Crypto currency mining using CPU — a brief playground setup
Background
This article was written on 11-Oct-2024.
I have been curious about cryptocurrency mining and want to know the technical details.
Lacking GPU nor ASIC, I am left with CPU only.
So I started to research about possibility of cryptocurrency mining using CPU and it is actually possible!
Precautions
Crypto related sites may be restricted in your environment (state, country, organizations, etc), so you may not be able to access them.
Some anti virus software will categorize crypto mining software as possible virus.
I have not been able to receive the generated RTM as not able to properly run the wallet. Will update again once I have time.
Prerequisites
Internet is required to receive crypto mining job and send result.
Any CPU will work, the more cores the better.
If you plan to run it in several systems, then you need to be at the domain admin level.
Which cryptocurrency?
Okay, so is it possible to mine cryptocurrency using CPU? Yes!
Not only yes, but there are cryptocurrencies which are designed to be mined using CPU only. The idea is to prevent fast calculation and keep its value high overtime.
At the time of this writing, below are what they called “cpu friendly” crypto:
- Monero (XMR)
- VerusCoin (VRSC)
- Raptoreum (RTM)
Out of these, let’s focus on RTM as it is faster/easier to see mining results.
Mining pool vs solo mining
From my understanding so far, we should opt to join mining pool.
Solo mining is still doable but it may require you a very long time to see result (it depends on luck as well).
Which miningpool?
Let’s go to miningpoolstat and see options for RTM.
From top left, you should take note that Raptoreum (RTM) is mined using GhostRider algorithm. So you should search for CPU mining software which can use ghostrider algorithm.
Sort it by hash rate.
In general, the higher the hashrate, the sooner the chance you will get result. But you may get a lower percentage.
Check the pool fee.
Most pools will charge you 1% fee (this is on top of your mining software fee/donation).
Some mining pool sites might be blocked in your environment or you simply not comfortable with how the setup is.
For my mining playground, I choose suprnova.cc
Mining pool setup
Register to rtm.suprnova.cc and create your workers.
Each system/PC requires separate worker account. In above example, I setup my PC_A1 as worker name and put a password.
For mining software login, you should use what is saved as “worker login”, for example: [account].PC_A1
Mining software
Although suprnova pool uses cpumining as example, but at the time of this writing, it seems the fastest CPU mining software with ghostrider algorithm is “xmrig”.
So let’s get the software from:
https://github.com/xmrig/xmrig
msvc means compiled with ms = microsoft, vc = visual compiler.
I am using Microsoft as my environment is mostly Microsoft.
Extract it to get xmrig.exe and other files.
Although it is recommended to use json, I choose to run using parameters as I will run it remotely using powershell.
We can copy existing rtm_ghostrider_example.cmd and modify the content. For example, copy as “rtm_sprnva.cmd”
As I am in Asia Pacific then my first pool would be the suprnova HK pool.
xmrig.exe -a gr -o stratum+tcp://stratum.apac-hkg1.suprnova.cc:6273 -u [account].[worker] -p [password] -k -a gr -o stratum+tcp://stratum.us-ny1.suprnova.cc:6273 -u [account].[worker] -p [password] -k -a gr -o stratum+tcp://rtm.suprnova.cc:6273 -u [account].[worker] -p [password] -k
Remotejob using powershell
Of course you can run xmrig locally, but the idle high performance CPU system might be a separate system. So we need to run our mining software remotely.
First copy the xmrig folder to the system which you intend to run mining, for example to d:\temp\xmrig-6.22.0\
You can use below script:
$computers = @(“pc_1”,”pc_2",”pc_3",”pc_4")
Invoke-Command -ComputerName $computers -ScriptBlock { & “d:\Temp\xmrig-6.22.0\rtm_sprnva.cmd” } -AsJob
To see how it is running, you can run “receive-job 1"
And you can see your working in rtm.suprnova.cc — dashboard as well:
Wallet
As you are accumulating coins, next you should create your wallet.
Raptoreum provides its own wallet: raptoreumcore
https://docs.raptoreum.com/docs-category/raptoreumcore/
But I have not been successful in running this wallet.
That is why for now, this is just a playground.
I will update once I have time to tinker more with raptoreumcore wallet.
Hash rate
Hash rate is the speed which your system is processing mining job.
In general a 12 cores CPU will give you 1.x KH/s hash rate. But it seems hash rate also depend on the job assigned by your pool. So it will vary and sometimes you wonder why your hashrate is so low.
That is what I can share for now, not yet successful as I have yet been able to create wallet and receive these RTM.
