Bitcoin gold mining

First, you need to setup a wallet to generate a Transparent Address to store your mined funds and to use as your username.
Once you have an address, validate it, and if it's valid - continue to setup compatible mining software.

Bitcoin Gold (BTG) Stratum servers:

Compatible GPU Miner Software

• Download one of these miners for your GPU:
  • EWBF v0.3.4b (NVIDIA) - Windows, Linux
  • dstm's ZCash v0.6.0 (NVIDIA) - Windows, Linux
  • ClaymoreZcash v12.6 (AMD) - Windows, Linux

It is recommended to set your virtual memory to at least 16GB

It is recommended to create a startup script to simplify mining.

• Create a file named "start-btgpool.bat"
• Open the newly created file with your favorite editor (Notepad, nano, vi, gedit)
• Use the example script files below as a starting point.

Example Miner Configurations

These examples are with an example wallet address and example worker name both of these should be changed.

Bitcoin gold mining

Please note, btgmine.org is suspending its operation until further notice.

In the beginning Bitcoin network transactions where secured by individual hobbyist miners. With the introduction of ASIC hardware security, functionality has been disproportionately concentrated into a handful of corporations making it less secure.

Bitcoin Gold blockchain database is going to be secured with Equihash algorithm that is ASIC resistant. Being able to mine bitcoin with conventional GPU hardware ensures Bitcoin Gold network security functions are well distributed across the world.

Bitcoin Gold: Mining Off to a Troublesome Start, No Rewards

Bitcoin Gold is far from shining- the launch of its mining pool came with a glitch, just like the hard fork came unprepared, with large parts of the code missing. A few blocks have been produced, but for now, the only coins that may exist are the pre-mined 100,000 BTG. The team claims they are now working on fixing the problem of mining and receiving the payouts.

Bitcoin Gold still trades thinly, mostly on experimental exchanges with small volumes. But the news of the real blockchain starting lifted the price for a while to $471 before dropping back to $238. The weekend pump was a far-away echo of the Bitcoin Cash move, and was mostly caused by the hype around the release of the main net.

New miners are using the Supernova pool, while complaining that the payout rate is rather low for the new coin. There are currently no signs of mining with lowered difficulty to achieve the pre-mine of 100,000 BTG for the developers' team.

Miners also had troubles with a mining pool not paying out and mining incorrectly using the official BTG mining pool, Pool.gold.

At one point, pool.gold seemed to be mining the wrong blockchain in error. The Slack channel also complained that pool.gold may have been a scam, with attached in-browser mining as well.

There is no detailed information on mining distribution, although users have noticed what looks like a large entity with high mining power, in practice disrupting the BTG idea of "One GPU, One vote".

Other glitches and problems are reported, such as undiscoverable BTG balances after the hard fork. Also, users cannot discover full nodes.

So far, Bitcoin Gold has shown its style relies on last-minute interventions, but it remains to be seen if the code written would hold and not lead to losses.

How to Mine Bitcoin Gold? An Ultimate Guide

Looking to mine the newest cryptocurrencies out there? How about mining Bitcoin Gold! While Bitcoin mining got to a whole new level, Bitcoin Gold is designed especially for GPU mining. This means, you only need a desktop computer and a Graphics card to start earning money today. Already a Zcash miner or new to mining, this is a complete guide for you to get started from buying the necessary hardware to setting up the software and calculating your profits.

Important notes:
Only testnet is currently available for Bitcoin Gold. That means you can only mine using testnet. Be aware of the addresses that you use, the address prefix for mainnet is “G,” “m,” or “n” for testnet. All of the examples below are for mainnet, so you just need to change the address structure to mine for testnet. The indicative mainnet launch date is the 12th of November. This can be changed. Just stay up to date with the official BTG blog for comments: BTG blog

Introduction

In our previous article: Bitcoin Gold Hard Fork – A Detailed Explanation we talked about Bitcoin Gold and how the team came up with the idea. Now, the work is done, and the mainnet will soon be available.

Miners, to ‘prove’ that the BTG transaction was legitimate, used computers with multiple high-end graphics cards to run the Equihash mining algorithm in order to search for a number. If the number was correct, the block is verified and the miners start working on the next block. Equihash is a popular algorithm that is currently used by the popular privacy coin ZCash.

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ZCash or Bitcoin Gold

For Miners, mining either coin will be the same since they both use the same algorithm, meaning that they will also use the same software. However one notable difference between each coin will be profitability. This will be the deciding factor for most miners, as most miners will want to make the most money out of mining to pay their hardware and power expenses. Though some miners may want to support the coin they think has the brightest future regardless of price. Depending on whether you want larger profits or if you want to support your favorite coin, these may be a deciding factor for which coin you end up mining. If you want to check which coin is the most profitable at any given time, you can use the WhatToMine.com calculator (More about mining profit: here), simply select which graphics cards you are using, and the calculator will figure out which coin is the most profitable.

Pool Mining and Solo Mining

When mining, you can decide whether to mine by yourself (solo) or with other (pool mining). The difference here is that with solo mining you have to do all the work by yourself, unlike pool mining where you work alongside others to mine the block. This means that solo miners require multiple, powerful computers with many high-end video cards.

However, pool mining is far simpler because you will be “pooled” together with other miners, and the combined hashrate of the pool will go towards solving the block. Because the pool is using the combined hashrate of all the miners, instead of being paid the entire block reward like you would when solo mining, each miner will be paid accordingly towards their own contribution. For example if you are contributing towards 10% of the pool’s total hashrate when a block is mined, you will be paid 10% of the total block reward.

What You Will Need

To start mining you will need:

• A computer which you will use to mine
• A wallet for your coins to be sent and stored
• Mining software so that your computer can connect to the network and start solving blocks.
• An account on an exchange in order to trade your mined coins for different ones or into fiat.

I will elaborate on the required hardware, software, and recommended wallets in later sections, but for now I will list some exchanges which support the upcoming Bitcoin Gold.

You can view the other exchanges on Bitcoin Gold website.

For Bitcoin Gold the mining will primarily be done on graphics cards, but you will still need auxiliary components such as the:

• Processor – a fast processor is not required and a standard Intel Celeron is a popular choice among miners.
• Motherboard – there are many “mining” motherboards that have multiple PCI slots for your graphics cards, however any standard motherboard with a few PCI slots will be fine.
• RAM – a 4GB stick of memory will suffice for mining.
• Storage – in order to store your operating system and mining software you should either have a small SSD for faster boot times or a cheaper, albeit slower HDD will be fine. It is fine to run your operating system off of an external hard drive, but this will lead to slow boot times.
• Power supply – to power the components you will need a power supply, and depending on how many graphics cards you are using you may have to use one with a maximum power of at least 800W or even multiple power supplies.
• Case – because the standard ATX cases cannot support more than 3 or 4 graphics cards, many miners decide to build their own cases, some even out of shoe racks. There are also websites to buy mining cases, however you will pay quite a large premium. Here is a link to one of those websites: Cryptomined. If you decide to get a custom case you will need to get PCI-E riser cables. These are nifty little extension cables that allow you to take your video cards off the motherboard and on to a more elevated position. This lets you put multiple graphics cards on the same motherboard. Another thing you will need is a power button, as you will not be able to power the system.

