Ahoy, Me Hearties,

Avast Ye. We have a booty for you on how to run a rig without getting marooned.

Pirate Chain is lucky to have some very knowledgeable miners among it’s ranks. This week we are asking community seadog but also Developer, Trader, Mining Farm & Pool Operator ComputerGenie about his experiences and opinion on mining in general and Pirate Chain ARRR more specifically.

1) How long have you been involved with blockchain projects and at what level?

The “truth” is “just under 3 years”. The long answer involves a long and sorted tale involving the misnomer of a channel called “tradebots”. The level of involvement has grown and shrank over that time depending on projects, coding language, and my personal life. At times I am “all in” testing and working on code and at times I sit back and watch events unfold.

2) How long have you been mining for?

Since June/July 2016.

3) How many miners do you work with?

Too many! That may sound like a lame answer, but the truth is that between CPUs, GPUs, and ASICs, I don’t keep a count (and never will) and even if I did there’s no way I would release that number or location to the public. We all keep whatever minor advantages we can and having some opsec is better than having none.

4) What are the 3 best ASIC miners in your opinion for equihash mining of ARRR and which one is your favorite?

At this time, there are only 2 “best” and that’s the A9++ and the Z11. I never really have a “favorite”, it all boils down to whatever is the most efficient thing on the market at time of purchase (but, I’ve also been known to buy less efficient models in bulk if the price is right and will make up the energy cost difference).

5) Most miners when they start, they tend to use a pool. Do you recommend the use of a pool?

Pools are “great” when you are first starting out and in some cases even after you grow. In my “ideal world view” pools don’t exist at all. But we don’t live in such a Utopia, so to pool or not to pool really comes down to a personal choice on whether the fees are worth not learning more about what you are doing.

6) You talk a lot about solo mining ARRR, why? Why is it better to solo mine?

The most simple and direct answer is greater profits. Absent some altruistic person creating a zero-fee pool, you will always make more (over time) not paying pool fees than you will paying them. Because, math…

7) What is the most frequent mistake that new miners do?

The worst is overpaying for equipment that isn’t new. It almost hurts my soul to see some poor bastard buy a single 2 year old used mini for $300+ and think he’ll make his money back before it dies, much less actually profit.

The next worst has to be “marrying a coin”. We “all” do it and it’s generally the least profitable option there is. Mining CoinX exclusively and never looking to see if it would be better to mine CoinY, sell it, and buy CoinX is a horrible notion and a “trap” that so many miners fall into.

8) What do you need to succeed as a miner so that it becomes part of making a living?

Make every day and decision count. Today is today and yesterday is yesterday (and gone). Let math guide the choices and when a new miner is developed buy as many of them as you can and as soon as you can. If a piece of equipment comes out today and you wait 2 years to buy it, you have given 2 years of more efficient profits to someone else.

9) How do you think that the halving on the 27th of February is going to influence mining for ARRR?

I think it “might” have some market push, but if I’m to be totally honest I have to say that I don’t think that ARRR has yet reached a utility or adoption level high enough that the supply change will radically alter the price enough to keep the lion’s share of miners and we’ll see another large reduction in hashrate (especially with the escalating cost of larger rentals that still exist on the network).

Until next time…