The pumpers are desperately trying to keep the price up — the GDAX price chart is still a comedy marathon for the avid buttcoiner, with frantic (and expensive!) pumps followed by a decline within the hour, rinse and repeat — but the party’s over for now.

And altcoins are priced in Bitcoin. And altcoin mining is a knife-edge business even for the few who make a profit. And the miners are selling up.

Gamers, after wanting to kill all Bitcoiners for the past few months — this is your moment! But buy wisely. That is to say, not from a miner.

A classic Bitcoin mining accident, from back in the day. This one features in chapter 5 of the book.

Remember — miners treat their GPUs badly. There’s lots of people in mining forums today talking about how to break up their rig for saleable parts. They all swear blind they’ve treated these cards like their precious babies and totally haven’t been running a Bitcoin mining accident — and I don’t believe a word of it, and neither should you.

New in box, honest! By the way, here’s the hash rate.

Ex-mining GPUs off Craigslist are just what you were after! We only ran them at 100% load 24/7 in terrible conditions for less than six months!

These were returned tonight. This is what happens when Bitcoin crashes. Maybe GPUs will actually be back to normal soon. @ButtCoin pic.twitter.com/8OEJ2ZRZyN — Kermomancer (@Cloud3514) February 6, 2018

When miners have kept the boxes, they may attempt to return the cards to the shop as “unused.” As such, even restocked returns can’t be trusted not to have been abused. Maybe they really didn’t thrash them! Are you feeling lucky?

Bitcoin miners returned used cards as new a lot in 2011 and 2012 — Fry’s had an incredibly generous return policy at the time. All in their original bags and boxes, practically new!

My recommendation:

Don’t buy a second-hand video card made since 2017. Possibly 2016.

Buy new from a shop, in person if you possibly can.

Try not to get a restock or refurbish. Ideally, you want the manufacturer’s original seal intact.

Be very clear and thorough when asking your warranty rights.

Be especially clear on your warranty rights if you can only afford a restock or refurbish.

And, gamers — feel free to ask any crypto enthusiasts you encounter how their “bot-coins” are doing.