Bitcoin pooled mining

Quick updates

02.02.2014

Datacenter connectivity issues have caused short drop in the hashrate. The problem has been resolved and all stratum servers are now reachable. This all happened when 900 Th/s was within a reach. We will get there again with your support and participation in mining ;-)

17.01.2014

We were having an extremely lucky yesterday's mining session. Unfortunately, around 1.30 AM UTC, we were experiencing stratum server issues that eventually spread across all our stratum servers. The problem has been resolved now and mining continues.

13.01.2014

The pool database backend has been successfully migrated to a new hardware. The website is now fully operational. The whole migration process has been accomplished without interrupting the actual mining.

13.01.2014

We are currently migrating pool database to a new machine. Mining will continue without interruption, only website will be down for 1-2 hours.

18.12.2013

Some recent payouts didn't go thru bitcoin network because of unsatisfied transaction fees. We're finding a soluton and all payouts will be processed soon

16.10.2013

In recent days we experienced some successful thefts of user's funds using compromised email accounts. We strongly encourage all users to change email passwords. There's no reason to think that pool security itself has been compromised.

08.07.2013

Getwork protocol support ended. Please be sure your miners support Stratum protocol. You can still use your old getwork miners with Stratum proxy installed on your mining rig.

21.05.2013

Bug in bitcoind caused many invalid blocks generated in recent hours. Thanks to cooperation with bitcoin developers, a bugfix has been deployed. Pool is now back in normal operation.

26.04.2013

Because the user database has been compromised in recent hack, please change password to your pool account!

25.04.2013

Pool is recovering to normal operation from previous attack. delayed payouts will be processed in the afternoon (UTC).

18.04.2013

Pool is recovering from DDoS attack.

14.04.2013

As announced in Getwork deprecation plan. the hashrate on Stratum is far above 90%, so workers which are still using the deprecated Getwork protocol are now charged by 10% fee. Please update your software and start using modern Stratum miners to reduce your fees back to 2%!

12.03.2013

Bitcoin network recently experienced global problems which caused some pool blocks to be invalid. Everything seems to be fixed now.

10.03.2013

Default mining URL for Stratum is stratum.bitcoin.cz:3333 . If you're still using api.bitcoin.cz, please fix your URL to prevent fallback to deprecated Getwork protocol.

08.03.2013

Stratum proxy version 1.5.2 has been released. This is bugfix release which add compatibility with some old miners (phoenix, Diablo).

03.03.2013

Stratum proxy version 1.5.0 has been released. All proxy users are encouraged to update .

13.02.2013

ASIC mining become a reality. Jeff Garzik (bitcoin core developer) is testing first shipped unit of Avalon ASIC miner on our pool.

30.01.2013

Native IPv6 address is now available. You can use ipv6.stratum.bitcoin.cz:3333 in your miner if your miners have IPv6 support! Please note that IPv6 works only for Stratum miners.

08.12.2012

If you're using old miners from early 2011 or you're mining on URL "mining.bitcoin.cz:8332", please update your miners and use "api.bitcoin.cz:8332" in your configuration instead. Mining on URL "mining.bitcoin.cz" is not working anymore.

27.11.2012

Only one day remains to halving block reward from 50 BTC to 25 BTC. Thanks to this change in Bitcoin world, mining income will be drastically reduced. As a countermeasure, pool is now paying block fees to miners. Everything you need to collect block fees is to use miner with Stratum support .

24.11.2012

How to start BitCoin Pool Mining on OS X

Pool is now giving transaction fees to Stratum miners! Use miner with Stratum support (latest version of GUIminer, cgminer, bfgminer, poclbm) or use your favourite miner with Stratum proxy to improve your mining income!

19.11.2012

Guiminer with Stratum support has been released. Upgrade is highly recommended.

12.10.2012

All users are encouraged to install or update Stratum proxy to current stable version 1.1.1. Instructions are here .

12.10.2012

New version of cgminer has been released. Please update cgminer to version 2.8.3 . which fixes serious bugs introduced in previous versions.

10.10.2012

In effect from 01.11.2012, pool increases the lower limit for payouts ("send threshold") to 0.05 BTC (around $0.6) as a protection against high transaction fees for tiny payouts. If you have a balance of less than 0.05 BTC and want to withdraw them, please do so before November 1.

20.09.2012

New version of poclbm miner has been released. All poclbm users are encouraged to update their miner, latest version includes major optimization.

