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Nvidia cripples cryptocurrency mining on RTX 3080 and 3070 cards

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Re: Nvidia cripples cryptocurrency mining on RTX 3080 and 3070 cards

#491

Post by webinvest »

koluna wrote: post #404
webinvest wrote: post #361

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can’t blame you for using a throwaway account for a comment like that. Many cryptocurrencies provide value while video games suck time and value.

I’m sorry, spit my coffee over the keyboard. What value does cryptocurrency provide other than sucking the world’s electric energy for meaningless calculations?

I am glad you asked. The value that cryptocurrencies provide boils down to 3 main things:

1) A store of value.

2) A transfer of value.

3) A creation of value.

Bitcoin provides a store of value by still letting you buy a pizza with your Bitcoin both now and in the future. It’s price has always been highly volatile but after every 4 year cycle, it has been worth more in every major world currency.

Stellar Lumens, Algorand, Dogecoin, and to a lesser extent Bitcoin, & Ethereum provide a transfer of value by letting you send money across the globe.

Ethereum is the poster child for a creation of value by allowing people to permanently deploy smart contracts to the Ethereum mining network. These contracts include ERC20 stablecoins like MakerDao’s Dai, USDC, lending platforms like AAVE and Compound, DeFi exchanges like Uniswap, Yield aggregators like Yearn.finance and Curve.fi, and DeFi coin converters like 1inch. Back in 2017, the only compelling Ethereum platform (or DAPP) was CryptoKitties which were the precursor to today’s NFTs. I think NFTs are in a bubble but nowadays there is a much more compelling and diverse lineup.

Re: Nvidia cripples cryptocurrency mining on RTX 3080 and 3070 cards

#492

Post by 22c »

akelly wrote: post #441

This won't really do anything for availability or reducing scalper pricing. Miners are a sizeable proportion of sales but far from the majority. Gamers will be able to buy more of these GPUs but less of the non-LHR or AMD GPU's. GPU prices won't actually change. The real reason Nvidia is doing this is that when mining profitability inevitably drops, either because of a crypto price crash or Ethereum moving to Proof o…

I don't think this will help pricing or availability much either. LTT did a video on this topic somewhat recently and it turns out a lot of the reasons that you can't get a card right now is related to chip shortages and people (yes, regular gaming enthusiasts) buying any card they can find. Even cards that already have terrible mining efficiency are scarce.

Re: Nvidia cripples cryptocurrency mining on RTX 3080 and 3070 cards

#493

Post by mehlmao »

smiley1437 wrote: post #69
skytreader wrote: post #18

Total hardware noob here. How do they do it? Is there a particular instruction that ETH needs to be "efficient" but games can live with throttled? Or perhaps a sequence of instructions that's signature to ETH?

From what I've read, the card detects if it has been continuously mining for 30 minutes then throttles itself.

Has anyone found out if Hashcat is impacted on the cards that have this already (3060)?

Re: Nvidia cripples cryptocurrency mining on RTX 3080 and 3070 cards

#494

Post by plantain »

dijit wrote: post #389
eropple wrote: post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This can be just as easier, and probably more truthfully, read as "miners can no longer make the used market a minefield by selling overtaxed consumer cards without disclosing their provenance." Because, yeah, having ex-miner cards burn out is a pretty common thing on the used market. Great! Cryptocurrencies are not inherently good or valuable and cryptocurrency people aren't special and their world-burning habits an…

> Because, yeah, having ex-miner cards burn out is a pretty common thing on the used market. This is mostly a myth, miners cards are usually undervolted, and only a subset of the card is used. If your CPU only used it's floating point unit then it wouldn't be as intense as if you were using the whole thing. The only potential issue is thermal damage, but that's hard to place and has to be close to, or in excess of 90…

The core clock is undervolted while mining - but the memory clock is absolutely cranked to the maximum it will support.

I've been idly mining on an RTX3080 for 6 months now, and the hashrate has slowly gone down about 20% since new. I suspect the thermal pads on the memory chips are slowly cooking. I replaced them once already and restored a bit of hashrate.

Re: Nvidia cripples cryptocurrency mining on RTX 3080 and 3070 cards

#495

Post by senectus1 »

matheusmoreira wrote: post #477
smoldesu wrote: post #397

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nvidia is implementing a hardware fuse system (a-la the Nintendo Switch) to prevent firmware manipulation. I can't speak to how secure these new cards will be, but the Tegra was an absolute pain in the ass to work with. It took a year before people even figured out how the firmware was loaded, much less how to interoperate between custom and official ones without blowing a fuse. To this day, approaching half a decade…

Hardware fuse? Trying to run custom software can actually brick hardware now?

e-Fuse. Samsung have been doing this for years on their phones. They tie it into their Knox system.

Re: Nvidia cripples cryptocurrency mining on RTX 3080 and 3070 cards

#496

Post by onethought »

Axien wrote: post #270
onethought wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mine on renewables and with 3000 series gpus. I didn’t want to do any of this, I ended up here because my energy retailer decided to tax me for exporting too much energy to the grid. So short of earthing the electricity, my solution was to burn it up in mining, and improve my solar roi. The 3000 series gpus are the most efficient hashes/watt. So actually by disabling this, you are driving people towards less effici…

Out of curiosity, has the mining yet payed for the rig/card?

No where near. But if you factor the tax I was paying (I.e assuming I didn’t earth it). It will reach cost neutral in a year and be returning margin after that.

