README 36 KB

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  1. This is a multi-threaded multi-pool GPU, FPGA and ASIC miner with ATI GPU
  2. monitoring, (over)clocking and fanspeed support for bitcoin and derivative
  3. coins. Do not use on multiple block chains at the same time!
  4. This code is provided entirely free of charge by the programmer in his spare
  5. time so donations would be greatly appreciated. Please consider donating to the
  6. address below.
  7. Con Kolivas <kernel@kolivas.org>
  8. 15qSxP1SQcUX3o4nhkfdbgyoWEFMomJ4rZ
  9. DOWNLOADS:
  10. http://ck.kolivas.org/apps/cgminer
  11. GIT TREE:
  12. https://github.com/ckolivas/cgminer
  13. Support thread:
  14. http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=28402.0
  15. IRC Channel:
  16. irc://irc.freenode.net/cgminer
  17. License: GPLv3. See COPYING for details.
  18. SEE ALSO API-README, ASIC-README, FGPA-README, GPU-README AND SCRYPT-README FOR
  19. MORE INFORMATION ON EACH.
  20. ---
  21. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ON USAGE:
  22. After saving configuration from the menu, you do not need to give cgminer any
  23. arguments and it will load your configuration.
  24. Any configuration file may also contain a single
  25. "include" : "filename"
  26. to recursively include another configuration file.
  27. Writing the configuration will save all settings from all files in the output.
  28. Single pool:
  29. cgminer -o http://pool:port -u username -p password
  30. Multiple pools:
  31. cgminer -o http://pool1:port -u pool1username -p pool1password -o http://pool2:port -u pool2usernmae -p pool2password
  32. Single pool with a standard http proxy, regular desktop:
  33. cgminer -o "http:proxy:port|http://pool:port" -u username -p password
  34. Single pool with a socks5 proxy, regular desktop:
  35. cgminer -o "socks5:proxy:port|http://pool:port" -u username -p password
  36. Single pool with stratum protocol support:
  37. cgminer -o stratum+tcp://pool:port -u username -p password
  38. The list of proxy types are:
  39. http: standard http 1.1 proxy
  40. http0: http 1.0 proxy
  41. socks4: socks4 proxy
  42. socks5: socks5 proxy
  43. socks4a: socks4a proxy
  44. socks5h: socks5 proxy using a hostname
  45. If you compile cgminer with a version of CURL before 7.19.4 then some of the above will
  46. not be available. All are available since CURL version 7.19.4
  47. If you specify the --socks-proxy option to cgminer, it will only be applied to all pools
  48. that don't specify their own proxy setting like above
  49. ---
  50. BUILDING CGMINER FOR YOURSELF
  51. DEPENDENCIES:
  52. Mandatory:
  53. curl dev library http://curl.haxx.se/libcurl/
  54. (libcurl4-openssl-dev)
  55. pkg-config http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/pkg-config
  56. libtool http://www.gnu.org/software/libtool/
  57. Optional:
  58. curses dev library
  59. (libncurses5-dev or libpdcurses on WIN32 for text user interface)
  60. AMD APP SDK http://developer.amd.com/sdks/AMDAPPSDK
  61. (This sdk is mandatory for GPU mining)
  62. AMD ADL SDK http://developer.amd.com/sdks/ADLSDK
  63. (This sdk is mandatory for ATI GPU monitoring & clocking)
  64. libudev dev library (libudev-dev)
  65. (This is only required for ASIC+FPGA support and is linux only)
  66. If building from git:
  67. autoconf
  68. automake
  69. CGMiner specific configuration options:
  70. --enable-opencl Enable support for GPU mining with opencl
  71. --disable-adl Override detection and disable building with adl
  72. --enable-scrypt Compile support for scrypt litecoin mining (default
  73. disabled)
  74. --enable-avalon Compile support for Avalon (default disabled)
  75. --enable-bflsc Compile support for BFL ASICs (default disabled)
  76. --enable-bitforce Compile support for BitForce FPGAs (default
  77. disabled)
  78. --enable-bitfury Compile support for BitFury ASICs (default disabled)
  79. --enable-hashfast Compile support for Hashfast (default disabled)
  80. --enable-icarus Compile support for Icarus (default disabled)
  81. --enable-knc Compile support for KnC miners (default disabled)
  82. --enable-klondike Compile support for Klondike (default disabled)
  83. --enable-modminer Compile support for ModMiner FPGAs(default disabled)
  84. --without-curses Compile support for curses TUI (default enabled)
  85. --with-system-libusb Compile against dynamic system libusb (default use
  86. included static libusb)
  87. Basic *nix build instructions:
  88. To actually build:
  89. ./autogen.sh # only needed if building from git repo
  90. CFLAGS="-O2 -Wall -march=native" ./configure <options>
  91. No installation is necessary. You may run cgminer from the build
  92. directory directly, but you may do make install if you wish to install
  93. cgminer to a system location or location you specified.
