The cryptographic principles underlying such hashing make random selection of nonce almost impossible. This means that the only way to find the correct nonce is to cycle through the entire range of possible solutions until the correct one is found. In such a case, the solution can serve as a “proof of work”—that the computer that discovered the correct nonce must have actually done the work, that is, used the computing power to run the hashing algorithm.
The miner who finds the correct nonce value decrypts the block and receives five ethers, after which the process begins again. The cycle repeats every 12 seconds.
Before you decide to assemble a farm of video cards, let us immediately note that now it is more profitable to invest in cloud mining services, where you rent the power of the same video cards and ASICs, but they are located in a remote data center and are serviced by specialists of this service, thereby freeing you from solving a bunch of problems that accompany the process of mining Ethereum on your own equipment, read more about cloud mining here.
For 2022, the best alternative to buying your own equipment is cloud mining, in which you do not buy equipment, but a contract to rent a certain power (hashret) for mining cryptocurrency. This option is much more profitable and easier to implement because... requires only purchasing a contract in your personal account and withdrawing the mined cryptocurrency to your personal wallet, exchange or exchanger.
What do you need to start mining Ethereum?
The optimal option for Ethereum mining for 2022 is cloud mining, due to the flexibility of contracts and more favorable working conditions than mining on your own equipment. The rating of reliable cloud mining services can be found here.
If you still decide to mine ETH on your own equipment, then you will need:
- A video card with good performance, at least one, but optimally 4-6 GPUs per farm computer.
- Naturally, a computer (system unit) or a farm with an installed operating system (Windows x64). It's the 64-bit version.
- Decide on the currency we will mine. There are several cryptocurrencies based on the Ethereum algorithm (dagger hashimoto), the largest of which are: Ethereum Classic (ETC), Musicoin (MUSIC) and others.
- Since our mining is online, we need the Internet. Fast speed is not needed, but good ping is desirable, more on that below.
- Select a pool (POOL) where we will mine ethereum. Next, select the miner program and configure it.
- Choose an exchange or Ethereum wallet where our mined Ethereum coins will be collected and accumulated, as well as services where you can exchange our earned coins for rubles and display them on a card (review of cryptocurrency exchangers).
Fast Internet is not necessary, but it must have a good ping. If you connect via cable, then of course this is the best option, but Wi-Fi will also work.
How much can you earn
No one can tell you a specific figure that you can earn by mining Ethereum at home. It all depends on a series of parameters, ranging from the technical capacity of your PC, as well as the region where you live and electricity prices. But, if you choose the option of working on a cloud pool, then the admins initially clarify the terms of cooperation and investment: that is, you know in advance what share, if the block is solved, will go to your specialized wallet. You need to understand that the process of mining ether itself is closely related to exchange rate indicators on exchanges and exchangers, because some do not accumulate savings, but everything they have mined is immediately exchanged for another crypto or fiat currency quickly through online exchangers or trading on the exchange.
Low mining speed and fairly expensive equipment only add disadvantages to the decision to mine ETH on your own. This is why many people choose either cloud pools or join together in collective farms. But I think this is not the peak of the development of Ether mining; in my opinion, it will reach the market with the release of a universal development from Bitmain - a super video card. And I traditionally want to wish you that your mining costs will be repaid by further investing or trading this cryptocurrency.
Author Ganesa K.
A professional investor with 5 years of experience working with various financial instruments, runs his own blog and advises investors. Own effective methods and information support for investments.
Mining Ethereum using a cloud mining service
Cloud mining is the best option for Ethereum mining in 2022, thanks to the flexibility of contracts and more favorable working conditions than mining on your own equipment.
Cloud mining is the extraction of cryptocurrencies using special cloud services that accumulate power in their data centers and farms.
This is a new model for earning cryptocurrency that creates groups (mining pools) with one goal: to generate more income compared to conventional distributed mining, through the management of equipment by a contractor who resolves all issues regarding technical and software components.
TOP 3 reliable cloud mining services according to Mining-Cryptocurrency.ru:
| Service | Grade | Detailed review |
| IQ Mining (editor's choice!) | 9.8 | Read review |
| HashFlare | 7.1 | Read review |
| Genesis Mining | 6.8 | Read review |
The criteria by which the rating is given in our rating:
- Profitability and profitability – we calculate payback periods, clarify the reality of mining.
- Prices and commissions – we take into account the validity of tariff plans and compare them with competitors.
- Deposit/withdrawal, discounts, reliability - we analyze reviews, test the correctness of accruals and withdrawals.