Here is an example list of suggested parts when building a Bitcoin Gold mining PC: PcPartPicker . You can also implement used parts, as these will be cheaper and you will be able to pay off your build sooner, although used parts may not come with a warranty, so if a part breaks due to a malfunction you will have to replace it out of your own pocket.

Top 5 Graphics Cards For Bitcoin Gold

If you want the highest profits to come out of Bitcoin Gold mining, you will need to choose the best graphics cards.

The 1050 Ti is a popular graphics card due to it’s low power constraints and affordable price. For the price of $160 and a power draw of 50 watts, it is an extremely efficient mining card clocking 160 Hashes per second (H/s). Some 1050 Ti’s do not require an external power connector, so if you want to mine Bitcoin Gold but don’t want to build a dedicated mining rig, you can easily put the graphics card into any desktop PC that has a PCI-E 16x slot.

The GTX 970 was a very popular graphics card when it was first released, and because it was from the previous generation of graphics cards it is extremely easy to find these used. With a hashrate of 280 H/s, the 970 is an excellent mining card, especially if you can find it at a cheap price.

The GTX 1060 has very similar performance to the 970, but has a few added benefits. The 1060 mines Bitcoin Gold at 310 H/s, and while only marginally better than the 970, the 1060 has a much lower power draw. Additionally, because it is a newer card you will be eligible for a warranty, just in case of a component malfunction. However, this card does fetch a higher price.

The GTX 1070 is a great graphics card for Bitcoin Gold, with a hashrate of 440 and with a power draw of 165 watts, the 1070 is a great choice for Bitcoin Gold. Because the 1070 is an extremely popular graphics card among miners and gamers alike, this card will be extremely easy to sell off should you decide to stop mining. The one drawback of the 1070 is it’s high price tag. With a price of over $400 not all miners will be able to afford it, making some of the other cards more reasonable choices.

The GTX 1080 Ti is easily the best graphics card for Bitcoin Gold. With an incredible 700 H/s, a miner with multiple 1080 Ti’s will easily net an extremely high profit margin. Though with so much power there are some drawbacks. The 1080 Ti costs over $700 making this a graphics card that is only bought by hardcore enthusiasts.

Verifying Compatibility

To make sure that all your selected components will work together, you can use the PC Part Picker website to make sure that the auxiliary components will work together. However, PCPP does not allow you to add multiple graphics cards, and this can be problematic because you might not know how large of a power supply you will need. You can calculate this by yourself by going to the graphics card’s manufacturer’s website, and finding the power draw. Multiply this number by the amount of graphics cards you will use, and add this number to the power draw of the auxiliary components (given by PCPP). When you know how much power your system will use, you can choose a power supply accordingly, though you should have 10-20% extra power draw just for general safety and efficiency. After choosing a power supply, check the connectors that come with it. This too can be found on the manufacturer’s website. If you can’t find any power supplies with enough connectors it is possible to use two power supplies. One popular configuration is using two 750 Watt power supplies, as you will have many extra PCI power cables for the graphics cards, as well as plenty of molex cables for the risers.

Technical Requirements

Though it is recommended to run multiple powerful video cards for mining Bitcoin Gold, you are not required to run any. It is technically possible to mine BTG on your processor, however compared to a dedicated graphics card, a processor is very slow and will not net even mediocre mining rewards. You most likely won’t even pay back the power costs of mining, making processor mining very inefficient and highly unpractical.

Mining Software

To mine Bitcoin Gold you will need the right software to do it. This software will connect your computer to the network or pool, and begin hashing. Here is a list of Bitcoin Gold compatible miners:

• EWBF Miner, compatible with NVidia graphics cards on Windows and Linux
• Claymore’s AMD Miner, compatible with AMD cards on Windows
• Optiminer, compatible with AMD cards on Linux

Windows Installation

In this section I will show you how to install the EWBF miner on Windows. Keep in mind that installing other mining software will follow a very similar installation process.

Go to the download page that you can find here: Bitcointalk. Find the download link and download the latest version of the mining software. Sometimes when downloading the software your antivirus will tell you that the file is infected, this is often a false flag, and can be avoided by downloading the file as a .zip.

Unzip the folder and store it in an accessible location.

Create a new simple text document inside the folder and add this:

you will replace it with the pools port. I will introduce the different wallets and pools you can use in the next sections. Your final file will look something like this:

Save the new file as .bat file.

Double click the .bat file then your computer will connect to the network and start mining.

Linux Installation

The Linux installation for the EWBF miner is a bit more complicated, but Linux can often provide more stability and sometimes even greater performance as opposed to the Windows variant. The following steps are done on the Ubuntu distribution of Linux

Open Terminal. This can be done by pressing ctrl + alt + T, then enter this command

You will then be prompted to enter your password. Text should start appearing inside of the Terminal window. You will soon be prompted to press [Enter] to continue. Press enter and wait for the command to finish processing.

Next, you will have to install the latest NVidia drivers for your system from the repository we just added. Enter this command into the Terminal window:

Many lines of code will start appearing on the screen. These are all the different updates that are being downloaded. This step may take some time.

One that step is finished, you will have to add another toolkit for the NVidia drivers in the Terminal window and enter:

This step will also take quite a while, but once it has finished you can move on to next step.

Though this is not 100% necessary, it is recommended to install this piece of software as you will be able to monitor and control your graphics cards. You can install it with this command:

Once it has finished downloading, you will have to enable your graphics cards to be monitored, and that is done through the following command:

Once you have finished all the steps above you will have to reboot your system, simply type reboot inside of the Terminal window. After your computer has booted back up, you can open the newly installed software by going to the launcher at the top left, and searching for “nvidia.” The software to open is called “NVIDIA X Server Settings,” and you can use this software for monitoring graphics cards, changing fan speeds, and overclocking processors in order to get extra performance.

Now that you have finished installing the necessary drivers for your graphics cards, it’s time to install the mining software. Simply go to this link and install the latest version of the EWBF miner. Extract the folder to an accessible location and open it. Inside the folder, right click and select “open in Terminal.” Inside the new Terminal window, you will have to create a file called “start.sh”. This is a script which acts similarly to a windows .bat file. Type:

And a blank window will now appear. Inside the window you will have to input:

Just like with the Windows installation, you will have to replace the necessary areas with the pool you want to mine on, your wallet address, and the server’s port. Once you have finished filling in the blanks, press ctrl+O then enter , and finally ctrl+x to close the window. There will now be a new file inside the folder.