  94. Native WIN32 build instructions: see windows-build.txt
  95. ---
  96. Usage instructions: Run "cgminer --help" to see options:
  97. Usage: . [-atDdGCgIKklmpPQqrRsTouvwOchnV]
  98. Options for both config file and command line:
  99. --api-allow Allow API access (if enabled) only to the given list of [W:]IP[/Prefix] address[/subnets]
  100. This overrides --api-network and you must specify 127.0.0.1 if it is required
  101. W: in front of the IP address gives that address privileged access to all api commands
  102. --api-description Description placed in the API status header (default: cgminer version)
  103. --api-groups API one letter groups G:cmd:cmd[,P:cmd:*...]
  104. See API-README for usage
  105. --api-listen Listen for API requests (default: disabled)
  106. By default any command that does not just display data returns access denied
  107. See --api-allow to overcome this
  108. --api-network Allow API (if enabled) to listen on/for any address (default: only 127.0.0.1)
  109. --api-mcast Enable API Multicast listener, (default: disabled)
  110. The listener will only run if the API is also enabled
  111. --api-mcast-addr <arg> API Multicast listen address, (default: 224.0.0.75)
  112. --api-mcast-code <arg> Code expected in the API Multicast message, don't use '-' (default: "FTW")
  113. --api-mcast-port <arg> API Multicast listen port, (default: 4028)
  114. --api-port Port number of miner API (default: 4028)
  115. --auto-fan Automatically adjust all GPU fan speeds to maintain a target temperature
  116. --auto-gpu Automatically adjust all GPU engine clock speeds to maintain a target temperature
  117. --balance Change multipool strategy from failover to even share balance
  118. --benchmark Run cgminer in benchmark mode - produces no shares
  119. --compact Use compact display without per device statistics
  120. --debug|-D Enable debug output
  121. --device|-d <arg> Select device to use, one value, range and/or comma separated (e.g. 0-2,4) default: all
  122. --disable-rejecting Automatically disable pools that continually reject shares
  123. --expiry|-E <arg> Upper bound on how many seconds after getting work we consider a share from it stale (default: 120)
  124. --failover-only Don't leak work to backup pools when primary pool is lagging
  125. --fix-protocol Do not redirect to a different getwork protocol (eg. stratum)
  126. --hotplug <arg> Set hotplug check time to <arg> seconds (0=never default: 5) - only with libusb
  127. --kernel-path|-K <arg> Specify a path to where bitstream and kernel files are (default: "/usr/local/bin")
  128. --load-balance Change multipool strategy from failover to quota based balance
  129. --log|-l <arg> Interval in seconds between log output (default: 5)
  130. --lowmem Minimise caching of shares for low memory applications
  131. --monitor|-m <arg> Use custom pipe cmd for output messages
  132. --net-delay Impose small delays in networking to not overload slow routers
  133. --no-submit-stale Don't submit shares if they are detected as stale
  134. --pass|-p <arg> Password for bitcoin JSON-RPC server
  135. --per-device-stats Force verbose mode and output per-device statistics
  136. --protocol-dump|-P Verbose dump of protocol-level activities
  137. --queue|-Q <arg> Minimum number of work items to have queued (0 - 10) (default: 1)
  138. --quiet|-q Disable logging output, display status and errors
  139. --real-quiet Disable all output
  140. --remove-disabled Remove disabled devices entirely, as if they didn't exist
  141. --rotate <arg> Change multipool strategy from failover to regularly rotate at N minutes (default: 0)
  142. --round-robin Change multipool strategy from failover to round robin on failure
  143. --scan-time|-s <arg> Upper bound on time spent scanning current work, in seconds (default: 60)
  144. --sched-start <arg> Set a time of day in HH:MM to start mining (a once off without a stop time)
  145. --sched-stop <arg> Set a time of day in HH:MM to stop mining (will quit without a start time)
  146. --scrypt Use the scrypt algorithm for mining (litecoin only)
  147. --sharelog <arg> Append share log to file
  148. --shares <arg> Quit after mining N shares (default: unlimited)
  149. --socks-proxy <arg> Set socks4 proxy (host:port) for all pools without a proxy specified
  150. --syslog Use system log for output messages (default: standard error)
  151. --temp-cutoff <arg> Temperature where a device will be automatically disabled, one value or comma separated list (default: 95)
