miner on something that’s static resistant. Not Carpet!
This is just my opinion, if possible, try to run everything networked by wire, there is always a small lag when it comes to Wi-Fi. Wi-Fi networks came be affected by so many things these days, The fans on the miners can interfere with the signals.
As for what miner. That is something that you must research! different miners can mine different algorithm - coins.
*Each coin has its own pros/cons.
You can find my website 3dps4u.com
Email sales@3dps4u.com
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I personally do not recommend spec mining for your first ASIC. Go BTC ASICs, like Bitmain’s S19, but has issues as stated by 3dps4u above.
Hey! I’m in the same boat as OP. I’m wanting to mine BTC ultimately but if I need to start with a different coin/also first to get some inflows is this a good idea or just put up the investment to mine BTC? I’ve got a budget of around 15k. Any help would be greatly appreciated!
With 15K you can grab 200+ TH of BTC miners that mine .124 a year after electricity costs. That’s .248 between em. If you’re able to HODL do the math @ 50K, 100K, 250K and so on. Long term, I’ll always recommend long term POW coins, especially BTC. There are other options but this is one coin you can almost say for sure will increase in value. The others are all speculative. Not saying I don’t mine speculative coins, but for someone starting out, I feel it’s the safest. Good luck to you!!
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Which machines are you suggesting, Robert?
Thanks Robert! Like the post below asking the same question. What would be your suggestion on miner?
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And how do you select between largely similar ASICs? An S19 Pro (110) vs S19JPro (104 vs 100 vs 96) vs S19XP (140)? Is it just the simple math of Hash rate and power consumption and purchase price or are there other factors that should be considered? I assume each of these would have the same reliability but I really don’t know that. I don’t know what I don’t know as far as any other variables or intangibles that I should be considering. Also, for example, comparing antminers to whatsminers. How is that calculus performed? I get that I can and will learn much from trial and error but I would prefer to not make any preventable mistakes that anyone here has already made if possible.
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Not a pro on the topic but here is my 2 cents-
Electricity as an overhead cost is relatively small when comparing all the top machines. I’m hoping to get started soon so I am looking at most cumulative TH for my $$. After you scale up over time ( assuming you don’t take profits and buy more miners) it will make sense to aim for more efficient machines, especially as you have more $$ to negotiate with.
And even if you aren’t using “clean” energy as you ramp up, my shallow opinion is the longer term benefits of decentralized bitcoin infrastructure outweigh the short term “costs-” which to some degree aren’t environmental costs if the energy you consume would have just been wasted anyways.
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Hey guys, I always go by hash/watt/dollar. And right now I believe the 104T is the most efficient in that regard. There are a few more efficient miners coming out very soon. The Bitmain S19XP is 140TH @ 3010 watts I believe. And the Whatsminer M50S+ is around 126 at 3276. Somewhere in that ballpark. Not financial advise in any way but that’s how I’d go.
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I think you’re safe with either the Bitmain a or the Whatsminers if you’re going Bitcoin Miners. They’re just built to last!! My guys in China rave over the Whatsminers durability and the fact that 99/100 can be repaired very easily!! Both are good choices.
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Great point. Get the most bang for your buck early on and flip it to whatever you want to invest in. You’re not bound to the coin it mines, just the amount it makes and what you want to do with it.
Thanks! How do you do that math? I like spreadsheets, and at current available prices/ electricity costs, it looked best to me to get a/ a few M30S, and compound up for a bit. Comparing it with the 104T S19s, and my initial investment target, seemed like after 1, 2,3 years of scaling, it was still better to go with M30S, but I know I probably am missing lots of pieces.
Same here Phillip, spreadsheets are your best friend to keep track of everything. Build the electricity cost into the sheet and you’ll know how much money, electricity, and profit per dollar spent you can get.
Cool, thanks!
Now just to turn 2k into enough to get started 
So you’re thinking of going the M30s and get one or a couple and then scale up?
Yeah, that’s the thought!
Especially with your low electric cost, it can move pretty quick. If you can get two (like from compass for 13k), then they become 4 in a year, become near 9 in 2, etc.
And obviously tech improves, so you won’t want to buy M30S next year- but if you hold your stack in BTC, it should stay somewhat accurate in terms of network purchasing power (my assumption)
Especially as Intel rolls out their product which they intend to keep at a fixed cost, rather than scaling with BTC value (fingers crossed)
Thanks for your thoughts. Very much appreciated! Good luck to you!