The final step before your computer can start mining is for you to start both the miner and the start.sh files. To do this, open a Terminal window (inside of the folder) and type:

After inputting this command, finally type:

And if you have followed all of the steps correctly, your computer will begin mining Bitcoin Gold.

At the moment, there are only three wallets that are planned to support Bitcoin Gold, and these wallets are:

• Coinomi – an Android exclusive multi-wallet.
• Guarda Wallet – another multi-wallet which is available on both Android and iOS.
• Free Wallet – another multi-wallet which is available on both Android and iOS.

Installation Guide

To mine Bitcoin Gold you will need a wallet to store all of those mined coins. Mobile wallets are the most accessible since you can view your balance no matter where you are as long as you have your phone on you. Here I will be showing you how to install the Coinomi Wallet for Android.

Locate the app in the Google Play store and download it.

Open the app once it has finished downloading. The app will then ask you to either restore or create a new wallet. If you create a new wallet you will be asked to write down a seed, this seed is in case you accidentally uninstall the app or lose your phone. The seed will help you restore your wallet so you can access all of your stored coins. If you want to import a wallet, you will be asked to import the seed.

Once you have created a wallet you will be asked to select a wallet to add. Scroll down until you locate Bitcoin Gold.

Once you have added the wallet, swipe to the “receive” tab and you will find your BTG address. You can use this address to receive BTG. Inside of your .bat or .sh file replace with this string of numbers, although remember to remove the spaces between the numbers. For example, change GUTb Tizu VXca Ueb4r YmCT mfjN PtJY p2NrA to GUTbTizuVXcaUeb4rYmCTmfjNPtJYp2NrA . If you leave the spaces in the address you will not receive any of your mined BTG.

If you only have one miner, it would be a wise decision to choose pool mining over solo mining so that your payouts will become more consistent. Also, if you have a weak miner, solo mining may not work at all for you. Here is a list of pools which will support Bitcoin Gold:

The rest of the pools that will support BTG can be seen on the Bitcoin Gold website

Joining a pool is simple. Most pools will have a “Getting Started” tutorial page where it will give you examples of .bat file configurations. These example configurations will contain the server link and the port to mine to. Below is an example configuration found on pool.mining.sg:

In the image you can see what to replace and

with in your .bat or .sh file. Once you have added these changes to your .bat/.sh file, alongside with your wallet, double click that file and you will begin mining to your wallet on the pool. You can view the Bitcoin Gold shares your miner has collected through the pools website. Simply go to “view miner stats” or “search for address,” depending on your pool. Input the Bitcoin Gold address you are mining to, and the pool will remotely show you your current hashrate and pending balance, however you can also view your current hashrate locally just by looking at the miners CMD or Terminal window.

Solo Mining

Solo mining is much more demanding than pool mining if you want consistent payouts because you will have to compete against every other pool and solo miner on the Bitcoin Gold network. There is also the very real possibility that you will never mine a block, especially if you are running a very weak system. Solo mining usually requires a very large investment, and multiple systems, with multiple graphics cards in each one.

Setting up a node

The easiest way to support Bitcoin Gold is by setting up and running your own Bitcoin Gold node. At the moment this can only be done through Linux.

If you don’t have a Linux machine you can use the digital service Digital Ocean cloud . This service will allow you to setup a Linux machine on a cloud server. If you decide to use Digital Ocean you will have pay a small $5 fee for every month you want to continue using the service. To use Digital Ocean you will have to create a droplet. After creating it you will receive access details in an email. In order to access your “droplet” you will have to download Putty and login via SSH. Once you have logged in you can start using the Linux droplet, and start building your Bitcoin Gold node

First, you will have to open your sources.list file. To find this open a Terminal window and type:

You will then need to paste this into the file:

Save the file and reboot your system.

Once your system has started back up again, open a Terminal window and enter these commands:

Note: Change /root/BTCGPU to the absolute path to your BTCGPU folder. If you have saved it elsewhere this step will not work.

Create config file to start a node and connect to mainnet:

1. How to create conf file

Add this config to conf:

Connect to testnet and test your miner

After you have finished these steps you will now be successfully running a Bitcoin Gold node.

Make sure that for each sub-step you input the command on an individual line.

Starting To Mine

Now that everything’s ready, and you’ve set up your mining computer and it’s software, simply start the .bat file if you are using windows, or the .sh file if you are on Linux, and congratulations! You are now mining Bitcoin Gold! As stated before, you can check your miner’s performance through the pools website, or through the software itself. To calculate your profits you can use this formula: P = M – W.

• P is Profit.
• M is Mined value, so if you mine 2.3 BTG, which is currently valued at $150 USD, M will be 345.
• W is wattage, or power consumption. You can find the monthly cost of running your miner by using this website: http://www.rapidtables.com/calc/electric/electricity-calculator.htm

So your end result will look something like this, P = 345 – 67, P = 278. This shows that your monthly profit is $278. You can check the current price of Bitcoin Gold here: Coinmarketcap. When Bitcoin Gold mining calculators are released this process will be made simpler and more efficient.

Upgrading Hardware

As more miners join the Bitcoin Gold network in the following months, the difficulty will go up. What this means is that if you’re pool mining, your payouts will happen less often. And if you’re solo mining, this means it will take a longer time for you to mine a block. If you want your profits to remain frequent, you will have to upgrade your hardware. You can upgrade this in one of two ways.

• Adding more graphics cards or mining computers to your setup.
• Upgrading your graphics cards to newer or more powerful ones.

This will help boost your hashrate, and in turn increase your payouts in order to remain a competitive miner. You may also want to upgrade your software for optimizations and new features, although these upgrades won’t benefit you as much as a hardware upgrade. They do, however, provide a small hashrate boost. Some software upgrades you can do are:

• Update drivers.
• Update the operating system.
• Download the latest version of the mining software.

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Bitcoin Gold: A Return to Mining?

What is Bitcoin Gold?

Bitcoin Gold Mining

How to Buy Bitcoin Gold (BTG)?

Bitcoin Gold Wallets

BTG – Holding and Trading

Cryptocurrencies have some confusing aspects and terms. For some people, this can start with the name itself. What is the “crypto” in cryptocurrency? It can get more confusing from there. Looking at the bigger picture, cryptocurrencies are dependent on blockchain technology. This involves another set of new ideas and unique terms. Too often explanations are more confusing than helpful.

Fortunately, these concepts can be understood by the cryptocurrency and blockchain novice. Bitcoin Gold provides the perfect example of how all of these elements can come together and create value. A proper evaluation of Bitcoin Gold walks through the cryptocurrency world from start to finish.

What is Bitcoin Gold?

This journey starts with the idea that digital currencies can exist without centralized control. This is the brilliant concept that Bitcoin proved could work in the real world. In order to implement this idea, it was necessary to create the units of cryptocurrency through computer software. Bitcoin Gold and others pay individuals and groups to perform this task. This called mining.