  152. --text-only|-T Disable ncurses formatted screen output
  153. --url|-o <arg> URL for bitcoin JSON-RPC server
  154. --user|-u <arg> Username for bitcoin JSON-RPC server
  155. --verbose Log verbose output to stderr as well as status output
  156. --userpass|-O <arg> Username:Password pair for bitcoin JSON-RPC server
  157. Options for command line only:
  158. --config|-c <arg> Load a JSON-format configuration file
  159. See example.conf for an example configuration.
  160. --help|-h Print this message
  161. --version|-V Display version and exit
  162. USB device (ASIC and FPGA) options:
  163. --icarus-options <arg> Set specific FPGA board configurations - one set of values for all or comma separated
  164. --icarus-timing <arg> Set how the Icarus timing is calculated - one setting/value for all or comma separated
  165. --usb <arg> USB device selection (See below)
  166. --usb-dump (See FPGA-README)
  167. See FGPA-README or ASIC-README for more information regarding these.
  168. ASIC only options:
  169. --avalon-auto Adjust avalon overclock frequency dynamically for best hashrate
  170. --avalon-fan <arg> Set fanspeed percentage for avalon, single value or range (default: 20-100)
  171. --avalon-freq <arg> Set frequency range for avalon-auto, single value or range
  172. --avalon-cutoff <arg> Set avalon overheat cut off temperature (default: 60)
  173. --avalon-options <arg> Set avalon options baud:miners:asic:timeout:freq
  174. --avalon-temp <arg> Set avalon target temperature (default: 50)
  175. --bflsc-overheat <arg> Set overheat temperature where BFLSC devices throttle, 0 to disable (default: 90)
  176. --bitburner-fury-options <arg> Override avalon-options for BitBurner Fury boards baud:miners:asic:timeout:freq
  177. --bitburner-fury-voltage <arg> Set BitBurner Fury core voltage, in millivolts
  178. --bitburner-voltage <arg> Set BitBurner (Avalon) core voltage, in millivolts
  179. --klondike-options <arg> Set klondike options clock:temptarget
  180. See ASIC-README for more information regarding these.
  181. FPGA only options:
  182. --bfl-range Use nonce range on bitforce devices if supported
  183. See FGPA-README for more information regarding this.
  184. GPU only options:
  185. --auto-fan Automatically adjust all GPU fan speeds to maintain a target temperature
  186. --auto-gpu Automatically adjust all GPU engine clock speeds to maintain a target temperature
  187. --disable-gpu|-G Disable GPU mining even if suitable devices exist
  188. --gpu-threads|-g <arg> Number of threads per GPU (1 - 10) (default: 2)
  189. --gpu-dyninterval <arg> Set the refresh interval in ms for GPUs using dynamic intensity (default: 7)
  190. --gpu-engine <arg> GPU engine (over)clock range in Mhz - one value, range and/or comma separated list (e.g. 850-900,900,750-850)
  191. --gpu-fan <arg> GPU fan percentage range - one value, range and/or comma separated list (e.g. 25-85,85,65)
  192. --gpu-map <arg> Map OpenCL to ADL device order manually, paired CSV (e.g. 1:0,2:1 maps OpenCL 1 to ADL 0, 2 to 1)
  193. --gpu-memclock <arg> Set the GPU memory (over)clock in Mhz - one value for all or separate by commas for per card.
  194. --gpu-memdiff <arg> Set a fixed difference in clock speed between the GPU and memory in auto-gpu mode
  195. --gpu-powertune <arg> Set the GPU powertune percentage - one value for all or separate by commas for per card.
  196. --gpu-reorder Attempt to reorder GPU devices according to PCI Bus ID
  197. --gpu-vddc <arg> Set the GPU voltage in Volts - one value for all or separate by commas for per card.
  198. --intensity|-I <arg> Intensity of GPU scanning (d or -10 -> 10, default: d to maintain desktop interactivity)
  199. --kernel|-k <arg> Override kernel to use (diablo, poclbm, phatk or diakgcn) - one value or comma separated
  200. --ndevs|-n Enumerate number of detected GPUs and exit
  201. --no-restart Do not attempt to restart GPUs that hang
  202. --temp-hysteresis <arg> Set how much the temperature can fluctuate outside limits when automanaging speeds (default: 3)
  203. --temp-overheat <arg> Overheat temperature when automatically managing fan and GPU speeds (default: 85)
  204. --temp-target <arg> Target temperature when automatically managing fan and GPU speeds (default: 75)
  205. --vectors|-v <arg> Override detected optimal vector (1, 2 or 4) - one value or comma separated list
  206. --worksize|-w <arg> Override detected optimal worksize - one value or comma separated list
  207. See GPU-README for more information regarding GPU mining.
  208. SCRYPT only options:
  209. --lookup-gap <arg> Set GPU lookup gap for scrypt mining, comma separated
  210. --shaders <arg> GPU shaders per card for tuning scrypt, comma separated
  211. --thread-concurrency <arg> Set GPU thread concurrency for scrypt mining, comma separated
  212. See SCRYPT-README for more information regarding litecoin mining.
  213. Cgminer should automatically find all of your Avalon ASIC, BFL ASIC, BitForce
  214. FPGAs, Icarus bitstream FPGAs, Klondike ASIC, ASICMINER usb block erupters,
  215. KnC ASICs, Hashfast ASICs and ModMiner FPGAs.
  216. ---
  217. SETTING UP USB DEVICES
  218. WINDOWS:
  219. On windows, the direct USB support requires the installation of a WinUSB
  220. driver (NOT the ftdi_sio driver), and attach it to your devices.
