Mining Pools
Unless you want to solo mine, which is unfeasible for many people, you will need a pool to mine towards. Make sure to choose the one closest to you!
To view a list of pools, check out mining pool stats
Pinging a Pool
The best pool is the one that is closest to you; this can easily be determined by pinging the pool through your terminal
Open up your terminal; look for "Command Prompt" or "Terminal" in your Start/Applications menu
When open, enter this command: ping <pool url>, replacing <pool url> with the address of your pool.
For example, if I was mining at newpool.pw, then the pool url (what you put into your miner) is minenice.newpool.pw. Thus, I would enter:
ping minenice.newpool.pw
The port number is not necessary
Analyze the number before the ms; this is how long it takes for you to send a receive a packet from the pool. The lower it is, the better.
You may need to press Ctrl + C on your keyboard to exit the command.
Definition of Fees
Rather simple; the pool operator will take a percentage of the reward of the block found for himself.
Example-
- the fee is 0.1%
- the block reward is 2.43 XTCASH
- 2.43 x 0.001% = 0.00243 XTCASH
Therefore, the pool operator will take 0.00243 XTCASH for himself.
Definition of Different Types of Methods
These will be found on the pool website; if not specified, it is most likely proportional.
Proportional (share-based)
A proportional pool carries no risk to the pool operator as miners are simply paid out when a block is found. No blocks, no payout!
With a proportional pool the risk is all on the miners if it takes longer than expected to find a block then the miners earn less. On the flip side, if the pool is lucky (they will all average out the same eventually) the miners get more.
Example-
- A block is found after 100,000 shares
- You submitted 1,000 of those shares (you have 1% of the pool's total hash power)
- There’s 2.43 XTCASH per block
Quite simply you will get 1% of the block = 0.00243 XTCASH.
Now if the pool has a bad round (a round is the time taken to find a block) and it takes 200,000 shares to find a block (twice as long) and you have submitted 2,000 shares (as you’ve been mining twice as long), you still only get 1% of the block = 0.00243 XTCASH
This can also work in the miners favor too, as if it takes half the time (50,000 shares) to find a block and you submitted only 500 shares - again 1% - 0.00243 XTCASH.
Basically, you always get a percentage of the block and you win/lose depending on the “luck” of the pool.
The drawbacks to a proportional pool are that there is often a fee, although some pool operators rely on donations only, and you will have to bear the variance of the block times and luck unlike a PPLNS pool.
Also they are susceptible to “pool hoppers” where PPLNS pools are not.
PPLNS (Pay Per Last n Shares)
PPLNS does not pay out per block found, rather it pays based on the number of shares you last submitted, and helps to dissuade pool hoppers.
How it works is,
- you start mining with a PPLNS pool.
- Rather than paying you out based on the number of shares you submitted since you started mining/the last block was found, it will pay depending on how many shares you submitted in a period of time, called the window, which is an estimate of the time in which the pool in question finds a block.
- So, after you start mining, it will take a few hours for you to earn your normal earnings - and since the effect of pool hoppers is lessened, you may make comparatively more than other methods.
Basically, you get paid based on
- the number of shares you submitted (how good what you're mining with is)
- and how long you have been mining.