Mining a cryptocurrency is nothing more than solving a math problem on a computer by running this software. The math involved in creating blocks is the “crypto” part of cryptocurrency. Those who solve the problem add that solution to the list of solutions. This is the blockchain. Those who solved the problem have the address of this block – i.e., own the cryptocurrency they created– and can transfer it to someone else.

Bitcoin ran into a problem because the type of math it used allowed certain types of computers to do the math better than other types. Because the value of Bitcoin was so high, it became financially rewarding to build this type of computer. These “ASIC” machines came to dominate mining, and so dominated the Bitcoin blockchain.

Some viewed this as centralized control of what was always intended to be de-centralized. They considered this a threat to the philosophical underpinning of blockchain that was serious enough that something had to be done about it. Their proposed solution was to change the type of math required to so that specialized computers did not have an advantage. The solution was Bitcoin Gold.

Hard Forks

Not everyone agreed that the problem was this severe or that the proposed solution was the best answer. This is not surprising since the community included those who owned machines specifically built to do the “old math” and had a financial incentive to keep things the way they were. A rift developed in the Bitcoin community over this issue.

The structure of blockchain includes a solution to this type of disagreement. The solution is called a hard fork, and it is just what it sounds like. A hard fork is a new string of transactions branching off from the previous list. The start of this new list is the change to Bitcoin Gold, and it happened on October 24, 2017. Everyone holding Bitcoin at that date received an equal amount of Bitcoin Gold to use on the new fork of the blockchain, that is, the new string of transactions.

This move was criticized at the time as a simple attempt to create new value off the “Bitcoin” brand. Keep in mind that the total number of cryptocurrency units doubled at the time of the hard fork. However, this does not mean the value double since the market value of Bitcoin Gold was not the market value of Bitcoin. In fact, if no one supported the new Bitcoin Gold cryptocurrency it would quickly become worthless.

This threatened to be the case, particularly because of criticism of how the transition was handled. Some actions by the proponents of Bitcoin Gold had at least the appearance of simple greed, including delaying the release of mining software to the cryptocurrency community. This supposedly allowed those with “insider “access the opportunity to create units of Bitcoin Gold without competition.

Eventually Bitcoin Gold achieved a stand-alone status in the cryptocurrency markets. Although the value does not rival Bitcoin, it does command a respectable market price and is actively involved in the development of new blockchain technology, including the Lightning Network.

Bitcoin Gold Mining

However, the low market price relative to Bitcoin means that specialized miners have not flocked to the creation of Bitcoin Gold. Keep in mind that any concentration would undermine the expressed purpose of creating Bitcoin Gold in the first place. This has created an opportunity for less technologically savvy individuals to participate in the creation of units of Bitcoin Gold without assembling computers specifically tailored to this purpose.

However, the value and potential value has attracted enough miners that some specialization is recommended. Remember that solving the math equation – hashing – is only one step in the process. It’s also necessary to arrive at the answer before anyone else and successfully post that solution to the blockchain. In effect, miners compete with each other in a cooperative venture.

Mining enthusiasts recommend against using a standard personal computer for this purpose. They suggest that using a high-quality graphics card significantly increases the likelihood of successful mining. Keep in mind that even if a computer is already owned and is not being used for other purposes, mining is not free. There are electrical costs. Mining Bitcoin Gold requires enough success to represent a return on this investment.

In addition to a graphics card, mining enthusiasts also recommend installing additional memory and checking the power supply for the entire system. The technical aspects of evaluating and installing any of these components are well beyond the scope of this article. However, they can be easily found on the Internet, along with the software required for mining.

For those unwilling or unable to take on the technical aspects of mining by themselves, it is possible to join a mining pool, which is a cooperative group that uses the computing power of individual machines to mine Bitcoin Gold. Each member of the group is rewarded with a percentage of the profits equal to their contribution. Mining groups can be easily found on the Internet and have a range of technical requirements.

How to Buy Bitcoin Gold (BTG)?

It is also possible to purchase Bitcoin Gold on a variety of exchanges. The market is very dynamic with new exchanges adding Bitcoin Gold. The best option for identifying an exchange is the official Bitcoin Gold website which currently lists 19 different exchanges where Bitcoin Gold is available.

The exchanges operate in a variety of locations and are not available in all countries. Some offer to exchange national fiat currencies such as US dollars for Bitcoin Gold, while others only exchange for Bitcoin or Ethereum.

Buying Bitcoin Gold with Fiat Currencies

For those who are looking to buy Bitcoin Gold with fiat currencies, not many exchanges provide this option. CEX.IO is one of the only exchanges that provide you the purchase of Bitcoin Gold with USD. If you previously own Bitcoin, all you need to do is to register in CEX.IO, confirm your account and search for BTG/USD.

Other exchanges that support Bitcoin Gold with fiat currencies include YoBit and DSX.

Another easy way to buy Bitcoin Gold is via AvaTrade which provides Contract for Differences (CFD’s) on Bitcoin Gold. The broker allows you to buy cryptocurrencies with a leverage position in a fairly simple process.

Buying Bitcoin Gold with Cryptocurrencies

For those looking to buy Bitcoin Gold with cryptocurrencies, you will need to go through an exchange that caters for the BTG/BTC or BTG/ETH pairing that you are looking to buy Bitcoin Gold coins with. Binance has the largest wide selection of cryptocurrencies, including BTG/BTC.

In the event that you don’t already have an existing account on an exchange and are not holding Bitcoins or Ethereum, open an account on Coinbase and purchase Bitcoin or Ethereum. Do note that, while there are higher transaction fees when purchasing with debit or credit card, the purchase is instantaneous.

Bitcoin Gold Wallets

Regardless of how you plan on obtaining Bitcoin Gold, it will be necessary to hold it in a wallet. Like everything else in the cryptocurrency world, wallets are going through rapid change. Wallets that support the Bitcoin Gold blockchain are listed on the Bitcoin Gold website. Each has its own attributes and advantages.

The main distinction between wallets is between “hot” (online software wallets) and “cold” (offline hardware wallets). A cold wallet that is not plugged into the Internet is clearly more secure than a hot wallet that exists on a central server. Even wallets housed on personal computers that are connected to the Internet are vulnerable to attack.

Keep in mind that wallets are distinct from accounts on exchanges. While both can hold Bitcoin Gold or other cryptocurrency, accounts at exchanges are much more vulnerable to theft by hackers. This is simply because they represent a richer target. All cryptocurrency experts agree that Bitcoin Gold and other currencies should be stored in a private wallet –either hot or cold – and moved to an exchange only for trading.

BTG – Holding and Trading

Bitcoin Gold is growing in popularity, as evidenced by the growing number of exchanges that offer it. However, it is also still very young, even under the standards by which cryptocurrencies are measured. These factors mean that the brief trading history might not be a good indication of the trading value. Still, there is one clear relationship that stands out.

