This article isn’t so much about the different types of Mining devices as much as the mindsets of what I perceive to be the 3 types of miners that exist. As I see it, there really only 3 types of people Mining:
- Hobby Miners: Want to get involved, want to learn how this all works but don’t want to spend a bunch of money. These are usually using USB rigs which make great desk ornaments but do not end up making much BTC. The transactions they deal with are in the Satoshi level (0.00000001 ฿). These Mining operations are usually more of a hobby and consume very little electricity. What you see below is a great little project using a raspberry pi and 4 usb miners. You can find most of what you need for this project at https://www.adafruit.com, and the miners can be found in lots of places online, I’d start with ebay. You will notice that the production of this rig is 1.333133 Gh/s.
- Home Miners: Are willing to invest a bit more money and time. Purchasing dedicated hardware exclusively to Mine and dedicating a chunk of their electric bill to this end. I’ve seen home Miners go through some extreme lengths to power their operations effectively. Below is my Mining rig from last year, 4 Antminer S7s and an S2 with a combined yield of 19.92 Th/s.
- Corporate Miners: Organizations with enough money to pay for facilities and employees to run a vast Mining network. These have become more popular in places like China where the electricity is cheap and so is labor so you wind up with monsters like this Mining farm which produces 7Ph/s and eats up 25,000Kw of power.
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