  221. The easiest way to do this is to use the zadig utility which will install the
  222. drivers for you and then once you plug in your device you can choose the
  223. "list all devices" from the "option" menu and you should be able to see the
  224. device as something like: "BitFORCE SHA256 SC". Choose the install or replace
  225. driver option and select WinUSB. You can either google for zadig or download
  226. it from the cgminer directoy in the DOWNLOADS link above.
  227. LINUX:
  228. On linux, the direct USB support requires no drivers at all. However due to
  229. permissions issues, you may not be able to mine directly on the devices as a
  230. regular user without giving the user access to the device or by mining as
  231. root (administrator). In order to give your regular user access, you can make
  232. him a member of the plugdev group with the following commands:
  233. sudo usermod -G plugdev -a `whoami`
  234. If your distribution does not have the plugdev group you can create it with:
  235. sudo groupadd plugdev
  236. In order for the BFL devices to instantly be owned by the plugdev group and
  237. accessible by anyone from the plugdev group you can copy the file
  238. "01-cgminer.rules" from the cgminer archive into the /etc/udev/rules.d
  239. directory with the following command:
  240. sudo cp 01-cgminer.rules /etc/udev/rules.d/
  241. After this you can either manually restart udev and re-login, or more easily
  242. just reboot.
  243. Advanced USB options:
  244. The --usb option can restrict how many Avalon, BFL ASIC, BitForce FPGAs,
  245. Klondike ASIC, ModMiner FPGAs or Icarus bitstream FPGAs it finds:
  246. --usb 1:2,1:3,1:4,1:*
  247. or
  248. --usb BAS:1,BFL:1,MMQ:0,ICA:0,KLN:0
  249. or
  250. --usb :10
  251. You can only use one of the above 3
  252. The first version
  253. --usb 1:2,1:3,1:4,1:*
  254. allows you to select which devices to mine on with a list of USB
  255. bus_number:device_address
  256. All other USB devices will be ignored
  257. Hotplug will also only look at the devices matching the list specified and
  258. find nothing new if they are all in use
  259. You can specify just the USB bus_number to find all devices like 1:*
  260. which means any devices on USB bus_number 1
  261. This is useful if you unplug a device then plug it back in the same port,
  262. it usually reappears with the same bus_number but a different device_address
  263. You can see the list of all USB devices on linux with 'sudo lsusb'
  264. Cgminer will list the recognised USB devices with the '-n' option or the
  265. '--usb-dump 0' option
  266. The '--usb-dump N' option with a value of N greater than 0 will dump a lot
  267. of details about each recognised USB device
  268. If you wish to see all USB devices, include the --usb-list-all option
  269. The second version
  270. --usb BAS:1,BFL:1,MMQ:0,ICA:0,KLN:0
  271. allows you to specify how many devices to choose based on each device
  272. driver cgminer has - there are currently 5 USB drivers: BAS, BFL, MMQ.
  273. ICA & KLN
  274. N.B. you can only specify which device driver to limit, not the type of
  275. each device, e.g. with BAS:n you can limit how many BFL ASIC devices will
  276. be checked, but you cannot limit the number of each type of BFL ASIC
  277. Also note that the MMQ count is the number of MMQ backplanes you have
  278. not the number of MMQ FPGAs
  279. The third version
  280. --usb :10
  281. means only use a maximum of 10 devices of any supported USB devices
  282. Once cgminer has 10 devices it will not configure any more and hotplug will
  283. not scan for any more
  284. If one of the 10 devices stops working, hotplug - if enabled, as is default
  285. - will scan normally again until it has 10 devices
  286. --usb :0 will disable all USB I/O other than to initialise libusb
  287. NOTE: The --device option will limit which devices are in use based on their
  288. numbering order of the total devices, so if you hotplug USB devices regularly,
  289. it will not reliably be the same devices.
  290. ---
  291. WHILE RUNNING:
  292. The following options are available while running with a single keypress:
  293. [P]ool management [G]PU management [S]ettings [D]isplay options [Q]uit
  294. P gives you:
  295. Current pool management strategy: Failover
  296. [F]ailover only disabled
  297. [A]dd pool [R]emove pool [D]isable pool [E]nable pool
  298. [C]hange management strategy [S]witch pool [I]nformation
  299. S gives you:
  300. [Q]ueue: 1
  301. [S]cantime: 60
  302. [E]xpiry: 120
  303. [W]rite config file
  304. [C]gminer restart
  305. D gives you:
  306. [N]ormal [C]lear [S]ilent mode (disable all output)