The chart below from Coinmarketcap.com shows the price of Bitcoin Gold expressed in US dollars (Green line) and Bitcoin (Yellow line). There is a clear distinction before November 27, 2017, and afterward (seen as the point where the blue market cap line is calculated correctly).

Since this point in time, the price of Bitcoin Gold has been significantly more volatile when measured in US dollars than it has been when measured in Bitcoin. In fact, for most of 2018, the price of Bitcoin Gold has seen little movement when measured in Bitcoin.

This strongly suggests that the price of Bitcoin Gold moves directly with the price of Bitcoin. Anyone seeking to trade Bitcoin Gold based on volatility such as day traders will be disappointed if they hold Bitcoin as their reserve currency (assets that are held until a favorable buying opportunity is identified and after the targeted asset is sold).

There are two reasons for this. First, the movement in price going from Bitcoin to Bitcoin Gold is small (i.e., the yellow line is relatively flat). This leaves little opportunity for profitable trades. Second, volatility in the price of Bitcoin itself could potentially eliminate any profits made on trading Bitcoin Gold.

Holding Bitcoin Gold as a long-term asset instead of Bitcoin is also somewhat problematic. The chart indicates that the market does not perceive a significant difference between these two cryptocurrencies. Keep in mind that Bitcoin Gold has the same mission, vision, and values as Bitcoin. The developers simply feel that they have followed these standards more closely than Bitcoin.

In other words, as a cryptocurrency investment, Bitcoin Gold is fairly indistinguishable from Bitcoin. The most significant differences are the separate blockchain and the different mining technique. These are technical matters that may make a difference in market value in the future if Bitcoin Gold proves successful.

Conclusions

Understanding these core value propositions is critical to understanding Bitcoin Gold and the investment opportunity it may represent. It is impossible to predict if these factors will materialize in an increasing market price, and even more difficult to determine if that price movement will be independent of Bitcoin. In this view Bitcoin Gold is a very similar investment to Bitcoin.

However, the most fundamental error that can be made is to assume that the current price differential between Bitcoin Gold and Bitcoin will close because the two are interchangeable. This assumption ignores the “first mover” advantage of Bitcoin and the fact that the Bitcoin community does not completely support Bitcoin Gold.

The technical issues that distinguish Bitcoin Gold may prove to be inconsequential in the long-run, and the market price may continue to move with Bitcoin. It is simply too early in the development cycle of Bitcoin Gold to fully judge the situation accurately. However, to the extent that Bitcoin continues to be accepted as the premier cryptocurrency, Bitcoin Gold will not be far behind.

This article was originally posted on FX Empire

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Your search engine does not find any satisfactory results for searches. It is too weak. Also, the server of bing is often off

I created a yahoo/email account long ago but I lost access to it; can y'all delete all my yahoo/yahoo account except for my newest YaAccount

I want all my lost access yahoo account 'delete'; Requesting supporter for these old account deletion; 'except' my Newest yahoo account this Account don't delete! Because I don't want it interfering my online 'gamble' /games/business/data/ Activity , because the computer/security program might 'scure' my Information and detect theres other account; then secure online activities/ business securing from my suspicion because of my other account existing will make the security program be 'Suspicious' until I'm 'secure'; and if I'm gambling online 'Depositing' then I need those account 'delete' because the insecurity 'Suspicioun' will program the casino game 'Programs' securities' to be 'secure' then it'll be 'unfair' gaming and I'll lose because of the insecurity can be a 'Excuse'. Hope y'all understand my explanation!

I want all my lost access yahoo account 'delete'; Requesting supporter for these old account deletion; 'except' my Newest yahoo account this Account don't delete! Because I don't want it interfering my online 'gamble' /games/business/data/ Activity , because the computer/security program might 'scure' my Information and detect theres other account; then secure online activities/ business securing from my suspicion because of my other account existing will make the security program be 'Suspicious' until I'm 'secure'; and if I'm gambling online 'Depositing' then I need those account 'delete' because the insecurity 'Suspicioun' will program the casino game 'Programs' securities' to be… more

chithidio@Yahoo.com

i dont know what happened but i can not search anything.

Golf handicap tracker, why can't I get to it?

Why do I get redirected on pc and mobile device?

Rahyaftco@yahoo.com

RYAN RAHSAD BELL literally means

Question on a link

In the search for Anaïs Nin, one of the first few links shows a picture of a man. Why? Since Nin is a woman, I can’t figure out why. Can you show some reason for this? Who is he? If you click on the picture a group of pictures of Nin and no mention of that man. Is it an error?

Repair the Yahoo Search App.

Yahoo Search App from the Google Play Store on my Samsung Galaxy S8+ phone stopped working on May 18, 2018.

I went to the Yahoo Troubleshooting page but the article that said to do a certain 8 steps to fix the problem with Yahoo Services not working and how to fix the problem. Of course they didn't work.

I contacted Samsung thru their Samsung Tutor app on my phone. I gave their Technican access to my phone to see if there was a problem with my phone that stopped the Yahoo Search App from working. He went to Yahoo and I signed in so he could try to fix the Yahoo Search App not working. He also used another phone, installed the app from the Google Play Store to see if the app would do any kind of search thru the app. The Yahoo Search App just wasn't working.

I also had At&t try to help me because I have UVERSE for my internet service. My internet was working perfectly. Their Technical Support team member checked the Yahoo Search App and it wouldn't work for him either.

We can go to www.yahoo.com and search for any topic or website. It's just the Yahoo Search App that won't allow anyone to do web searches at all.

I let Google know that the Yahoo Search App installed from their Google Play Store had completely stopped working on May 18, 2018.

I told them that Yahoo has made sure that their Yahoo members can't contact them about anything.

I noticed that right after I accepted the agreement that said Oath had joined with Verizon I started having the problem with the Yahoo Search App.
No matter what I search for or website thru the Yahoo Search App it says the following after I searched for
www.att.com.

WEBPAGE NOT AVAILABLE
This webpage at gttp://r.search.yahoo.com/_ylt=A0geJGq8BbkrgALEMMITE5jylu=X3oDMTEzcTjdWsyBGNvbG8DYmyxBHBvcwMxBHZ0aWQDTkFQUEMwxzEEc2VjA3NylRo=10/Ru=https%3a%2f%2fwww.att.att.com%2f/Rk=2/Es=plkGNRAB61_XKqFjTEN7J8cXA-
could not be loaded because:
net::ERR_CLEARTEXT_NOT_PERMITTED

I tried to search for things like www.homedepot.com. The same thing happened. It would say WEBPAGE NOT AVAILABLE. The only thing that changed were all the upper and lower case letters, numbers and symbols.
Then it would again say
could not be loaded because:
net::ERR_CLEARTEXT_NOT_PERMITTED

This is the same thing that happened when Samsung and At&t tried to do any kind of searches thru the Yahoo Search App.