- Convenience of the platform and website – we evaluate functionality, errors and failures when working with the service.
- Features of the company are unique services and useful services, duration of work on the market.
- The final score is the average number of points for all indicators, determines the place in the ranking.
What is ether and how to mine it
People who have ever been interested in cryptocurrencies probably know that, in addition to Bitcoins, there are many more virtual currency units. Ethereum is in second place in popularity. More than one person has already made good money mining this unit. Therefore, if you start working in this area, it is better to mine Ethereum.
This virtual unit (Ethereum) was founded by Vitalik Buterin. His idea was implemented as a large decentralized virtual machine based on the blockchain.
If you delve deeper into Ethereum mining, you can understand that Ethereum acts as a kind of supercomputer. Its applications are distributed among the people who are in the business.
I wonder how to learn how to mine Ethereum? Below are step-by-step instructions on how to mine Ethereum in 2022.
Mining Ethereum on video cards
By and large, the process of mining Ether is no different from mining other digital currencies. Therefore, the requirements for video cards are largely similar.
Let's start with memory capacity. Here, choose a larger one, at least 3 GB, and soon the minimum will be 4 GB, since the size of the DAG file is constantly increasing. This amount of memory will provide you with efficient operation and a fairly quick payback.
A table comparing video cards by hashrate for mining Ethereum and other cryptocurrencies is posted on our website.
As for memory speed, the best option is the DDR 5 standard. Such video cards have a good balance of performance and power consumption.
You will need a 256-bit bus, since working on video cards with 128-bit buses is less productive and the mining speed is too low.
The cooling system is also very important for efficient production. Many people advise choosing developments from Radeon. Among other things, they demonstrate resistance to wear. But the latest 10th generation of Nvidia shows itself quite well, especially since there are many more of them in stores.
And one more parameter, although not very significant, is the possibility of overclocking. Of course, there is a chance to add from 20 to 40 percent of the initial GPU power, but you will have to make additional settings; detailed instructions for overclocking are here.
Ethereum mining pools
We have already done a detailed review of Ethereum mining pools, in which you will find a complete analysis of the pools with statistical data and a comparative table with ratings. Here we briefly list the seven most relevant pools for 2022:
- ETHpool. This is the very first pool. It was he who refused to accept new users due to high workload and continued to cooperate only with his old clients. Its power is about 20% of the total power of the system, and the number of participants is close to 4 hundred.
- Minergate. One of the most popular pools, it is better to give preference to nvidia video cards. This is a multi-currency resource, that is, you can mine several different coins, including Ethereum. The site has a simple and intuitive interface. It is enough to create 1 account and you can use several PCs in mining at once. You can mine with either a processor or video card. You can use “smart” mining, such a mode is available.
- NiceHash. And this is a pool with the ability to mine several digital currencies. Installation and configuration are very simple, even a novice user can handle it. The service automatically selects the most profitable mining algorithm, automatically transfers the mined crypt to BTC and also automatically withdraws payments to your wallet when 100,000 satoshi have accumulated.
- ETH Nanopool. A new ambitious project. Despite its youth, its share in the network is already almost 2 times larger than that of ETHpool. The number of participants has already exceeded 4 hundred. The pool fee is 2%, the withdrawal fee is 0.005 ETH. But there is one unpleasant nuance - the administration of the service warns users that “saving drowning people is the work of the drowning people themselves,” that is, if problems of a technical or other nature arise (for example, loss of balance), no compensation should be expected.
- Ethereumpool. Another young service that works and continues to be developed at the same time. While its share of the total network power is 1.8%, the speed is 6 gigahashes per second.
- WeiPool. A completely new resource, quite convenient, with a simple interface. There are still few miners and the share in the total network capacity is only 0.2%. The commission is 1.5%, but the first week of work is at zero rate. Payments are daily.
- ETH Supernova. This service is known to many users who are interested in altcoin mining. Now you can mine Ether here, which will undoubtedly be good news for participants. It is impossible to work here without registration, but the interface is familiar and understandable, and security is at a high level. The pool is definitely trustworthy, it is reliable, allows you to make good money and provides quality service to its clients.
Solo mining Ethereum
As the name suggests, solo mining involves the extraction of Ether only using your capacities; if they are not large, we highly do not recommend this option to you.
But if capacity allows, then we will share a small guide dedicated to solo (single) mining of ETH coins on a local system or within a network of several mining rays. Please note that at this point it is almost pointless to try to mine alone using only CPUs or if you do not have sufficient GPU power then you are unlikely to be able to complete a block.
