Bitcoins

[PityOnU]

What's the most power-efficient way to mine at the moment?

I would actually consider investing into this as long as I don't have to run high-end PC parts and then end up melting them.

 

[Flame]

is they like a guide or something on how we buys Bitcoins, i dont want to mine just buy, so i can buy something later.

 

[PityOnU]

After looking into it, seems like the way to go now is something from Butterfly Labs paired with a Intel minnowboard.

 

[FAST6191]

is they like a guide or something on how we buys Bitcoins, i dont want to mine just buy, so i can buy something later.

You can buy it like anything else you buy from another person* -- you just need a bitcoin wallet (download the program for your computer, a portable device or use an online one if you find one you trust -- http://bitcoin.org/en/choose-your-wallet ) and a method to communicate with someone that is selling bitcoins. Most people will probably go to an exchange though, https://www.mtgox.com/ is undoubtedly the most popular though there are others (anybody can set one up for free and without oversight** after all) and you would probably be advised to go in for one there. From there you can buy them using a variety of methods.

*some might say this is one of the points of the currency, abstract the payments away from existing financial institutions.

**you can, what your local laws say might be different.

Speaking of laws if you do buy into them and the inflation makes it so you have earned a packet for having your money sit there then you may or may not want to read up on taxes lest you get stung for it.

As for the matter at hand... eh. Saw it rising, found the legal situation that arose with it all to be interesting, debated putting my throwaway 200 into it and would have a packet if I did and occasionally watch what goes with regards to everything.

 

[DanTheManMS]

I learned about it when it was trading at around $0.25 apiece. I proudly participated in the very first mining pool using the CPU on my desktop computer from 2004. I actually mined about 0.75 BTC using just that CPU, heh. Once GPU mining became available, I dabbled in that very slightly, but my laptop's GPU could only pull about 2 or 4 MHash/s, and I got a few payouts of 0.20 apiece every few days from a pool before deciding that the difficulty increases made it completely infeasible.

Since that point I've held various amounts, selling off some when I needed some emergency cash, as I've long since made back my initial investment. I've currently got about 37 BTC remaining, and recently got 25 LTC as well just for grins.

I really like the idea behind it, and the advantages in using it. The tipping bot on Reddit is a great way to both reward quality posts in a manner similar to buying them Reddit Gold, and spread the word about Bitcoin without being *too* terribly evangelical about it at the same time. I've also enjoyed playing some online gambling games, which feels more real than just using "play money".

I'm waiting for the day that it gets easy enough for the average person to use that it can actually become widespread. I'm very impressed with the Blockchain.info app for my Android phone, and that's a huge step in the right direction, but it's still difficult to transfer money to someone using it.

 

[exangel]

I learned about it when it was trading at around $0.25 apiece. I proudly participated in the very first mining pool using the CPU on my desktop computer from 2004. I actually mined about 0.75 BTC using just that CPU, heh. Once GPU mining became available, I dabbled in that very slightly, but my laptop's GPU could only pull about 2 or 4 MHash/s, and I got a few payouts of 0.20 apiece every few days from a pool before deciding that the difficulty increases made it completely infeasible.

Since that point I've held various amounts, selling off some when I needed some emergency cash, as I've long since made back my initial investment. I've currently got about 37 BTC remaining, and recently got 25 LTC as well just for grins.

I really like the idea behind it, and the advantages in using it. The tipping bot on Reddit is a great way to both reward quality posts in a manner similar to buying them Reddit Gold, and spread the word about Bitcoin without being *too* terribly evangelical about it at the same time. I've also enjoyed playing some online gambling games, which feels more real than just using "play money".

I'm waiting for the day that it gets easy enough for the average person to use that it can actually become widespread. I'm very impressed with the Blockchain.info app for my Android phone, and that's a huge step in the right direction, but it's still difficult to transfer money to someone using it.

+1 for www.blockchain.info as a wallet. Liked reading your story altogether.