11.09.2012

I'm seeking for beta testers of new mining protocol called Stratum mining. If you want to join testing, please download the proxy and point your miners to it. Thank you!

08.07.2012

Do you have some bitcoins from the mining and do you want to sell them for cheap? Add your offer to localbitcoins.com and find a buyer in your neighborhood!

11.06.2012

Follow pool's page for recent updates and news!

05.02.2012

poclbm/GUI miner is affected by serious bug. If your miner is crashing on 'unexpected error' message, please follow miner forums for the newest versions.

26.01.2012

Pool is now supporting BIP 16 protocol extension, as described here. It is just internal change on the Bitcoin network, miners don't need to update anything.

08.11.2011

Implemented prioritization of long polling. Fast miners should expect lower stale ratio.

10.10.2011

Merged mining for Namecoins added. Please fill NMC address on your profile to start collecting Namecoins! Accounting isn't finished yet, but will come very soon.

03.10.2011

Bitcoin.cz is official sponsor of European Bitcoin conference 2011. See you on 25.-27. November in Prague!

26.03.2011

Second server added

Total hashrate at 60Ghash/s

19.01.2011

We're over 20 Ghash/s

20.12.2010

How To Mine Bitcoins

Twitter Pushes Android App Update To Fix The “Me” Tab Bug

Mining bitcoins – a process that helps manage bitcoin transactions as well as create new “wealth” – is the new Beanie Babies. Luckily for us, however, bitcoins seem to be going up in value and should maintain their value over time, unlike your mint condition Tiny the stuffed Chihuahua.

But how do you get bitcoins? You can begin by buying them outright, but the market is currently wild. At $188 per coin, the direction of the bitcoin is anyone’s guess right now and, unlike equities, these things don’t split. In short, you should probably mine. But what is bitcoin mining?

Think of it as work done by groups of people to find large prime numbers or trying keys to decrypt a file. You can read a lot more about it here but just understand that for every block mined you get 25 coins or, at current rates, $4,722.25. Currently a single bitcoin is valued at $188, an alarming result that is probably caused by money movements related to Cyprus and a general bubble-like excitement over the platform in general. In fact, many wager that the DDOS attacks on many bitcoin-related services are direct action by hackers to inject instability in order to reduce the price.

As it stands, mining solo is very nearly deprecated. The process of finding blocks is now so popular and the difficulty of finding a block so high that it could take over three years to generate any coins. While you could simply set a machine aside and have it run the algorithms endlessly, the energy cost and equipment deprecation will eventually cost more than the actual bitcoins are worth.

Pooled mining, however, is far more lucrative. Using a service like “Slush’s pool” (more on that later) you can split the work among a ground of people. Using this equation:

(25 BTC + block fees – 2% fee) * (shares found by user’s workers) / (total shares in current round)

While this is simplified, it is basically how the system works. You work for shares in a block and when complete you get a percentage of the block based on the number of workers alongside you, less fees. Using this method, I have been able to raise about $1.50 over the weekend by running a dormant PC. The astute among you will note that I probably used twice that amount of electricity.

Being a neophile, I’m surprised it took me so long to start mining. My buddy Tom explained how to set up a pooled mining account so I thought it would be interesting to share the instructions.

1. Get a wallet. You can either store your wallet locally or store it online. Coinbase.com is an online wallet that is surprisingly simple to set up. Wallets require you to use or download a fairly large blockchain file – about 6GB – so downloading and updating a local wallet may be a non-starter. Like all wealth storage mediums, keeping your bitcoins “local” is probably a better idea than trusting a web service, but that’s a matter of private preference. There is no preferred wallet type and there are obvious trade-offs to both. Privacy advocates would probably say a local wallet is best.

You can download a local wallet here but make sure you keep a copy of your data backed up.

Once you’ve created a wallet, you get an address like this: 1BEkUGADFbrEShQb9Xr4pKPtM8jAyiNQsJ. This, without the period, is a direct way to send bitcoins to your wallet. Make a note of your address. In Coinbase, the wallet address found under linked accounts.

2. Join a pool. To mine in a pool you have to work with a group of other miners on available blocks. The most popular is Slush’s Pool found here. You can also try guilds like BTC Guild as well as a number of other options. Each of the pools is characterized mostly by the fees they charge per block – 2% for Slush’s pool, for example – and the number of users. Pools with fewer users could also have a slower discovery time but pools with many users usually result in smaller payments.