Also, from our own experience, we can say that geth periodically closes and stops sending new work from the current block (during single mining), so you will have to carefully monitor the operation of your systems. If you want to mine in a pool, then you will probably be interested in reading our article on this issue. Before you begin, you will need to download the latest geth and ethminer windows packages using the link at the end of the material.
Generating a wallet address
- Open the geth folder and run geth-console.bat to open Ethereum in console mode.
- The software will need to download the blockchain data, so this will take some time.
- Enter the following data into the console: personal.newAccount("password") - instead of the word password in this paragraph, you need to enter your own password and remember it well.
- Next, enter into the console: eth.accounts - this command will show you the address of your Ethereum wallet.
- To check your balance, you can use the command web3.fromWei(eth.getBalance(eth.coinbase), “ether”).
Launch geth for solo mining
- To listen only for local connections: geth --rpc --rpcaddr "localhost" --rpcport 8545.
- To provide access on the local network: geth -rpc -rpcaddr "192.168.0.123" -rpcport 8545 - in order to be accessible on the local network, do not forget to replace the IP address of rpcaddr with the address of the computer on which the system is running (192.168.0.123 - this is just an example).
- To be accessible on the Internet: geth -rpc -rpcaddr "xxxx" -rpcport 8545 - in order to be accessible on the Internet, do not forget to replace the IP address of rpcaddr with the address of the computer on which the system is running (xxxx is just an example and not will work). Also don't forget to set the port to 8545 (or any other you want).
Launching ethminer for solo mining
- To mine with ethminer on the same local system where geth is running, use: ethminer –G.
- To mine on a system on the local network where geth is installed and running, use: ethminer -G -F https://192.168.0.123:8545 - make sure the local system's IP address is set correctly (192.168.0.123 is just an example) . Also be sure to disable any firewalls that may be blocking these connections.
- To use a mining rack for Internet mining on a PC whose local network uses geth, use: ethminer -G -F https://xxxx:8545 - to provide access via the Internet, instead of xxxx in the example, specify your external IP address , and set port 8545 or the one that will correctly interact with your external IP and the system on which geth is running.
FAQ
How is Ethereum mined now?
With the help of mining - solving algorithmic problems on specialized equipment.
How will Ethereum be mined after updating to version 2.0?
The network will be supported by staking. Validators are the people who stake ETH and are responsible for confirming transactions. From an economic point of view, it is similar to investing: investing money and gradually receiving a return on investment.
What will happen to the mining equipment?
Will cease to be in demand.
How are preparations for the transition going?
The London hard fork reduced mining rewards so that some users would leave it now, but there were those who would benefit from mining until the last second, thanks to reduced competition.
When is the full transition planned?
Tentatively in 2022, but the dates may be postponed, because the process is not easy.
How will the update affect ordinary users?
Ideally, they should not notice any changes at all.
How much money does it take to become a validator?
32 ETH. But you can invest less if you join a pool of validators.
Ethereum mining programs
There are several programs for mining ETH coins, we will look at the two most popular of them. There is no fundamental difference in performance between them.
Claymore's Dual program for joint mining of Ethereum and Decred
Claymore's Dual Ethereum+Decred GPU Miner is a miner program for those who mine either Ethereum (ETH), or Decred (DCR), or both cryptocurrencies at the same time. Positions itself as the best miner of these cryptocurrencies in terms of mining speed.
The miner is designed in such a way that in dual mining mode, you will get full Ethereum mining performance, with slower Decred mining performance, compared to single Ethereum or Decred mining mode.
Claymore claims that Ethereum mining speed efficiency should be 3-5% higher, due to completely different miner code, higher GPU load, and uses optimized OpenCL code. The miner is designed for use in a pool and does not currently support solo mining. Claymore's Dual Ethereum+Decred AMD GPU Miner has versions for both Windows (currently only released for 64-bit Windows) and Linux.
The miner is free, however, when mining Ethereum in the Ethereum-only mining mode, you will pay 1% of the mined Ethereum commission and 2% of the mined Ethereum in the Ethereum +Decred mining mode. When mining Decred, no commission is charged.
Versions have been released for both AMD and Nvidia video cards with 3 GB of video memory or more.
We download Claymore's Dual Ethereum Miner only through the official link from the developer https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1433925 (don’t be surprised, the official link is on the Bitcointalk forum)
Setting up Claymore's Dual
In order for the program to run, you must have a 64-bit Operating system, I use Windows 10, but there are those who like to mine on Linux.
