This will be the first mining rig I'm going to build, I just bought all the hardware and the shipment will arrive next week. I want this post to be a synthesis of every information I've read on internet about building mining rigs. I will also add the sources at the bottom in case anyone want more info. Please comment if you either need more help or you've got some advice.
First of all:
The hardware
GPU:
6x EVGA GeForce GTX 1080 Ti SC Black Edition GAMING, 11GB GDDR5X, iCX Cooler & LED, Optimized Airflow Design, Interlaced Pin Fin Graphics Card 11G-P4-6393-KRNote: I used nicehash calculator (https://www.nicehash.com/?p=calc) to check and compare the hashing power of my GPU. Even though 1080ti are expensives, they have the most hashing power of any GPUs at this moment and they were the ones easily available on amazon. According to official EVGA site this cards are worth 709$
https://www.evga.com/products/product.aspx?pn=11G-P4-5390-KR
I bought them at 719$, so I think it was a fair price. Other GPUs are sold on amazon much more expensive than their official price.
Motherboard:
1x ASUS PRIME Z270-A LGA1151 DDR4 DP HDMI DVI M.2 USB 3.1 Z270 ATX MotherboardNote: For the motherboard I read few posts where the ASUS Prime Z270-A was mentioned. http://cryptomining-blog.com/tag/asus-mining-motherboard/ .This motherboard could handle 8 GPUs, tho I only got 6.
CPU:
1x Intel BX80677G3930 7th Gen Celeron Desktop ProcessorsRAM:
1x Kingston HyperX FURY Black 8GB 2133MHz DDR4 Non-ECC CL14 DIMM Desktop Memory (HX421C14FB/8)Note: I read on several posts that It was enough just to use one 4gb RAM memory since it didn't affect mining at all, but then I came up with some posts arguing that they were performing better with 8Gb RAM memory, so I decided I spend a little more in RAM to get 8Gb. Also if I were to sell the equipment, I think It could have a better recover value. (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=491667.0)
or (https://www.bestvpn.com/es/ethereum-mining/)
PSU:
2x EVGA SuperNOVA 1000 G2 80+ GOLD, 1000W Fully Modular NVIDIA SLI and Crossfire Ready 10 Year Warranty Power Supply 120-G2-1000-XRRemember you will have to dual PSU. I still have not found how to do that. Please Help on this!!!
Note: I might have also gone a little overkill on this, but then again I could expand my mining rig to 1-2 More GPUs. I got 2x 1000watts PSU. Each 1080ti consumes about 250w. So 1500 all six of them, plus all the other components. Also power supply perform better around 50%-80% of the total load capacity.
Take into account that one 1080 ti could peak to 300w
(http://1stminingrig.com/nvidia-geforce-gtx-1080-ti-mining-performance-review/)
or (https://www.pcper.com/reviews/Graphics-Cards/NVIDIA-GeForce-GTX-1080-Ti-Review/Detailed-Power-Consumption-Testing)
PCI-E Risers:
1x Ubit Mining Dedicated Graphics Card PCI-E Riser 1X to 16X Riser Card 164P / 60cm USB 3.0 Extension Cable & 6-pin to SATA Power CableHard Drive:
SanDisk SSD PLUS 120GB Solid State Drive (SDSSDA-120G-G26)Power Button:
Any motherboard power button.Note: For the other hardware I just used what a friend of mine recomended. I've read that CPU does not affect the mining much. And that I could also use a pendrive instead of a SSD. But you could check on that a bit more.
On the risers tho I read that Molex to Sata cables were having issues, so I decided to get 6-pin to Sata cables Risers instead.
2:
The Rig Frame
If you are not planning on building your own frame skip this part. For building my rig frame I followed 3 sources. Ill paste them here so anyone trying to build their own frame can check them out.
http://highoncoins.com/litecoin-rig/how-to-make-diy-wooden-frame-for-litecoindogecoin-rig/
Other videos I got inspiration from :
At the end, it is just measuring your hardware, deciding how much space you're leaving between GPUs and that is it. I have not finished mine yet, but here is the picture.
The build
From this point forward I have not done it. But I'll add new post on that when I finish.
Nevertheless, I will use the following videos for instructions on how to build my assembly my rig.
This is one of the best videos I could find:
3.1 Motherboard Setup.
First thing you need to do is to install the motherboard, Only power cable, CPU, RAM Memory, and On/Off power Button/Cable. Do it as seen on the video I mentioned before. Do not install the GPUs, or risers Yet. It is important to do this since you will need to Update and modify the BIOS settings on the Motherboard. You will need a keyboard, a HDMI cable and your ethernet cable with internet connection.
Connect keyboard to Motherboard and HDMI cable to Monitor and motherboard. Turn on the motherboard and get to the BIOS settings, since there is nothing else it will run automatically to the BIOS. After that plug in your ethernet cable into the motherboard.
Press F7 on the keyboard to go to the advance settings. Go to TOOLS menu and select ASUS EZ Flash 3 Utility. Select Via internet.It will reboot and then select via internet again. and then DHCP option. It will reboot a few times, but after you will be welcome at a successful screen for updating. Press enter.
Then you are going to follow the instructions on this video from minute 7.
They are using Linux, on the video but I'll be using windows 10.
Shut down the computer.
3.2 Windows installation.
Note: Remember it must be 64bit
For windows installation use a bootable pen drive with windows 10. If you do not know how to do it there here is the official microsoft site:
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10
According to several sources, one should only plug the hard drive and one of the GPUs (on the main PCI-e Slot) and as seen on the video mentioned on point 3. Then install windows.
But I just saw a video where they installed windows with all 6 GPUs already installed. So I'll be assembling all 6 GPUs and then installing windows.
Any thoughts on this?, Please comment!! To install it just plug the pen drive with windows ISO and power on the computer.
Unplug any internet connection. You will update it manually later.
While installing its going to say ethernet is not connected. Select skip that for now. Select no password; say NO to cortana and turn everything off on the privacy settings. You can check all that from Minute 48 to minute 49 in this video.
(
Check on device manager if windows recognized all the display adapters, it should. Then plug ethernet cable and check for updates. Since it is a new mining rig with nothing installed yet it is Ok to update to the latest. You can check how it is done on windows 10 from minute 53 to minute 55 on the previous video.
After everything Updates on windows update, you should be able to see all 6 Nvidia cards recognized.
Then go ahead to Nvidia official site and download the latest drivers. Here is a tutorial on the official site.
http://nvidia.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/2900/~/installing-nvidia-display-drivers-under-windows-7%2C-windows-8%2C-or-windows-10
Here is the link for downloading the actual driver for the geforce 1080 ti:
http://www.nvidia.com/download/driverResults.aspx/120486/en-us
I hope this post serve as a small guide for all newbies like myself. Please complement with your sources as well and comment your findings.
Thank you for reading the first part of my post. There are 2 more posts coming. One about windows settings, setup or configuration for your 6x 1080 ti mining Rig, and the other one for the miner softwares for Lbry and Zcash for the 1080 ti
How much did you spend for your rig and how much will you estimate to earn in one year?
Well acording to nicehash If I start mining today ill get around 18 dollars per day. I cant do yearly cuse prices are so volatile. Everything cost me around 5500$. Hopefully prices will go up again and Ill start geting more income.
Some great basics here (Just considering building a rig...) so thank you... interested in an update of how you're getting on? How was the software install and ROI's?