How can you be sure the pool owner doesn’t steal all your bitcoins? You can’t. However, as one pool owner, Slush, notes:

In theory, as the Bitcoin pool operator, I could keep the 25 BTC from a block found by the pool for myself. I’m not going to do this, but I completely accept that people do not trust the pool operator. It is their freedom of choice, and Bitcoin is about freedom.

For simplicity’s sake, I’m using Slush’s Pool and have created three workers. First, create a pool login. Then add workers. The workers are sub-accounts with their own passwords and are usually identified by [yourlogin].[workername]. I have three workers running, currently – one on my iMac and two on my old PC.

You must create workers to mine. The instructions are very straightforward for most services so don’t become overwhelmed. Like any online club, you can dig deeply into the subculture surround bitcoin as you gain experience. I like to think of it as a financial MMORPG.

Also be sure to enter your wallet address into the pool information. This will ensure you get your bitcoins.

3. Get a miner. There are a number of mining options for multiple platforms although OSX users may find themselves in a bit of a pickle. Miners use spare GPU cycles to power the mining operation, much like services like SETI@Home uses spare cycles for finding intelligent life. Miners, on the other hand, use these cycles to help handle peer-to-peer processes associated with bitcoins. Thus by doing “work” you are maintaining the network as well.

GUIMiner is the simplest solution for Windows users as it allows you to create miners using almost all standard graphics cards. You can download it here. 50Miner is also a popular solution. Both require you to enter your worker info and pool and they’ll start mining.

Linux users can run miners like CGMiner. An excellent guide to installing a miner on Ubuntu is available here .

OS X users can use DiabloMiner. a two-year old command-line program that will mine using OpenCL. Sadly, it uses deprecated calls to Bitcoin and is quite a bit slower. As a result, you need to run your own proxy, Stratum. that allows Diablo to connect with services like Slush’s pool. Both of these programs usually run without issue on OS X although you may need to install OpenCL for OSX .

To mine I’ve created a script that I run in Terminal that simply runs the proxy in the background and then connects Diablo. Note the last two arguments are necessary for Mountain Lion.

/stratum-mining-proxy-master/mining_proxy.py &

/DiabloMiner-OSX.sh -u WORKERNAME -p WORKERPASSWORD -o localhost -r 8332 -w 64 -na

RPCMiner is far easier to run – you simply click an icon and enter some data – and both have very rudimentary, text-based interfaces. Running Diablo on my iMac has not had much effect on application performance under OS X although it does slow down my Windows 8 machine considerably.

4. Keep your mind on your money. Bitcoins are baffling in that they are wildly simple to use and mine. Speculators, then, would probably be able to throw hundreds of machines at the problem and gather bitcoins like raindrops, right? Wrong. As more bitcoins are found, they become more difficult to find. This profitability calculator will help you understand what you’re up against but understand that this isn’t a sure thing. I’ve run my systems for a weekend and seen a mere $1.50 – enough for a coke – but other users may have improved hardware and methods to succeed. In short, if it costs more to run your hardware than you gain in bitcoins, you’re probably doing something wrong.

Good luck in your journey and enjoy your first foray into this wild and wooly world.

The Bitcoin revealed!

Everything you need to know to get started and get in on the greatest wealth generating tool of the 21 st Century .

Since its inception the value of Bitcoin has gone up 145,000,000% and in the last year, it’s gone up over 7000%. One can’t help imagining the exorbitant sums of money that the early adopters are making. The good news is that, this is in fact, just the beginning. Some of our most enlightened minds are speculating that 1 Bitcoin could easily cost over $1Million in the not so distant future. You could turn $100 into $100,000 in the time it takes to get there. I hope that captures your attention because wealth is being generated here and now, its brand new wealth and it’s available to all.

The adoption rate of Bitcoin is following a pleasantly similar path to those of Facebook and Twitter and is only now starting to touch on what is known as “hypergrowth”. Having said that, Bitcoin is currently trading at close to $1000 per coin. Now put two and two together and get excited. Let your imagination expand into forbidden territory because that’s where we’re going. Bitcoin presents us with enormous opportunity to not only generate lots of wealth but to discover an entirely new and far more eloquent concept of money.

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Bitcoin itself, the blockchain and the Bitcoin network

Wallets and addresses

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Mining

Security

Spending Bitcoins

Profiting from Bitcoin

Earning Bitcoin

Trading Bitcoin

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