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If you are mining Bitcoin, you do not need to calculate the total value of the 64-digit number (the hash). I repeat: You do not need to figure the entire value of a hash.

Remember that ELI5 analogy, in which I composed the number 19 on a piece of newspaper and put it in a sealed envelope

In Bitcoin mining terms, that metaphorical undisclosed number in the envelope is called the objective hash.

What miners are doing with those tremendous computers and dozens of cooling fans is guessing in the target hash. Miners make these guesses by randomly generating as many"nonces" as possible, as quickly as possible. A nonce is short for"number only used once," and also the nonce is the key to generating these 64-bit hexadecimal numbers I keep talking about.

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The first miner whose nonce generates a hash that is less than or equal to the target hash is awarded credit for completing that block, and is given the spoils of 12.5 BTC. .

In theory you can achieve the same goal by rolling a 16-sided expire 64 days to Reach random numbers, but why on earth would you want to do that

The screenshot below, taken from the site Blockchain.info, might enable you to put all this information together in a glance. You are looking at a summary of everything which happened when block 490163 was mined. The nonce that generated the "winning" hash was 731511405. The goal hash is shown on top.

As you see here, their contribution to the Bitcoin community is they confirmed 1768 transactions for this cube. If you really want to find all 1768 of those transactions for this block, go to this page and scroll down to the heading"Transactions." .

There is no minimum target, but there's a maximum goal determined by the Bitcoin Protocol. No target can be greater than this number:

Here are some examples of randomized hashes and also the criteria for if they will lead to success for your miner:

You'd have to find a fast mining rig or, more realistically, join a mining pool--a bunch of miners who combine YOURURL.com their computing ability and split the mined bitcoin. Mining pools are similar to people Powerball clubs whose members buy lottery tickets en masse and agree to discuss any winnings. A disproportionately large number of blocks are mined by pools rather than by individual miners. .

In other words, it is literally just a numbers game.  You cannot guess the pattern or make a prediction based on previous target hashes. The difficulty level of the most recent block at the time of writing is 2,874,674,234,416, i.e. the chance of any given nonce producing a hash beneath the target is just 1 in 2,874,674,234,416--significantly less than 1 in two trillion. .

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The aforementioned website Cryptocompare offers my site a helpful calculator that allows you to plug in numbers like your hash rate, power prices etc. to estimate the costs and benefits.

Mining rewards are paid to the miner who discovers a solution to the puzzle , and also the likelihood that a participant is going to be the one to find the solution is equivalent to the portion of the entire mining energy on the network.  Participants with a small percentage of the mining capability stand a tiny chance of discovering the next block on their own.  For instance, a mining card that one could buy to get a few thousand dollars would represent less than 0.001% of the network's mining power.  With such a small chance at finding the next block, it could be a long time before that miner finds a block, and the difficulty going up makes things even worse.  The miner may never recover their investment.  The answer to this predicament is mining pools.  Mining pools are run by third parties and coordinate groups of miners.  By working together in a swimming pool and sharing the payouts amongst participants, miners can find a steady stream of bitcoin starting the afternoon that they trigger their miner.  Statistics on a few of the mining pools can be seen on Blockchain.info. .

Sure. As mentioned, the simplest way to get Bitcoin is to purchase it on an exchange like Coinbase.com. Alternately, you can always leverage the"pickaxe plan". This relies on the old saw that during the 1848 California gold rush, the wise investment was not to pan for gold, but rather to create the pickaxes taken for mining.

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In a crypto context, the pickaxe equivalent are a company that manufactures equpiment used for Bitcoin mining. You can start looking into companies that make ASICs miners or GPU miners. .