  307. [D]ebug:off
  308. [P]er-device:off
  309. [Q]uiet:off
  310. [V]erbose:off
  311. [R]PC debug:off
  312. [W]orkTime details:off
  313. co[M]pact: off
  314. [L]og interval:5
  315. Q quits the application.
  316. G gives you something like:
  317. GPU 0: [124.2 / 191.3 Mh/s] [A:77 R:33 HW:0 U:1.73/m WU 1.73/m]
  318. Temp: 67.0 C
  319. Fan Speed: 35% (2500 RPM)
  320. Engine Clock: 960 MHz
  321. Memory Clock: 480 Mhz
  322. Vddc: 1.200 V
  323. Activity: 93%
  324. Powertune: 0%
  325. Last initialised: [2011-09-06 12:03:56]
  326. Thread 0: 62.4 Mh/s Enabled ALIVE
  327. Thread 1: 60.2 Mh/s Enabled ALIVE
  328. [E]nable [D]isable [R]estart GPU [C]hange settings
  329. Or press any other key to continue
  330. The running log shows output like this:
  331. [2012-10-12 18:02:20] Accepted f0c05469 Diff 1/1 GPU 0 pool 1
  332. [2012-10-12 18:02:22] Accepted 218ac982 Diff 7/1 GPU 1 pool 1
  333. [2012-10-12 18:02:23] Accepted d8300795 Diff 1/1 GPU 3 pool 1
  334. [2012-10-12 18:02:24] Accepted 122c1ff1 Diff 14/1 GPU 1 pool 1
  335. The 8 byte hex value are the 2nd 8 bytes of the share being submitted to the
  336. pool. The 2 diff values are the actual difficulty target that share reached
  337. followed by the difficulty target the pool is currently asking for.
  338. ---
  339. Also many issues and FAQs are covered in the forum thread
  340. dedicated to this program,
  341. http://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=28402.0
  342. The output line shows the following:
  343. (5s):1713.6 (avg):1707.8 Mh/s | A:729 R:8 HW:0 WU:22.53/m
  344. Each column is as follows:
  345. 5s: A 5 second exponentially decaying average hash rate
  346. avg: An all time average hash rate
  347. A: The total difficulty of Accepted shares
  348. R: The total difficulty of Rejected shares
  349. HW: The number of HardWare errors
  350. WU: The Work Utility defined as the number of diff1 shares work / minute
  351. (accepted or rejected).
  352. GPU 1: 73.5C 2551RPM | 427.3/443.0Mh/s | A:8 R:0 HW:0 WU:4.39/m
  353. Each column is as follows:
  354. Temperature (if supported)
  355. Fanspeed (if supported)
  356. A 5 second exponentially decaying average hash rate
  357. An all time average hash rate
  358. The total difficulty of accepted shares
  359. The total difficulty of rejected shares
  360. The number of hardware erorrs
  361. The work utility defined as the number of diff1 shares work / minute
  362. The cgminer status line shows:
  363. ST: 1 SS: 0 NB: 1 LW: 8 GF: 1 RF: 1
  364. ST is STaged work items (ready to use).
  365. SS is Stale Shares discarded (detected and not submitted so don't count as rejects)
  366. NB is New Blocks detected on the network
  367. LW is Locally generated Work items
  368. GF is Getwork Fail Occasions (server slow to provide work)
  369. RF is Remote Fail occasions (server slow to accept work)
  370. The block display shows:
  371. Block: 0074c5e482e34a506d2a051a... Started: [17:17:22] Best share: 2.71K
  372. This shows a short stretch of the current block, when the new block started,
  373. and the all time best difficulty share you've found since starting cgminer
  374. this time.
  375. ---
  376. MULTIPOOL
  377. FAILOVER STRATEGIES WITH MULTIPOOL:
  378. A number of different strategies for dealing with multipool setups are
  379. available. Each has their advantages and disadvantages so multiple strategies
  380. are available by user choice, as per the following list:
  381. FAILOVER:
  382. The default strategy is failover. This means that if you input a number of
  383. pools, it will try to use them as a priority list, moving away from the 1st
  384. to the 2nd, 2nd to 3rd and so on. If any of the earlier pools recover, it will
  385. move back to the higher priority ones.
  386. ROUND ROBIN:
  387. This strategy only moves from one pool to the next when the current one falls
  388. idle and makes no attempt to move otherwise.
  389. ROTATE:
  390. This strategy moves at user-defined intervals from one active pool to the next,
  391. skipping pools that are idle.
  392. LOAD BALANCE:
  393. This strategy sends work to all the pools on a quota basis. By default, all
  394. pools are allocated equal quotas unless specified with --quota. This
  395. apportioning of work is based on work handed out, not shares returned so is
  396. independent of difficulty targets or rejected shares. While a pool is disabled
  397. or dead, its quota is dropped until it is re-enabled. Quotas are forward
  398. looking, so if the quota is changed on the fly, it only affects future work.
  399. If all pools are set to zero quota or all pools with quota are dead, it will
  400. fall back to a failover mode. See quota below for more information.
