Please NOTE: This page is an archive! For the most up-to-date information you will want to visit my new site:
https://www.zcashcommunity.com/mining/mining-pools/
For many of us who don’t have a huge mining farm at our disposal our best chance to get some Zcash will be to join a pool.
Pools are great for smaller miners because if the pool does win a block each of the workers contributing to the pool gets a portion of that block based on the percent you contributed to the pool. But joining a pool has a few drawbacks that you also need to know about: First of all is pool fees, many pools charge a fee to help the maintainer of the pool pay for server costs and of course make some profit. The other drawback of a pool is that you have to trust the pool operator! Since they are paying you based on the hash power you contribute to the pool you have be sure they are honest about the calculations . I strongly advise you to do some homework about who is behind the pool and the reputation they have before joining any pool.
So lets jump in!
I’m going to assume you have followed my other guide about getting started mining you will know about using the embedded zcashd miner by starting with ./src/zcashd -daemon . That miner works well for CPU mining solo (be sure to add the Trump solver!) but for mining on a pool you will need to learn a few more commands to tell it where to connect to.
- zcashd -daemon (starts the miner)
- -stratum= (each pool will have a different stratum address check the pool site for details)
- -user= (this is the user account you made with the pool)
- -password= (this is the password you made with the pool)
- -debug (this creates a log)
- -printtoconsole (this shows the connection status in the terminal window)
So when we are ready to join a pool we will run ./src/zcashd -daemon -stratum=poolstratum -user=username.worker -password=yourpass -debug –printtoconsole
IMPORTANT: That code is just an example you will need to fill in that command line with the correct information depending on which pool you choose!
Below is a list of pools I know of, I try to keep this list up to date as I can
http://zcash.flypool.org/ (This one uses nice hash miner, see site for instructions)
https://zmine.io/ (this one is using str4d’s standalone miner, see site for instructions)
These links are provided to help you find a pool, proceed at your own risk! mineZcash.com is not directly affiliated with any pool and does not recommend any pool over another so don’t ask. If you own a pool and would like to be included on this list please send me an email feedback@minezcash.com
If you found this information useful you can buy me a Starbucks coffee: 15VZNqUazPKoK8rJMFb5XUzuB4o6Ww6xD3 (BTC)