You also need to install the correct driver. If you have a farm on video cards from AMD, then the version should be 16.9, a later version does not see the firmware video cards. For Nvidia, the latest driver will do.
Bat file code:
In order to configure the miner for the pool, you need to register a Bat-file with the following settings:
setx GPU_FORCE_64BIT_PTR 0
setx GPU_MAX_HEAP_SIZE 100
setx GPU_USE_SYNC_OBJECTS 1
setx GPU_MAX_ALLOC_PERCENT 100
setx GPU_SINGLE_ALLOC_PERCENT 100
EthDcrMiner64.exe -epool eth-ru.dwarfpool.com:8008 -ewal 0x0364fea61f52e3323dad984ed20a007bc0e735b4/ferma1 -epsw x -etht -allpools 1 -ftime 10
Where -epool eth-ru2.dwarfpool.com:8008 is the address and port of the pool via the Russian server, where the ping is lower if you are from Russia, the full list of pool servers is on the website Dwarfpool.com/eth.
And then -ewal 0x0364fea61f52e3323dad984ed20a007bc0e735b4/ferma1 is the wallet number and the name of the forker for the farm, so you can see the statistics.
I mine in Dual mode, I mine 2 cryptocurrencies at once, which is profitable at the moment and my batch file looks like this:
setx GPU_FORCE_64BIT_PTR 0
setx GPU_MAX_HEAP_SIZE 100
setx GPU_USE_SYNC_OBJECTS 1
setx GPU_MAX_ALLOC_PERCENT 100
setx GPU_SINGLE_ALLOC_PERCENT 100
EthDcrMiner64.exe -epool eth-ru.dwarfpool.com:8008 -ewal 0x0364fea61f52e3323dad984ed20a007bc0e735b4/ferma1 -epsw x -etht 1000 -dpool dcr.suprnova.cc:3252 -dwal LOGIN.WORKER -dpsw x -all pools 1 -ftime 10
With the second coin we mine Decred on the supernova pool. You can get a wallet on Poloniex, but when registering on supernova, this wallet is linked to your account, and you need to specify a login in the body file. But more on that in another article. In dual mining, the power consumption of video cards is higher, and their temperature also jumps by 10-15 degrees.
Now add a batch file shortcut to startup so that mining starts immediately after loading the operating system, and also configure the AC Back parameter in the motherboard BIOS so that the computer turns on itself after power is supplied.
The startup folder in Windows 10 can be opened with the shell:Startup command from the command line or from the Run utility, which can be called by pressing the keyboard shortcut Win+R.
To view statistics, copy your wallet number into the text field in the Ethereum section on the Dwarfpool website. After a while, you will see solutions appear in front of your worker.
Ethminer miner program and its configuration
The ethminer program is used to mine Ethereum. There are several mining software available, we have tested many miners and this miner has the best performance, we recommend it for inexperienced users. Advanced users can try connecting with other miners.
To launch ethminer, you need to create a bat file in which we will actually play with the parameters and launch the miner itself.
At the beginning of the file we write:
Setx GPU_FORCE_64BIT_PTR 0 Setx GPU_MAX_HEAP_SIZE 100 Setx GPU_USE_SYNC_OBJECTS 1 SETx GPU_SINGLE_ALLOC_PERCENT 100 this is to free up memory on video cards (critical for 2 GB)
Next is launching ethminer with the following parameters: ethminer.exe -G -F —farm-recheck 200
- -G launch the miner on the GPU i.e. on a video card using OpenCL (available on both Radeon and NVidia), if instead of -G you write -C, mining will start on the processor but the speed is very low, -U will start mining using CUDA (computing in Nvidia cards). I have an AMD Radeo, so I couldn’t explore this parameter, write your Nvidia card in the comments, we’ll try to figure out this parameter together.
- -F here we tell the miner where to connect, IP:PORT/LOGIN_FOR_MINING. Attention, the login for mining is not your number in the system, the login for mining must be obtained in the Earn -> Mining section. Here you need to indicate only your mining login instead of 101162
- —farm-recheck 200 - this is the same for everyone
These were the basic settings of ethminer, first of all, try to run the miner this way, at first it will think for a long time, load the DAG file into memory, then it will work.