They are increasing this tax as well shortly... so it will get better.

Re: Nvidia cripples cryptocurrency mining on RTX 3080 and 3070 cards

#497

Post by creato »

akelly wrote: post #441

This won't really do anything for availability or reducing scalper pricing. Miners are a sizeable proportion of sales but far from the majority. Gamers will be able to buy more of these GPUs but less of the non-LHR or AMD GPU's. GPU prices won't actually change. The real reason Nvidia is doing this is that when mining profitability inevitably drops, either because of a crypto price crash or Ethereum moving to Proof o…

One of the issues people have mentioned in this thread is that cards sold by miners are often burnt out or nearly burnt out. In that case, it seems like cutting off miners from the secondary market would be an improvement for the secondary market.

Re: Nvidia cripples cryptocurrency mining on RTX 3080 and 3070 cards

#498

Post by onethought »

istorical wrote: post #278
onethought wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mine on renewables and with 3000 series gpus. I didn’t want to do any of this, I ended up here because my energy retailer decided to tax me for exporting too much energy to the grid. So short of earthing the electricity, my solution was to burn it up in mining, and improve my solar roi. The 3000 series gpus are the most efficient hashes/watt. So actually by disabling this, you are driving people towards less effici…

You are the exception of all exceptions. What percentage of GPUs being purchased for the purposes of crypto are for reasons like yours vs being bought by already wealthy conglomerates and mining groups to further enrich the new crypto multi-millionaire/billionaire class.

Aren’t wealthy just buying giant TH asic machines?

The gpus are good exactly because they are efficient but if you didn’t care about power consumption, ASICS are more profitable (in terms of cost of setup vs return from mining).

The primary reason I went with gpus, is because I can shut them off based on solar excess in 100w increments. So if I’m 200w in excess, turn 2 cards on. 300w - 3 cards etc.

Re: Nvidia cripples cryptocurrency mining on RTX 3080 and 3070 cards

#499

Post by kyboren »

behringer wrote: post #439
kyboren wrote: post #390

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, that's arbitrage.

Is that a fancy word for scalping?

No, scalping is a loaded word for reselling.

This whole situation, and especially the anger at other market participants from people like you, is totally ridiculous. We know how markets work. NVidia is pricing their units at far below market value. What did you expect? Next you'll complain that water is wet and that the wind blows.

NVidia could solve this problem immediately by correctly pricing their units. If they want to, they can even have a conditional rebate--or make special individualized offers--to subsidize targeted buyers who they believe are "legitimate" gamers.

But instead they insist on continuing to mis-price their products. Shortages are the inevitable result.

Re: Nvidia cripples cryptocurrency mining on RTX 3080 and 3070 cards

#500

Post by __blockcipher__ »

kbenson wrote: post #449
Justsignedup wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To add on: none of it is malicious. its just the market stabalization problem a) let's keep consumer grade stuff stable in price b) let's charge miners 3x, because they willing to pay 3x, and destroy the scalping market which is VERY anti everything. Scalpers hurt literally everyone. c) let's not de-stabalize nvidia's income again when eth drops in value. They don't want to be beholden to a coin's gamble either. Basi…

> Scalpers hurt literally everyone. Not entirely true, and also not accepting that one person's "scalper" is another person's "bought this but decided I would rather have the money it seems to be worth now that I see how much this is". Secondary markets provide liquidity, allow for original sellers to trade money for time, provide reputational protection based on societal perceptions (this one is a bit weird, and may…

Yeah I always find it interesting that statements like that ("scalpers hurt literally everyone") can just be made and treated as gospel by most people. Not only is the statement not self-evident, but to your point, just a small amount of thought on the issue makes it obvious what the value is.

People love to get mad at a scapegoat rather than a root cause. So you blame the scalper rather than realizing that the concert you bought the ticket for set their prices way too low - perhaps because selling at the "true" price (somewhere between the sticker value and the scalped value) - would generate negative goodwill, or it would give the perception that an event (say Coachella as the classic example) is only "for rich people". The irony is of course that selling at an artificially low price doesn't suddenly make it not for rich people, it just adds a small random chance that you'll be able to convert your own time sitting there refreshing the website across many browsers into a cheaper-than-it-should-be ticket. But functionally the vast majority of people end up buying from scalpers or at least at a slightly above sticker price.

There's a related discussion about so-called "price gouging". IMO it's the classic scalper argument but just in a different form. Price gouging laws are not just immoral but are actively ineffective at their stated purpose; they just lead to the hypothetical price-gouge transaction never occurring. If you drive across state lines to bring HAM radios or water filters or what-have-you during hurricane katrina, and try to sell at above market rate, you'll be tossed in jail and your goods will be seized by the police, rather than making it out to the people who actually need them and are willing to pay 2x or 3x the usual price.

TL;DR: We've all got these twisted beliefs about how pricing works or the law of supply and demand, an illusion supported by the fact that our respective societies are so technologically/economically advanced that we can have massive supermarkets where you buy commoditized items that you can get at reasonably similar prices anywhere. Whereas if you go back in history to a pre-industrial time, a form of pseudo-bartering was the default and there was not this idea of a commodity, but rather every transaction, every buyer:seller relationship etc was a unique and non-commoditized interaction and thus it wouldn't seem weird to have different prices for different people or different prices at different points in time, etc.

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