{"id":10991,"date":"2022-02-08T14:31:09","date_gmt":"2022-02-08T14:31:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mailinvest.blog\/index.php\/2022\/02\/08\/why-mining-crypto-will-murder-your-laptop\/"},"modified":"2022-02-08T14:31:09","modified_gmt":"2022-02-08T14:31:09","slug":"why-mining-crypto-will-murder-your-laptop","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mailinvest.blog\/index.php\/2022\/02\/08\/why-mining-crypto-will-murder-your-laptop\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Mining Crypto Will Murder Your Laptop"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Laptops and mining crypto<\/a> don\u2019t mix. Even a gaming laptop<\/a> doesn\u2019t have the hardware to go all-out 24\/7. Using your laptop as a mining rig is a good way to damage the hardware\u2014and it won\u2019t be able to mine well.<\/p>\n

What Crypto Mining Does to a Computer<\/h2>\n

Whether you\u2019re mining Bitcoin<\/a>, Ethereum<\/a>, or any other cryptocurrency<\/a> that uses proof-of-work, \u201cmining\u201d works a bit like guessing the combination to a lock. On a three-tumbler lock, you\u2019d definitely get the right combination within 1000 tries, because there are only 1000 combinations of numbers between 000 and 999. Add one digit and that list of combinations goes up an order of magnitude with 10000 possibilities.<\/p>\n

Now imagine an encrypted puzzle with billions or trillions of possible combinations and you have to repeatedly guess until you get the right one. That\u2019s mining: a computationally trivial transaction verification accompanied by a brute-force guessing game where whoever has the fastest computer has the greatest chance of getting to the right number first. The reward for winning is cryptocurrency.<\/p>\n

GPUs are the computer component that\u2019s best at mining current popular cryptocurrencies and they\u2019ll run at full tilt to crunch those numbers, generating heat and pushing every component that supports the GPU to its limit.<\/p>\n

This isn\u2019t necessarily a problem for desktop GPUs. A GPU used for mining may still have a good lifespan ahead of it if it was properly cooled<\/a>. However, a laptop is\u00a0very\u00a0<\/em>different from a mining rig.<\/p>\n

Laptops Are Not Designed For This<\/h2>\n

Most laptops, even high-end ones for gaming and creative professional work, are not designed to run at peak capacity 24\/7. Instead, they ramp up performance as needed and keep heat and power levels as low as possible the rest of the time. Even heavy workloads, such as playing a AAA video game for hours, don\u2019t peg your computer\u2019s CPU and GPU at 100%. Instead, the load is dynamic, providing small opportunities to dump heat.<\/p>\n

Video editing and even encoding video projects also don\u2019t reach the sustained load of mining cryptocurrencies. Instead, it\u2019s more like a torture test for your components: the sort of thing you might do for 24 hours to make sure everything is working properly, and then never again.<\/p>\n

There are laptops that are designed as number-crunching workstations, but these computers are better described as \u201cportable\u201d rather than mobile computers. Some of these workstation laptops have socketed desktop CPUs, which are designed to suck power from a wall outlet and really push those thermal limits. Unless you have one of these behemoths, your laptop probably wasn\u2019t made to handle the stresses of mining.<\/p>\n

Fans Wear Out<\/h2>\n
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Modern laptops don\u2019t have many moving parts anymore. Mechanical hard drives and optical drives are quickly going the way of the dodo, but computers still use spinning fans to move air through the system and carry heat with it.<\/p>\n

The longer and faster your fans spin, the sooner they\u2019ll seize up and need replacement. Replacing a desktop case or processor fan is fairly trivial, but laptops don\u2019t use off-the-shelf cooling components. So don\u2019t expect to replace them as easily.<\/p>\n

Modern laptops dynamically adjust fan speeds to match the thermal load, with some even switching them off when the system is only under a light load. If you\u2019re mining cryptocurrency, they\u2019ll be screaming headlong towards the end.<\/p>\n

Thermal Battery Aging<\/h2>\n

While most of your electronic components will probably be fine as long as they stay within the rated safe temperate range, one component that might not take the heat well is the laptop\u2019s battery. Lithium-ion batteries should operate between -20 \u00b0C to 60 \u00b0C depending on the specific application and manufacturer recommendation. If they are exposed to temperatures higher than that, they can degrade and have their lifespans shortened due to an effect known as thermal aging.<\/p>\n

In 2018, Shuai Ma and colleagues published a paper on thermal impact and lithium-ion batteries<\/a>. They cite research showing that lithium batteries subjected to 75\u00a0\u00b0C for a few days show severe degradation. While that doesn\u2019t mean sustained high temperatures in your laptop will kill your batteries quickly, it\u2019s worth remembering that components like the GPU can hit temperatures close to 100\u00a0\u00b0C, especially in a laptop where the line between \u201csafe\u201d and \u201ctoo hot\u201d is very thin.<\/p>\n

Laptops Are Bad at Mining, Anyway<\/h2>\n

Setting aside the fact that using your laptop as a crypto mining device might stress it into an early grave, laptops just aren\u2019t very good mining systems. Your laptop will start throttling performance at the point where the cooling system can\u2019t keep temperatures in check anymore. Also, laptops aren\u2019t energy efficient at mining. The typical laptop that\u2019s fast enough to mine anything at all will likely use more electricity than the little bit of money it makes\u2014unless you were planning on mooching electricity from your workplace or school. Don\u2019t do that.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a reason miners use ASICs (Application-specific Integrated Circuits) or specific models of GPU with the right power, cost, and performance ratio. The margins on mining are already razor-thin, so using something as ill-suited to mining as a laptop just doesn\u2019t make sense.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n