In case you haven't heard, Electroneum investors have been unable to access the coins they purchased in the ICO. While this is a bummer, interested parties should take heed.
Fear not!
You can still get your hands on some by mining! If you have a gaming computer or mining rig, this can be quite profitable. Even if all you have is a spare laptop or desktop CPU, you can still make a few coins and dip your toe into the "pool" that is cryptomining (see what I did there?).
Getting started
Whether you're GPU mining on a full-blown rig, or just sending some hash power to a pool with your CPU, you'll need to grab the correct software.
I've found that for nvidia cards, ccMiner (specifically the tpruvot fork) works quite well. I've had luck with xmr-stak-nvidia as well, but that tends to crash on my rig for whatever reason. For AMD cards, I also recommend xmr-stak (the AMD variant). For CPU, I've had good luck with (you guessed it) xmd-stak-cpu. Links follow:
GPU mining software
nvidia: https://github.com/tpruvot/ccminer/releases -OR- https://github.com/fireice-uk/xmr-stak-nvidia/releases
AMD: https://github.com/fireice-uk/xmr-stak-amd/releases
CPU: https://github.com/fireice-uk/xmr-stak-cpu/releases
Of course there are several other options, so feel free to look around and choose what works best for you and your hardware.
Choosing a pool
Next up is choosing a pool. People have many different opinions on what makes a good pool. I'll leave that discussion topic for another time. Personally, I've setup my own pool and have been throwing my 6x 1060s at it. You are welcome to use it. In fact, I'd appreciate it! It's a brand new pool with few miners, so any rewards found will only be shared by a few people (for now)! That means bigger potential rewards!
Help spread the hash power around and join me at http://hashing.fun
Configuration
Setting up the mining software isn't hard. Here are a couple examples:
nvidia w/ ccminer: You need to edit the .bat file (assuming you use Windows) with something similar to the following:
ccminer -o stratum+tcp://hashing.fun:3333 -u YOUR_WALLET_ADDRESS -p x
Make sure to replace YOUR_WALLET_ADDRESS with your ACTUAL wallet address if you want to get paid (spoiler: you DO)!
all xmr-stak miners: you must run the software once. This will generate an optimal set of values for your configuration. Copy and then paste those values into the appropriate section in the config file. Further down in the file there is additional information on how to maximize profits. You can skip these steps, but they are recommended for a reason!
The most important part is to scroll down and find the pool address, wallet address, and wallet password sections. Insert your pool (along with the port you've chosen, details will be given to you by the pool's website) of choice between the quotes after pool address (again, my choice is http://hashing.fun), wallet address between the quotes in that section, and the password can simply be "x" on most pools.
Once you've entered the appropriate information into the config file, simply save it and run the mining software again, being mindful of any errors it will throw.
Success!
Regardless of what software you've chosen, if you set it up right, it should give you results like this:
Pro-tip!
Did you know you can run a GPU miner and a CPU miner on the same machine? Maximize your profits! Simply configure them both accordingly and launch them in separate windows. Neat!
As long as you use the same wallet address, the pool will treat your CPU/GPU miners as one unit and anything found by them will all be rewarded to you.
Thanks!
I hope you enjoyed this quick and simple guide to starting to mine Electroneum. I'd love it if you'd use my pool and help spread the hashpower and secure the network, but don't feel obligated. I'll do my best to answer any questions that may arise. Take care and good luck!