The Crypto Blog on Medium is Looking for Authors

2 Feb
2021

We have recently started something new – a Crypto Blog publication on Medium as a kind of experiment. It is targeted at a wider audience that may be interested in crypto, but not so advanced or into it for as long as others following the Cryptomining Blog. It is covering pretty much the same topics, but often in more detailed and/or user friendly way suitable mostly for the audience of Medium which is not mostly advanced crypt users.

The Crypto Blog Medium publication is looking for authors that write on the topic of crypto currencies and crypto mining on Medium already (or are considering to do so) that are willing to reach wider audience. So, if you are one, then by all means please contact us with a link to your account and preferably something you have already written on Medium or other sources as a reference.

– To visit the Crypto Blog cryptocurrency publication on Mendium…

FutureBit Apollo BTC – A Bitcoin ASIC Miner and Full Node

1 Feb
2021

FutureBit Apollo BTC is an upcoming SHA256 ASIC miner designed for home users that is capable of not only mining, but also running a Full Bitcoin node. The device comes in the form of a compact and silent desktop class computer machine and is intended for home use and not for use in large crypto mining farms. It is based on the same idea of the FutureBit Apollo LTC Pod Scrypt ASIC Miner and Full Litecoin Node, but further improving things and not just only focusing on Bitcoin here.

FutureBit announced it is going to be taking Pre-Orders for the Apollo BTC starting this Friday 2/5/21 at 6PM EST (GMT-5) on their official website with shipping expected to begin at the end of April. The Batch 1 price starts at $349.99 USD, but the full package with the 500GB M.2 SSD and 200W dedicated PSU will cost you $599.99 USD and this is what you should probably get as it is the complete package that is ready to run.

The FutureBit Apollo BTC device consists of six CPU cores, 44 ASIC cores, 500GB NVMe-based SSD drive, quiet cooler, and with less than 200 Watts of power usage. At the heart of the new Apollo BTC device is a revamped SBC (Single Board Computer), that is as powerful as any consumer grade desktop system according to the developers and can run almost any Bitcoin Application natively on the device 24/7. All you have to do is to take it out of the box, plug it in, power it on, and you are already running a full Bitcoin node without needing to do anything more.

You can install a wallet of your choice, use any hardware wallet, run BTCPayServer, run a block explorer, run a Lightning Node and so much more. All of this is possible with the help of a six core ARM based CPU with 4GB of RAM, and a 500GB NVMe SSD drive that can easily store a FULL non pruned Bitcoin Node. The Apollo BTC device should be able to synchronize a Full Node in less than 48 hours, which is a record for a device of its class and almost an order of magnitude faster than any Raspberry Pi 4 based Bitcoin Full Node.

The FutureBit Apollo BTC mining hashrate and power usage is varying based on the settings you run it at, it should be capable of delivering between 2 and 3.8 TH/s of SHA256 performance per miner with 125 Watts of power usage in ECO mode, and 200 Watts in TURBO mode respectively. The best thing of all is that the device should be pretty silent, regardless of the modes it is running in, so that it can be friendly for home use as this is where its intended use is.

FutureBit Apollo BTC Features:
– Compact All-In-One Desktop Bitcoin System (4x6x4in) that mines Bitcoin and any SHA256 based crypto (Bitcoin Cash etc).
– Powerful 6 ARM Core CPU with 4GB of LPDDR4 RAM and 500GB NVMe SSD (NOT included in the Standard or Standard + package).
– Comes Pre-Installed with a Bitcoin node, and you can install almost any Bitcoin Application
– Very wide range of operation modes with preset ECO (quiet) mode, BALANCED, and TURBO mode.
– 2-3.8 TH/s of SHA256 performance per miner (+/- 5%)
– 125 Watts in ECO mode, and 200 Watts in TURBO * +/- 10%
– Can be used as a full Desktop computer with a monitor keyboard and mouse (not included), or through our Web UI
– Connect almost any peripheral with our USB 3.0 ports, USB C port, HDMI, AC Wifi, and Bluetooth
– Clocks and Power is fully customizable by user with easy-to-use interface
– Hashboard now monitors both voltage and power draw for accurate measurements*
– Custom designed cold forged hexagonal pin heatsink with leading thermal performance for the quietest ASIC miner in operation!
– 1k-5k RPM Quiet Dual Ball Bearing Fan with automatic thermal management with onboard temperature sensor
– Controlled via local connection on a web browser similar to Antminers. You can simply set it up via smartphone browser. No crazy driver installs, hard to use miner software or scripts needed.
– Two Six Pin PCIE power connectors for wide-range of power draw
– Custom Designed all Aluminum case
– Ships with a custom built 200W 94% efficient PSU and is ready to run out of the box! (Does NOT come with Standard package).