Yahoo needs to fix the problem with their app.

Yahoo Search App from the Google Play Store on my Samsung Galaxy S8+ phone stopped working on May 18, 2018.

I went to the Yahoo Troubleshooting page but the article that said to do a certain 8 steps to fix the problem with Yahoo Services not working and how to fix the problem. Of course they didn't work.

I contacted Samsung thru their Samsung Tutor app on my phone. I gave their Technican access to my phone to see if there was a problem with my phone that stopped the Yahoo Search App from working. He went to Yahoo and… more

How to Mine Bitcoin Gold: Complete Beginners Guide

Bitcoin Gold is a mineable cryptocurrency that utilizes the Proof of Work algorithm Equihash. This is the same algorithm used by Z-Cash. The benefit of this is that Equihash is ASIC resistant, therefore mineable with a regular PC. This gives everyone the opportunity to join in and start mining. This guide will illustrate how to setup your computer to mine bitcoin gold.

Before you download the necessary programs, there’s a few things you need to make sure you have.

To start mining you will need:

• Windows 7 or newer 64-bit OS
• if nVidia GPU mining, GPU with compute capability
• if AMD GPU mining, GPU with OpenCL support
• Newest driver updates for GPUs
• Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0
• Microsoft Visual C++ Redistributable 2013
• Internet Connection
• Bitcoin Gold Wallet

First, we will setup a Bitcoin Gold wallet so you can receive payouts. Either download Coinomi, the official Bitcoin Gold wallet, or use an exchange wallet like one on Binance. The Bitcoin Gold address you are given must be inputted into the software later on.

Depending on whether you’re using an nVidia GPU, or an AMD GPU, different software will have to be installed.

For AMD, you will utilize Claymore’s Miner. Click the download link as shown, and extract to a folder of your choice.

Once extracted we can configure the miner by editing the config file to set our Bitcoin Gold address, as well as set our mining pool. The choices for Bitcoin Gold mining pools are:

For this guide we will use the BTG Pool Pro. Choose the server closest to you. For me, the server would be ‘us.btgpool.pro:3857’. There’s two modifications that must be made to the files. Open the start.bat file, and add:

Once that is completed, save and close. Now open the config.txt file and add:

For me, i’ll select the US server as shown. Make sure to also include the port number. In the config.txt, I will insert ‘-zpool stratum+tcp://eu.btgpool.pro:3857’. Simply add your Zcash wallet to the wallet section by adding ‘-zwal YOUR_WALLET_ADDRESS’. You can also add a worker (each individual computer will be tracked) by adding -zwal YOUR_WALLET_ADDRESS.YOUR_WORKER_ADDRESS’. The last addition is ‘-allpools 1’, this ensures that the miner will start mining Bitcoin Gold otherwise it will not start.

Additionally, you may want to remove or modify -epools to ensure you do not switch over back to a Zcash pool if theres a failure on your main mining pool. To do this simply add # in front of the pools, or add additional Bitcoin Gold pools.

Before you run your mining software, it is recommended to increase your virtual memory at this point to ensure the mining software runs smoothly.

To ensure you have the correct virtual memory enabled, search for system in the start menu. Open system and on the left hand side click ‘Advanced System Settings.’ Go under the advanced tab, under performance settings, and advanced again. Then click ‘Change’ under virtual memory. Uncheck the box that states to ‘Automatically manage paging file size for all drives’ and then input a custom size of 16384 (or whatever is the maximum allowable value) into the Initial and Maximum size fields. This will prevent you from having any errors with virtual memory.

And that’s it, you’re ready to mine Bitcoin Gold. Simply click the Start.bat file and you should start mining. You can also look up the statistics of your miners on the pool website that you’re using by inputting your public address into the mining pools webpage.

For nVidia

For nVidia, you will utilize EWBF’s Cuda Miner. Download EWBF’s miner as shown, and extract to a folder of your choice.

Once extracted we can configure the miner by editing the start.bat file to set our Bitcoin Gold address, as well as set our mining pool. The choices for Bitcoin Gold mining pools are:

For this guide we will use BTG Pool Pro.

For EWBF’s mining software, we will be configuring the start.bat file. Simply right click to edit in notepad. Once opened, we can set the server address, and your Bitcoin Gold public address. For this guide we will use the ‘us.btgpool.pro:3857’ server, but choose the server closest to you as per those listed on the website. Insert this string into your start.bat file:

Your Start.bat file should now be configured similar to mine as seen below.

Before you run your mining software, it is recommended to increase your virtual memory at this point to ensure the mining software runs smoothly.

To ensure you have the correct virtual memory enabled, search for system in the start menu. Open system and on the left hand side click ‘Advanced System Settings.’ Go under the advanced tab, under performance settings, and advanced again. Then click ‘Change’ under virtual memory. Uncheck the box that states to ‘Automatically manage paging file size for all drives’ and then input a custom size of 16384 (or whatever is the maximum allowable value) into the Initial and Maximum size fields. This will prevent you from having any errors with virtual memory.

Bitcoin Gold Pool Mining Code Contains a Fee of 0.5%

The launch of Bitcoin Gold has been quite challenging, which was only to be expected. It now turns out there are a lot more issues under the hood than previously believed. One source claims there is a fee in the code for mining pools. Even though this has been pointed out previously, there are no plans whatsoever to remove it. The future of BTG looks even more uncertain than it did before.

Bitcoin Gold Pool Mining Code

When the Bitcoin Gold project was announced, a lot of the required information was kept under tight wraps. The source code of this project has been kept hidden for so long, it almost seemed as if the project had died out before the actual launch. Thankfully, the code was eventually unveiled, although it hasn’t necessarily redeemed the project or its developers. In fact, a lot of new information has come to light that raises even more questions regarding the coin’s legitimacy.

Especially when it comes to the code required to set up Bitcoin Gold mining pools, there have been some very interesting developments. It turns out someone discovered irregularities in the code which hint at unusual fees. This was not done by accident either, as it was a conscious decision by the Bitcoin Gold development team. Considering that this altcoin also has a big premine, stealing funds from miners is unacceptable.

It seems the fee is hard-coded into the z-nomp fork advertised by the developers. Developer StarbuckBG mentioned that he was aware of this development and decided not to merge it into the main code. However, the code will not be removed either, which means the Bitcoin Gold developers are willingly stealing money from BTG miners. That doesn’t mean that mining pool operators can’t remove the code, though, but if they remain unaware of its existence, they will not do so anytime soon. It’s a very troubling development for an altcoin trying to ride Bitcoin’s coattails.

So far, it seems the fee in question is 0.5% of all block rewards . For their part, the BTG developers see no issue with this since it can be removed or changed by pool operators. At current prices, that means around 0.06 BTG per block – worth around US$10 – is simply given to the developers. It is a very dubious way of getting paid for something they seemingly created in a week or less. Combine this dubious fee with the major premine and it becomes evident that Bitcoin Gold will not be around for much longer.

