I've made about $300 in the last 2 weeks using these methods (and 5 dedicated servers, and 3 aws instances).
Protoshares are a alternate cryptocoin (altcoin) similar to Bitcoin. However, unlike Bitcoin they are desgined to be mined
using CPU power, instead of GPU or ASIC power. Currently, with 1 protoshare trading at about $25 USD, it is very profitable
to mine protoshares.
There are 2 ways to mine protoshare: pooled or solo. Solo involves you searching for an entire block of protoshares, which with the current dificulty and hashrate would take a very long time. The other way to mine protoshares is with a pool. Thisway, instead of everyone looking for a block, the entire pool coordinates thier efforts in looking for a block. This way,
you will earn small ammounts of protoshares every time a block is found by the pool, proportional to the ammount of work that you contributed.
There a variety of pools to chose from (listed in the description), but for the purpose of this guide we will be using the ypool mining pool (which also supports feathercoin and primecoin mining). So create an account on ypool, switch to protoshares on the banner, then workers->workers on the left banner and add a new worker. Now, you'll need to setup a miner to connect to the pool.
apt-get install screen
wget http://shockbyte.com/jhprotominer.tgz
tar -xf jhprotominer.tgz
screen
cd jhprotominer
//You'll now see a bunch of folders named linux64-generic-XXXXM or something. The XXXX refers to the ammount of memory used per
//CPU thread. You'll need to calculate how much memory you can use per thread. (Note: number of threads often equals number of
cpu cores on desktop processors, you'll need to look up the number of threads if you are using a server). I'm using 512MB ram
per thread for this example
cd linux64-generic-512M
./jhprotominer -o ypool.net -u <workername> -p <password> -t <number of threads>
Ctrl+a+d
I also included a aws.autostart script in the archive. Just edit the script to your desired memory, username and password, then run
in a screen. Press Ctrl+a+d to detach from the screen and return to a normal shell.
Windows:
Goto https://mega.co.nz/#F!h0tkXSxZ!f62uoUXogkxQmP2xO8Ib-g
Download the package applicable to your processor and architecture.
Extract the package to your desired location
Create a new shortcut
Edit the properties to location: C:/<your location>/jhprotominer<version>/win<64/32>-generic-XXM/jhprotominer -o ypool.net -u
<workername> -p <password> -t <threads>
So now you have a worker or 2 (or more) mining protoshares for you. You'll need a way to exchange these for other cryptocoins or money.
You can use either bter of cryptsy for this purpose. Simply register on either site, get a deposit address, then set ypool to payout to
that address.
Congradulations and good luck!!
(If you have any questions please let me know and I will do my best to help)
If this guide helps you, please consider making a donation at the addreses below.
Links:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=325261.0 <- Info about protoshares.
http://beeeeer.org <- Mining Pool
http://bitsharestalk.org/index.php?topic=564.0 <- Hardware Comparison
https://mega.co.nz/#F!h0tkXSxZ!f62uoUXogkxQmP2xO8Ib-g <-Mining software downloads for all processors, OS's, and architectures.
https://www.cryptsy.com <-Protosharees exchange
http://bter.com <- Another exchange
http://coin2pal.info <- Sell bitcoins for paypal payments
Donations:
BTC: 17gXNb1F4oRc9AAJmyWWj46iSAHf3haZ1e
