Should you Mine on your Gaming Rig?
Recently, I finally managed to get my hands on an RTX 3070 Founders Edition… For MSRP!
Before getting the card like many people I was a avid believer that Miners were the root cause of the recent GPU Prices and that Scalpers where just an unintended side-effect.
A few days after getting the card though however I did start to wonder.
How long would it take to pay back my card if I mined on it?
So, I started to do a little bit of research and it actually shocked me.
At the time of writing Ethereum gas fees are absolutely ridiculous so mining is incredibly profitable.
A Quick google search led me that the coin to mine would be Ethereum as it would net me ~£10.60 / $15USD (Minus Electricity Costs) Per day, This is a bit misleading but lets get into that later.
The RTX 3070 once Overclocked and Undervolted is an absolute beast of a card for mining.
Here are my MSI Afterburner Stats in case anyone is wondering
Core Voltage = +0
Power Limit = 56% (130W)
Core Clock = +0
Mem Clock = +1200
Fan Speed = 55%
Those settings keep the card at ~53C and if not using the computer ~62MH/s or if you are using it for light work (Such as writing this article, ~58MH/s)
Lets do a quick bit of Maths to work out the Time it will take to get my ROI
RTX 3070 FE = £469 / $664
Daily Return = £10.60 / $15
469 / 10.60 = 44.245 Days
Time till ROI = ~1.5 Months
Wow! Just under 2 Months till the card is essentially free.
Now, you might quite rightly say Kodey didn’t you start mining in unprecedented times for Ether rewards due to the stupidly high gas fees. YES you’re right.
There are also other things you’re gonna have to factor in such as the Pool fee (I’m mining with EtherMine and they take 1% but due to their shear size they half the time end up mining there own gas fees so the 1% basically covers that)
Halfway through my week of mining Ethereum… The rates dropped by 2/3 leaving me with a daily average of ~5USD which basically triples the time its going to take for me to reach my ROI (~1.5Months to ~4.5Months)
So How much did I earn in a week?
With the amazing rates to start off with I earnt 0.01364 ETH which is at the time of writing £28 / $40.
So all things considered should you mine to recoup your money. I mean unless you particularly want to leave your PC running for ~4.5Months without playing games then go for it and with ETH 2.0 right around the corner your chances to mine are getting slimmer and slimmer.
If you want to recoup some of the money you spent then go for it but don’t expect to be able to pay off the card before ETH 2.0 comes into effect.