Next, you can start fine-tuning ethminer, only 2 parameters are used: cl-local-work and cl-global-work, first of all try setting —cl-local-work 128 —cl-global-work 8192 , just add the parameters to the end of the launch line miner.
ethminer.exe -G -F --farm-recheck 200 --cl-local-work 128 --cl-global-work 8192
To determine the optimal cl-local-work for a video card, you need to call the following command ethminer -G --list-devices for OpenGL and ethminer -U --list-devices for CUDA in the CL_DEVICE_MAX_WORK_GROUP_SIZE report and your optimal cl-local-work will be, but keep in mind , if you work on a computer on which mining is running, then for better response and lack of brakes, install -cl-local-work 128 -cl-global-work 8192. You can create two bat files for mining during work and idle time. To get the report you need to create a bat file in the folder with the miner, the report will also show information about the amount of memory on the video card
ethminer.exe -G --list-devices pause
—cl-global-work try to gradually raise 8192, 16384, 20384 (20384 tested on R9 380-390,+ several Mhs)
If you have several video cards on your computer, but you want to use only one for Ethereum mining, add the parameter \\\"—opencl-device X\\\", but instead of X specify the index of the required video card, you can view the index with the command: ethminer.exe --list-devices
You can download a batch file to run a miner for Ethereum mining here.
Setting up Windows for Ethereum mining
Before you start mining, you also need to configure virtual memory in Windows.
To go into the Windows 10 page file settings, you can simply start typing the word “performance” in the search field, and then select “Adjust system presentation and performance.”
In the window that opens, select the “Advanced” tab, and in the “Virtual Memory” section, click the “Change” button to configure virtual memory
By default, the parameters will be set to “Automatically select the size of the paging file”, we change this parameter to 16000 and wait for confirmation:
Ethereum cloud mining
There is an alternative for people who want to start mining Ethereum but avoid the hassle of purchasing and managing hardware. We are talking about cooperation with cloud services.
Cloud mining involves sharing the computing resources of remote data centers that specialize in storing and processing data. This solution has many advantages:
- There is no constantly operating equipment in the apartment, which creates additional noise and generates heat.
- Electricity bills no longer empty miners' pockets.
- There is no need to constantly monitor the operation of the unit for fear of failure or breakdown.
- There is no need to independently assemble the system and configure the program. Despite the apparent simplicity of this work, for most inexperienced users it is a serious obstacle to the difficult path of a miner.
This type of mining comes with some risks, so you should be careful when choosing a platform for further cooperation. As a rule, it is recommended to deal with proven resources that have been working on the market for several years.
The best cloud mining service at the beginning of 2022 is IQ Mining, due to the most favorable rates and excellent reputation (it has never delayed payments over the past two years). Read a full review of all major cloud mining services on our website.
Important Tips
Before mining Ethereum using the staking method, consider a number of important points:
- The size of the reward decreases as new participants add Ethereum coins. The sooner you can connect, the better.
- With the full launch of Eth 2.0, the average income is 2% per year. This means that if you invest the entire amount of $132,000, you can expect a return of $2,640.
- Blocked Ethereum coins for staking will not be able to be withdrawn until the implementation of Phase 1.5. This means that the funds “hang” for about 1-2 years.
- When staking together, there is still a risk of being blocked due to violation of the rules. To avoid such consequences, it is important to carefully read the terms and conditions of cooperation.
- In the absence of knowledge and experience, you can use prepared services/validator nodes.
- Every day new platforms are appearing that offer collaborative staking services. That’s why when choosing, you need to study all the offers, read reviews, study the conditions, and only then make a choice.
Profitability for 2022 and further prospects
As of 2022, the GPU farm is no longer able to bring in such good money as in 2017-2018, and if the ETH rate drops significantly, the profitability may even go into the negative. Electricity costs are no longer just pennies compared to how much Ether is released per month, but its almost equal price in the exchanger. And how profitable it is to mine this or that cryptocurrency with different types of video cards, see the current profitability calculators (links below).
Ethereum mining profitability calculator
What I would definitely like to mention is the need to use a mining calculator for a preliminary analysis of the profitability of Ether mining. This program is available to everyone; you just need to enter a series of data, and you will have an approximate picture of probable income (or losses).
The two most accurate and informative calculators today:
- https://whattomine.com
- https://nicehash.com
Is it worth mining ETH?
You can easily buy Ethereum on cryptocurrency exchanges, but mining is different.
Here are three reasons to try:
- This is an easy way to get ETH. Mining is a hobby and a low-risk, inexpensive (at least to start with) way to obtain cryptocurrency and participate in the crypto movement
- You are part of the community - through mining you contribute to the stability of the network and become an active part of the community
- You can subsidize the cost of high-end graphics cards. While the margins aren't that great these days, it will help pay for that expensive gaming graphics card.