  401. The failover-only flag has special meaning in combination with load-balance
  402. mode and it will distribute quota back to priority pool 0 from any pools that
  403. are unable to provide work for any reason so as to maintain quota ratios
  404. between the rest of the pools.
  405. BALANCE:
  406. This strategy monitors the amount of difficulty 1 shares solved for each pool
  407. and uses it to try to end up doing the same amount of work for all pools.
  408. ---
  409. QUOTAS
  410. The load-balance multipool strategy works off a quota based scheduler. The
  411. quotas handed out by default are equal, but the user is allowed to specify any
  412. arbitrary ratio of quotas. For example, if all the quota values add up to 100,
  413. each quota value will be a percentage, but if 2 pools are specified and pool0
  414. is given a quota of 1 and pool1 is given a quota of 9, pool0 will get 10% of
  415. the work and pool1 will get 90%. Quotas can be changed on the fly by the API,
  416. and do not act retrospectively. Setting a quota to zero will effectively
  417. disable that pool unless all other pools are disabled or dead. In that
  418. scenario, load-balance falls back to regular failover priority-based strategy.
  419. While a pool is dead, it loses its quota and no attempt is made to catch up
  420. when it comes back to life.
  421. To specify quotas on the command line, pools should be specified with a
  422. semicolon separated --quota(or -U) entry instead of --url. Pools specified with
  423. --url are given a nominal quota value of 1 and entries can be mixed.
  424. For example:
  425. --url poola:porta -u usernamea -p passa --quota "2;poolb:portb" -u usernameb -p passb
  426. Will give poola 1/3 of the work and poolb 2/3 of the work.
  427. Writing configuration files with quotas is likewise supported. To use the above
  428. quotas in a configuration file they would be specified thus:
  429. "pools" : [
  430. {
  431. "url" : "poola:porta",
  432. "user" : "usernamea",
  433. "pass" : "passa"
  434. },
  435. {
  436. "quota" : "2;poolb:portb",
  437. "user" : "usernameb",
  438. "pass" : "passb"
  439. }
  440. ]
  441. ---
  442. LOGGING
  443. cgminer will log to stderr if it detects stderr is being redirected to a file.
  444. To enable logging simply add 2>logfile.txt to your command line and logfile.txt
  445. will contain the logged output at the log level you specify (normal, verbose,
  446. debug etc.)
  447. In other words if you would normally use:
  448. ./cgminer -o xxx -u yyy -p zzz
  449. if you use
  450. ./cgminer -o xxx -u yyy -p zzz 2>logfile.txt
  451. it will log to a file called logfile.txt and otherwise work the same.
  452. There is also the -m option on linux which will spawn a command of your choice
  453. and pipe the output directly to that command.
  454. The WorkTime details 'debug' option adds details on the end of each line
  455. displayed for Accepted or Rejected work done. An example would be:
  456. <-00000059.ed4834a3 M:X D:1.0 G:17:02:38:0.405 C:1.855 (2.995) W:3.440 (0.000) S:0.461 R:17:02:47
  457. The first 2 hex codes are the previous block hash, the rest are reported in
  458. seconds unless stated otherwise:
  459. The previous hash is followed by the getwork mode used M:X where X is one of
  460. P:Pool, T:Test Pool, L:LP or B:Benchmark,
  461. then D:d.ddd is the difficulty required to get a share from the work,
  462. then G:hh:mm:ss:n.nnn, which is when the getwork or LP was sent to the pool and
  463. the n.nnn is how long it took to reply,
  464. followed by 'O' on it's own if it is an original getwork, or 'C:n.nnn' if it was
  465. a clone with n.nnn stating how long after the work was recieved that it was cloned,
  466. (m.mmm) is how long from when the original work was received until work started,
  467. W:n.nnn is how long the work took to process until it was ready to submit,
  468. (m.mmm) is how long from ready to submit to actually doing the submit, this is
  469. usually 0.000 unless there was a problem with submitting the work,
  470. S:n.nnn is how long it took to submit the completed work and await the reply,
  471. R:hh:mm:ss is the actual time the work submit reply was received
  472. If you start cgminer with the --sharelog option, you can get detailed
  473. information for each share found. The argument to the option may be "-" for
  474. standard output (not advisable with the ncurses UI), any valid positive number
  475. for that file descriptor, or a filename.