– For More Information About the FutureBit Apollo BTC ASIC Miner and Full Bitcoin Node…

Mine VertCoin (VTC) After the Switch to the Verthash Algorithm

31 Jan
2021

If you been intr crypto for longer time probably have heard about VertCoin (VTC), after all it has been available for more than 7 years already and during that time forked multiple times changing Proof of Work (PoW) mining algorithms. Well, VTC did it once more this time switching from using Lyra2REv3 to Verthash in order to bring back mining VertCoin back in the hands of GPU miners. As is it normal with forks, requiring wallet updates and new mining software things may get a bit messy initially until everyone updates to the required software and the fork just happened. This means that not all mining pools and exchanges supporting VTC have already upgraded and are ready for the fork, so make sure if you mine VTC using Verthash to do it on a compatible mining pool and keep the mined coins locally and not sending them directly to an exchange for a while more at least!

In order to be able to mine VTC with the new Verthash algorithm you need to start by downloading the latest VTC wallet (currently version 0.17.1) and running it as it will generate a Verthash Datafile on its first run. This verthash.dat file is over 1GB in size so it can take a while, but it is a requirement for the miner to start working, so you will need to wait (the dat file is required on every mining rig!).

– To Download the latest Vertcoin Wallet v0.17.1 (Verthash)…

The next thing you need is to download and configure the latest VerthashMiner, there is a Windows and Linux version available and the miner works on both Nvidia CUDA and AMD OpenCL GPUs. Have in mind that the VerthashMiner miner requires a GPU with a minimum of 2GB VRAM! In order to start mining you will need two things, a mining pool where you will point your mining hashratre (you can go for the – Suprnova Vertcoin Pool like we do in this example) and the second thing the miner needs is the verthash.dat file that the wallet will generate on its first run.

– To Download the latest VerthashMiner v0.6.1 Miner…

Suprnova VTC VertHash Stratum server:
– Standart Difficulty: stratum+tcp://vtc.suprnova.cc:1777
– High Difficulty: stratum+tcp://vtc.suprnova.cc:1778
– High Difficulty: stratum+tcp://vtc.suprnova.cc:1779

Example VerthashMiner command line:
VerthashMiner -o stratum+tcp://vtc.suprnova.cc:1777 -u USERNAME.WORKER-ID -p x --verthash-data verthash.dat --all-cu-devices --all-cl-devices

Make sure to replace USERNAME with the username and WORKER-ID with a worker id you have created on the pool. Then either copy the verthash.dat file from the VertCoin wallet folder to the miner folder or set the full path to the file in the miner command line.

How much VTC can you mine using the new Verthash algorithm, well that depends on what kind of video cards you have available and how many. For instance, a single power-optimized Nvidia GeForce RTX 1080 Ti video card does about 700 KH/s in terms of hashrate and that can probably get you about 1 VTC per two hours maybe (1 VTC is about $0.22 USD at the moment), though with difficulty increasing that will surely change and go down.

If you are looking for an easier alternative to get started mining Vertcoin (VTC) with the new Verthash crypto algorithm, then you might want to also check out the official Vertcoin One Click Miner that simplifies the process described above for people that are new to crypto and mining in general.

– To Download the VTC One Click Miner vNext 2.0-rc4…

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