GPU Mining: CGMiner


Step 1 -  Downloading the Miner
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Windows users, you can grab the windows build of cgminer from here. Compiled by me of course <3

If you would feel more comfortable building it yourself, I understand. Download the latest of the git tree and follow the instructions in the included windows-build.txt file.


If you downloaded the prebuild binarys, please extract it somewhere. Your desktop maybe? It doesn't matter.

Step 2 - Making A .bat File
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Go into your new cgminer folder, right click in an empty white space, go to New -------> and click Text Document. Open the new file you made.
Click on File, and click on Save As. A new window will open, asking you where to save and what to name it as. You should still be in your cgminer folder.

Make sure you add .bat to the end of the file name, and change the "Text Documents" to All Files.

Once your settings match the above, click save. It should create a .bat file. If it doesn't then you did something wrong.


Step 3 - Configurating - Setting Up A Pool
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Now we can move onto the hard part. We have to configure cgminer, so lets start with the basics, lets set the pool up. Any pool will work as long as you have the username and password correct.

If you would rather use another pool you can find others on the mining pools wiki page.


cgminer --scrypt -o http://notroll.in:6332 -u Username.1 -p 12345


cgminer - That is telling the bat file that you want to execute cgminer, and whatever follows it as the configuration.


--scrypt - Telling cgminer to mine scrypt.


-o http://notroll.in:6332 - This is telling cgminer that the pool you want to connect to is http://notroll.in:6332, notice how it includes the port at the end.


-u Username.1 - This tells cgminer what username you want to log onto the pool with. Username should be replaced with your username/worker on the pool. The .1, that is the worker. By default on a lot of pools the default worker is .1, that is why I have it here.


-p x - Another pool setting for cgminer, this simply sets the password. The password is usually defined on the workers page of a pool. It is usually x or 1 by default.


So, now I have to tell you that was the easy part. The next part I can't really help you all that much, it mostly depends on you to figure it out yourself if it doesn't work correctly.


Step 4 - Configurating - Finding the Right Settings
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Recommended to set (And kinda sorta required):

cgminer --scrypt -o http://notroll.in:6332 -u Username.1 -p x --shaders #### --intensity ## --worksize ### -g #


A lot. Yeah. Let me break it down one at a time.


--shaders #### - This tries to choose the best settings for mining scrypt on your graphics cards. It does mathy witchcraft stuff to chooses the best settings for your gpu based on your shaders.

To find the best number for this, look at the table in this post, find your gpu and set this setting as the number of shaders your card has.


--intensity ## - This sets the "intensity" of the gpu scanning. A high number is good for dedicated miners, a lower mining should be used if you plan on using your desktop. Most cards do well at 12 for desktop usage and 13+ for dedicated mining.


--worksize ### - Tweaking this can improve your performance.
Try 256, 128, or 64. Larger doesn't equal better sometimes.


-g # - Sets the threads per gpu. You usually want to keep this at 1


Some notes:
- For multible gpu setups, you can use commas to control both cards. Say you have two cards and one does better at worksize 128 and another at 256, just set --worksize 128,256 in the order of your gpus.

- You may not get the results you expect. I suggest you search or browse the scrypt cgminer thread for other users optimal settings.