The wider cryptocurrency community isn’t too happy about this development, which is only to be expected. The code was used to run the only mining pool available during the first few hours following the coin’s launch. At that time, the rest of the community experienced issues syncing the blockchain due to the many forks created in the process. This source code was recommended by one of the main Bitcoin Gold developers, all the while knowing it contained an unnecessary fee structure.

How all this will play out for Bitcoin Gold remains to be determined. It is doubtful most people will still wait for their free coins after knowing all this. Nor will most people continue to mine this currency given the shady tactics employed by its developers. Unfortunately, our initial assumption about Bitcoin Gold has been confirmed. The project never had any honest intentions and it shouldn’t have existed in the first place.

About The Author

JP Buntinx is a FinTech and Bitcoin enthusiast living in Belgium. His passion for finance and technology made him one of the world's leading freelance Bitcoin writers, and he aims to achieve the same level of respect in the FinTech sector.

How to Mine Bitcoin Gold : Mainnet Launched

November 13, 2017 by admin 2 Comments

In this post you will get to know how to mine bitcoin gold with gpu.Bitcoin Gold is a new fork from bitcoin blockchain which tends to make mining decentralized again.Check this post to know more about bitcoin gold, should you invest in it or not?

Bitcoin Gold mining will start from 1 November 2017. I will update the post with bitcoin gold mining procedure,mining software, BTG mining pool and overclock settings. To get notified, subscribe to our push notification by pressing the bell icon.[bottom left corner]

We all know bitcoin is lagging behind from altcoins in terms of transaction speed, transaction cost and privacy.So to improve these aspects immediate changes were required in bitcoin otherwise altcoin would have surpassed bitcoin in the near future. As a result of this we saw the first bitcoin hardfork, bitcoin cash on 21 July 2017. Bitcoin cash increased the bitcoin blocksize to 8 MB from the earlier 1 MB. Now a second bitcoin fork took place on 24th October 2017 giving birth to a new coin named bitcoin gold.

Bitcoin Gold Mining : BTG Mining [BGold]

Bitcoin mining has become centralised as China owns maximum bitcoin network hashing power and bitcoin is mined using very costly ASICs. Bitmain is the only company which makes the most profitable Bitcoin Mining Hardware and maximum miners use miners provided by bitmain. So its bad for a decentralised cryptocurrency to have centralised mining.Thus to counter this situation Bitcoin Gold has been introduced so as to make mining decentralised again such that anyone in the world having a GPU can start mining BTG, Bitcoin Gold.

Bitcoin Gold will change the Bitcoin mining POW(proof of work algorithm) from SHA256 to Equihash. Equihash algo is an asic resistant algorithm thus solving any problems in future related to centralised mining.

BGold Mining is Started : Equihash Algo

Mining Difficulty Adjustment :

BGold mining difficulty will be adjusted with every block.

Bitcoin Gold Premined :

Bgold have devlopers blocks premined. Those premined coins will be used by the team for further development of BTG. See road map for more info.

How to mine Bitcoin Gold : BGold

Don’t know which pool is best. Haven’t received any payment so for. With 7 GTX 1080 Ti, 5000 solutions/second I have earned 0.6 BTG in 6 hours. ( shown on pool )

Update : BTG Mining is started but too much drama firstly developer premined BTG then chain split. BTW I am mining it right now.

1. Download Miner Software for your GPU

BTG Nvidia GPU Miners: EWBF’s CUDA Equihash Miner 0.3.4b Linux Miner

AMD GPU BTG Miners: Claymore’s ZCash AMD GPU Miner v12.6

CPUMiner : Downlolad Here (CPU must have AVX instruction set)

2. Download BGold Wallet : Here

3. Use Anyone of these two pools ( Although I have not received payment from any of them yet)

1. mine.pool.gold :
2. btgpool.pro : Use any of these two servers
   eu.btgpool.pro:3857 (standard server… recommended)
   eu.btgpool.pro:3858 ( high difficulty server)

4. Open suprnova.bat file( right click and edit)

6. Add following to the bat file and replace it accordingly. See images below for help.

7. Thats it, run suprnova.bat and mining will start instantly.

I am using Windows EWBF Miner, if you are using any other miner make changes accordingly

Bitcoin Gold Mining Pools

Many of the popular pools will support bgold mining. BTCGpu.org homepage will guide you about the pools which will provide btg mining.

I think once the BTG mining starts everyone having gpu’s will be mining it. Gpu mining farms may decrease mining profitability for small miners.

Best GPU For Mininig Bitcoin Gold : BTG

Bitcoin gold will use equihash algorithm for POW and equihash is not minable by asics.Nvidia GTX 1060, GTX 1070, GTX 1080 Ti all are good for mininig equihash algo. Check here to know best gpu for BTG Mining : Equihash algo.

As compared to amd cards, nvidia cards are much better for mining equihash algo. AMD card owners can still mine Bitcoin Gold but AMD is not optimized for equihash algo so you will be earning less.So its good news for nvidia card owners.

No one knows what will be the price of BTG in near future, so don’t miss the opportunity of mining it early when difficulty will be low.

Different Methods for Mining BTG : Bitcoin Gold

Pool Mininig :

It will start on 1 November 2017.Will add reliable pool at that time. Pool mining is profitable for small miners.

Solo Mining :

If you have a GPU mining farm then you can currently mine BTG on testnet, more info here. But you won’t be rewarded for mining on testnet, you’ll just help in the development. Mainnet will be launched on 1 November 2017.

CPU Mining :

BTG CPU mining is possible but it is not profitable as graphics card will provide you much higher hashrate.

GPU Mininig :

Most profitable with Nvidia cards. Can’t say anything right now about profitability.

Cloud Mining :

Don’t know if any cloud mining service will be available in near future for mining bitcoin gold.

Bitcoin Gold Mining Software

BTG will use equihash algo and we will be using ccminer for nvidia cards and sgminer for amd cards. May be new fork of these miner will be availabe in future which is designed specifically for mining bitcoin gold.

Nvidia Card Miner : Download Here

AMD Card Miner : Download Here

The links for the best mining softwares will be updated once the bgold mining starts.

Hope you liked this article about bitcoin gold mining and if you did then please give it a social media share.

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Policy / Civilization & Discontents

Bitcoin Gold, the latest Bitcoin fork, explained

Bitcoin is dominated by big mining companies. Bitcoin Gold wants to change that.

by Timothy B. Lee - Nov 13, 2017 9:45 pm UTC

A new cryptocurrency called Bitcoin Gold is now live on the Internet. It aims to correct what its backers see as a serious flaw in the design of the original Bitcoin.

There are hundreds of cryptocurrencies on the Internet, and many of them are derived from Bitcoin in one way or another. But Bitcoin Gold—like Bitcoin Cash, another Bitcoin spinoff that was created in August—is different in two important ways.