  476. To log share data to a file named "share.log", you can use either:
  477. ./cgminer --sharelog 50 -o xxx -u yyy -p zzz 50>share.log
  478. ./cgminer --sharelog share.log -o xxx -u yyy -p zzz
  479. For every share found, data will be logged in a CSV (Comma Separated Value)
  480. format:
  481. timestamp,disposition,target,pool,dev,thr,sharehash,sharedata
  482. For example (this is wrapped, but it's all on one line for real):
  483. 1335313090,reject,
  484. ffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff00000000,
  485. http://localhost:8337,GPU0,0,
  486. 6f983c918f3299b58febf95ec4d0c7094ed634bc13754553ec34fc3800000000,
  487. 00000001a0980aff4ce4a96d53f4b89a2d5f0e765c978640fe24372a000001c5
  488. 000000004a4366808f81d44f26df3d69d7dc4b3473385930462d9ab707b50498
  489. f681634a4f1f63d01a0cd43fb338000000000080000000000000000000000000
  490. 0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000080020000
  491. ---
  492. RPC API
  493. For RPC API details see the API-README file
  494. ---
  495. FAQ
  496. Q: Can I mine on servers from different networks (eg smartcoin and bitcoin) at
  497. the same time?
  498. A: No, cgminer keeps a database of the block it's working on to ensure it does
  499. not work on stale blocks, and having different blocks from two networks would
  500. make it invalidate the work from each other.
  501. Q: Can I configure cgminer to mine with different login credentials or pools
  502. for each separate device?
  503. A: No.
  504. Q: Can I put multiple pools in the config file?
  505. A: Yes, check the example.conf file. Alternatively, set up everything either on
  506. the command line or via the menu after startup and choose settings->write
  507. config file and the file will be loaded one each startup.
  508. Q: The build fails with gcc is unable to build a binary.
  509. A: Remove the "-march=native" component of your CFLAGS as your version of gcc
  510. does not support it.
  511. Q: Can you implement feature X?
  512. A: I can, but time is limited, and people who donate are more likely to get
  513. their feature requests implemented.
  514. Q: Work keeps going to my backup pool even though my primary pool hasn't
  515. failed?
  516. A: Cgminer checks for conditions where the primary pool is lagging and will
  517. pass some work to the backup servers under those conditions. The reason for
  518. doing this is to try its absolute best to keep the GPUs working on something
  519. useful and not risk idle periods. You can disable this behaviour with the
  520. option --failover-only.
  521. Q: Is this a virus?
  522. A: Cgminer is being packaged with other trojan scripts and some antivirus
  523. software is falsely accusing cgminer.exe as being the actual virus, rather
  524. than whatever it is being packaged with. If you installed cgminer yourself,
  525. then you do not have a virus on your computer. Complain to your antivirus
  526. software company. They seem to be flagging even source code now from cgminer
  527. as viruses, even though text source files can't do anything by themself.
  528. Q: Can you modify the display to include more of one thing in the output and
  529. less of another, or can you change the quiet mode or can you add yet another
  530. output mode?
  531. A: Everyone will always have their own view of what's important to monitor.
  532. The defaults are very sane and I have very little interest in changing this
  533. any further.
  534. Q: What are the best parameters to pass for X pool/hardware/device.
  535. A: Virtually always, the DEFAULT parameters give the best results. Most user
  536. defined settings lead to worse performance. The ONLY thing most users should
  537. need to set is the Intensity for GPUs.
  538. Q: What happened to CPU mining?
  539. A: Being increasingly irrelevant for most users, and a maintenance issue, it is
  540. no longer under active development and will not be supported. No binary builds
  541. supporting CPU mining will be released. Virtually all remaining users of CPU
  542. mining are as back ends for illegal botnets. The main reason cgminer is being
  543. inappopriately tagged as a virus by antivirus software is due to the trojans
  544. packaging a CPU mining capable version of it. There is no longer ANY CPU mining
  545. code in cgminer. If you are mining bitcoin with CPU today, you are spending
  546. 1000x more in electricity costs than you are earning in bitcoin.
  547. Q: GUI version?
  548. A: No. The RPC interface makes it possible for someone else to write one
  549. though.
  550. Q: I'm having an issue. What debugging information should I provide?
  551. A: Start cgminer with your regular commands and add -D -T --verbose and provide
  552. the full startup output and a summary of your hardware, operating system, ATI
  553. driver version and ATI stream version.
  554. Q: Why don't you provide win64 builds?
  555. A: Win32 builds work everywhere and there is precisely zero advantage to a
  556. 64 bit build on windows.
  557. Q: Is it faster to mine on windows or linux?
  558. A: It makes no difference. It comes down to choice of operating system for
  559. their various features. Linux offers much better long term stability and
  560. remote monitoring and security, while windows offers you overclocking tools
  561. that can achieve much more than cgminer can do on linux.
  562. Q: Can I mine with cgminer on a MAC?
  563. A: cgminer will compile on OSX, but the performance of GPU mining is
  564. compromised due to the opencl implementation on OSX, there is no temperature
  565. or fanspeed monitoring, and the cooling design of most MACs, despite having
  566. powerful GPUs, will usually not cope with constant usage leading to a high
  567. risk of thermal damage. It is highly recommended not to mine on a MAC unless
  568. it is to a USB device.
  569. Q: I'm trying to mine litecoin but cgminer shows MH values instead of kH and
  570. submits no shares?