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ButterflyLabs is not the way to go. They have been shown to commit very poor business practices. They were cornered into admitting that they sold pre-orders before they even had a working prototype on their own forum. Their pre-sales questions forum is what clued me in to what a scam they are really running. They say the pre-order is 2 months but it's likely much more than that.
If you really want specialized mining equipment from a non-professional standpoint, USB Block Erupters are the only thing you can order right *now* and have a chance of getting while it's still relevant, if you HAVE to mine Bitcoin.

If you have a halfway decent AMD GPU, mine Litecoin. On my Radeon HD 7970, at current exchange rates it still earns a lot more than Bitcoin (~US$55/mo LTC vs ~US$30 BTC). I'm in the Litebonk pool. Although I have membership in a USD to Litecoin exchange, I send my litecoins to Cryptsy to hold or to convert to bitcoin for the purpose of buying up other currencies.

As a US resident I'm a member of the Coinbase Bitcoin exchange for buying/selling and they have a solid reputation among other US residents (I was referred there by a mod of the Coinchat.org chat room), but they require being linked to a bank account like a verified PayPal account does.
There is also www.Localbitcoins.com for cash and other types of exchanges which may be more useful to non-US people who are interested in this.

Mt. Gox is terrible, especially for US-based depositors (if you're interested in buying). I experience connection issues to them frequently and they are based in Japan and can only take USD deposits by Wire Transfer (and this usually comes at a $15-25 fee per deposit depending on your bank/CU). Unless you are dealing in substantial volumes, Coinbase will offer you better rates and they consistently trade 5-10 dollars lower than Gox. (Though transactions are not instant).

I use a combination of Coinbase and Preev to get a sense of BTC's minute-to-minute value although Bitcoincharts is a good resource too as it compares multiple exchanges.


After months of casual research and weeks of active research and talking with other BTC investors and some miners, the best thing to do starting from zero, is accumulate alternate currencies and trade them on an exchange like Cryptsy or mcxNOW, or actually buy a moderate chunk of BTC/LTC or both, and sit on it.

Buying mining hardware is rarely recommended except as a novelty because the Return-on-Investment may never be realized -- If you want to have a high end graphics card that mines when you're not using your computer, you're not likely to be disappointed by increasing difficulties.
BUT spending $650 on bitcoin-exclusive mining hardware that could take 6+ months to pay for itself even if the difficulty doesn't increase is a bad idea, if you're not already doing plenty of research on how else you can use that hardware if the Bitcoin returns aren't high enough. The scarcity and value of the coins is going up due to the massive difficulty hikes (which are exponential), and many of my acquaintances feel it's better to just sit on the coin than buy anything at all. I'm starting to think that's the right idea, and I'm hanging onto around 7 bitcoins right now. I had been planning to get about 9 or 10 Block Erupters, but I don't think I'll get more than four block erupters now, at least not more than four at first. I'd rather have more coinage at hand if the exchange rate spikes again.

edit: also, I want to do this: http://learn.adafruit.com/piminer-raspberry-pi-bitcoin-miner/initial-setup-and-assembly

 

[DanTheManMS]

There is also www.Localbitcoins.com for cash and other types of exchanges which may be more useful to non-US people who are interested in this.

+1 for LocalBitcoins. After the MtGox+Dwolla method stopped being viable as a way to sell BTC for dollars, I switched to offering to locals. It does feel a tiny bit sketchy, as you're arranging online to meet in person for a cash deal, but everyone I met was friendly enough (always met at a public location like a McDonalds).

For those looking to profit from day-trading of Bitcoin like a stock, there are a couple of people who do technical analysis of the market, using algorithms normally used on the stock market. I know of two (may require subscription): http://www.btcanalyst.com/ and http://www.bitcoinbullbear.com/

I want to emphasize that Bitcoin's exchange as a stock is not of course its intended use. Just providing the info for those who may be interested.