Bitcoin Gold is branding itself as a version of Bitcoin rather than merely new platforms derived from Bitcoin's source code. It has also chosen to retain Bitcoin's transaction history, which means that, if you owned bitcoins before the fork, you now own an equal amount of "gold" bitcoins.

While Bitcoin Cash was designed to resolve Bitcoin's capacity crunch with larger blocks, Bitcoin Gold aims to tackle another of Bitcoin's perceived flaws: the increasing centralization of the mining industry that verifies and secures Bitcoin transactions.

The original vision for Bitcoin was that anyone would be able to participate in Bitcoin mining with their personal PCs, earning a bit of extra cash as they helped to support the network. But as Bitcoin became more valuable, people discovered that Bitcoin mining could be done much more efficiently with custom-built application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs).

As a result, Bitcoin mining became a specialized and highly concentrated industry. The leading companies in this new industry wield a disproportionate amount of power over the Bitcoin network.

Bitcoin Gold aims to dethrone these mining companies by introducing an alternative mining algorithm that's much less susceptible to ASIC-based optimization. In theory, that will allow ordinary Bitcoin Gold users to earn extra cash with their spare computing cycles, just as people could do in the early days of Bitcoin.

How Bitcoin mining became centralized

At the core of the Bitcoin network is the blockchain, a distributed ledger that records every transaction that has ever occurred. Every 10 minutes, on average, one computer in Bitcoin's peer-to-peer network adds a block to the end of the blockchain and collects a reward of 12.5 bitcoins—currently worth around $75,000.

Miners compete for the privilege of adding a block to the blockchain by racing to solve a difficult mathematical problem. Here's how it works: the miner takes a list of transactions and adds a random string called a nonce to the end. Then it computes a SHA-256 hash function of this entire block.

A hash function is designed to produce an essentially random string of bits that uniquely represents the data that was hashed. The miner "wins" if these random bits begin with a certain number of zeros. Most of the time, this doesn't happen, so the miner chooses another nonce and repeats the calculation until a winning block comes up.

A miner who discovers a winning block announces it to the rest of the network; everyone else on the network verifies that it meets all the requirements of the Bitcoin rules and then adds the block to their copies of the blockchain. Then the race begins again.

The point of this rather elaborate process is to give the network a way to reach a consensus without a central authority to count votes. If two blocks are announced around the same time, producing a disagreement about which one is the "official" block, the dispute is settled by running another round of the race. Whoever wins the next round gets to choose which block in the preceding round becomes official.

In practice, this means that a node's influence over the network is proportional to the amount of computing power it has. In Bitcoin's early years, this gave Bitcoin mining a democratic character. Almost everyone in the community had spare computing power sitting on their desks that they could devote to Bitcoin mining, earning virtual currency in the process. There were few professional bitcoin miners with dedicated hardware because somebody buying special hardware couldn't compete with a bunch of guys using spare computing cycles they already had.

But that changed when people began building custom Bitcoin-mining ASICs. These chips could compute SHA-256 hashes so much more efficiently than a PC that PC miners soon couldn't even produce enough bitcoins to cover their electricity bills. Mining became an ASIC-only operation heavily concentrated in places with low electricity costs.

Bitcoin Gold hopes to make mining democratic again

This strategy of making influence over a network proportional to computing power is known as proof-of-work. The more work you do—in this case, computing SHA-256 hashes billions of times—the more likely you are to win a chance to add a block to the blockchain.

Bitcoin Gold is identical to vanilla Bitcoin in most respects, but it uses an alternative proof-of-work algorithm called Equihash that supporters believe is impervious to being sped up with custom hardware. Equihash has also been adopted by a Bitcoin rival called Zcash for the same reason.

The key idea behind Equihash is that the algorithm is constrained more by memory than by computing power. Here's a simplified summary of how Equihash works (you can get all the gory details in the Equihash white paper):

1. Equihash starts with a list of pseudorandom bit strings derived from the block the miner wants to add to the blockchain.
2. The miner tries to find a subset of n strings (out of the ones generated in step 1) that XOR to zero.
3. The bit strings chosen in step 2 are concatenated together and hashed with the goal (as in the original Bitcoin) of finding a value below some pre-defined value.

Step 2 is the hard part of this process—the first and third steps are relatively trivial. And the most efficient algorithm for completing step 2 requires a lot of memory. Trying to solve the problem with less than the optimal amount of memory imposes drastic computational penalties. In one example presented in the Equihash paper, solving a version of the problem with 700 megabytes took about 15 seconds, while solving the same problem with 250 megabytes took 1,000 times as long.

The reason this matters, the creators of Equihash say, is that it's not really feasible to optimize memory-intensive algorithms with custom silicon the way you can optimize compute-intensive algorithms. Bitcoin mining hardware is blazingly fast because a chip custom-designed for computing SHA-256 hashes can compute vastly more hashes per second than a conventional CPU with the same number of transistors. But 1GB of memory takes up as much space on a chip whether it's being used for custom mining hardware or a general purpose PC.

The result, supporters hope, is that Bitcoin Gold will always be accessible to ordinary users who want to mine cryptocurrency with their PCs. That could give Bitcoin a more democratic character and reduce the influence of the big mining pools that are so powerful within the mainstream Bitcoin network.

Bitcoin Gold is still a fringe cryptocurrency

Bitcoin Gold's vision of democratizing Bitcoin mining appeals to a lot of people in the mainstream Bitcoin world. But the currency still faces a ton of skepticism in the broader Bitcoin community.

Critics have objected to the unusual way that Bitcoin Gold launched the currency. After forking the main Bitcoin blockchain a few weeks ago, the Bitcoin Gold team operated the new network privately, allowing them to mine a bunch of "gold" bitcoins without competition from the rest of the Bitcoin world. Critics say this leaves fewer bitcoins available for anyone else to mine.

The broader objection, though, is that many bitcoiners look with suspicion on any effort to split the Bitcoin community. They worry that having multiple, competing versions of Bitcoin will confuse the public. Opponents argue that Bitcoin Gold is unfairly capitalizing on the Bitcoin name.

But the Bitcoin Gold team insists that their project will be good for Bitcoin in the long run. They say their ultimate goal is to prove the viability of Equihash as an alternative proof-of-work algorithm and eventually convince the mainstream Bitcoin network to make a similar move. That seems like an uphill battle, however, given the millions of dollars Bitcoin miners have invested in their existing hashing hardware.

The market values Bitcoin Gold much less than vanilla bitcoin or even Bitcoin Cash. On Monday afternoon, one unit of Bitcoin Gold was worth around $250, compared to $1,400 for Bitcoin Cash and $6,300 for normal Bitcoin. Still, with more than 16 million bitcoins in circulation, the creation of Bitcoin Gold created $4 billion in new cryptocurrency value—at least on paper.