  571. A: Add the --scrypt parameter.
  572. Q: I switch users on windows and my mining stops working?
  573. A: That's correct, it does. It's a permissions issue that there is no known
  574. fix for due to monitoring of GPU fanspeeds and temperatures. If you disable
  575. the monitoring with --no-adl it should switch okay.
  576. Q: My network gets slower and slower and then dies for a minute?
  577. A; Try the --net-delay option.
  578. Q: How do I tune for p2pool?
  579. A: p2pool has very rapid expiration of work and new blocks, it is suggested you
  580. decrease intensity by 1 from your optimal value, and decrease GPU threads to 1
  581. with -g 1. It is also recommended to use --failover-only since the work is
  582. effectively like a different block chain. If mining with a minirig, it is worth
  583. adding the --bfl-range option.
  584. Q: Are OpenCL kernels from other mining software useable in cgminer?
  585. A: No, the APIs are slightly different between the different software and they
  586. will not work.
  587. Q: I run PHP on windows to access the API with the example miner.php. Why does
  588. it fail when php is installed properly but I only get errors about Sockets not
  589. working in the logs?
  590. A: http://us.php.net/manual/en/sockets.installation.php
  591. Q: What is a PGA?
  592. A: At the moment, cgminer supports 3 FPGAs: BitForce, Icarus and ModMiner.
  593. They are Field-Programmable Gate Arrays that have been programmed to do Bitcoin
  594. mining. Since the acronym needs to be only 3 characters, the "Field-" part has
  595. been skipped.
  596. Q: What is an ASIC?
  597. A: Cgminer currently supports 2 ASICs: Avalon and BitForce SC devices. They
  598. are Application Specify Integrated Circuit devices and provide the highest
  599. performance per unit power due to being dedicated to only one purpose.
  600. Q: Can I mine scrypt with FPGAs or ASICs?
  601. A: No.
  602. Q: What is stratum and how do I use it?
  603. A: Stratum is a protocol designed for pooled mining in such a way as to
  604. minimise the amount of network communications, yet scale to hardware of any
  605. speed. With versions of cgminer 2.8.0+, if a pool has stratum support, cgminer
  606. will automatically detect it and switch to the support as advertised if it can.
  607. If you input the stratum port directly into your configuration, or use the
  608. special prefix "stratum+tcp://" instead of "http://", cgminer will ONLY try to
  609. use stratum protocol mining. The advantages of stratum to the miner are no
  610. delays in getting more work for the miner, less rejects across block changes,
  611. and far less network communications for the same amount of mining hashrate. If
  612. you do NOT wish cgminer to automatically switch to stratum protocol even if it
  613. is detected, add the --fix-protocol option.
  614. Q: Why don't the statistics add up: Accepted, Rejected, Stale, Hardware Errors,
  615. Diff1 Work, etc. when mining greater than 1 difficulty shares?
  616. A: As an example, if you look at 'Difficulty Accepted' in the RPC API, the number
  617. of difficulty shares accepted does not usually exactly equal the amount of work
  618. done to find them. If you are mining at 8 difficulty, then you would expect on
  619. average to find one 8 difficulty share, per 8 single difficulty shares found.
  620. However, the number is actually random and converges over time, it is an average,
  621. not an exact value, thus you may find more or less than the expected average.
  622. Q: Why do the scrypt diffs not match with the current difficulty target?
  623. A: The current scrypt block difficulty is expressed in terms of how many
  624. multiples of the BTC difficulty it currently is (eg 28) whereas the shares of
  625. "difficulty 1" are actually 65536 times smaller than the BTC ones. The diff
  626. expressed by cgminer is as multiples of difficulty 1 shares.
  627. Q: Can I make a donation in litecoin?
  628. A: Yes, see SCRYPT-README for the address, but the author prefers bitcoin if
  629. possible.
  630. Q: My keyboard input momentarily pauses or repeats keys every so often on
  631. windows while mining?
  632. A: The USB implementation on windows can be very flaky on some hardware and
  633. every time cgminer looks for new hardware to hotplug it it can cause these
  634. sorts of problems. You can disable hotplug with:
  635. --hotplug 0
  636. Q: What should my Work Utility (WU) be?
  637. A: Work utility is the product of hashrate * luck and only stabilises over a
  638. very long period of time. Assuming all your work is valid work, bitcoin mining
  639. should produce a work utility of approximately 1 per 71.6MH. This means at
  640. 5GH you should have a WU of 5000 / 71.6 or ~ 69. You cannot make your machine
  641. do "better WU" than this - it is luck related. However you can make it much
  642. worse if your machine produces a lot of hardware errors producing invalid work.
  643. ---
  644. This code is provided entirely free of charge by the programmer in his spare
  645. time so donations would be greatly appreciated. Please consider donating to the
  646. address below.
  647. Con Kolivas <kernel@kolivas.org>
  648. 15qSxP1SQcUX3o4nhkfdbgyoWEFMomJ4rZ