We worked on The Mining NFT project. A look at the project and the 4070Ti/3080Ti rigs

In this short 2023 video (in French), we present the five mining rigs we assembled for The Mining NFT project, with RTX 4070 Ti and RTX 3080 Ti cards, then explain how this project combining mining and NFTs works. It was the kind of job we rarely saw during that downturn in mining.

Video from 2023: the prices below date from that time. See "What about today?" at the end of the article.

Five rigs of eight cards

For this project, we built five rigs with eight graphics cards each:

• three RTX 4070 Ti rigs, NVIDIA's new generation. These cards could then be found for about €1,000, a price we consider fair given their efficiency, much better than that of the 3000 series cards, including the famous RTX 3070;
• two RTX 3080 Ti rigs, built with the cards the client already owned, a few of them second-hand.

At first, the client wanted RTX 3080 Ti cards for all the rigs. But these cards were becoming hard to find new and were still fairly expensive, so we thought it better to switch to the RTX 4070 Ti for the other rigs.

The rig configuration

• Motherboard: B250 boards that take 12 GPUs, more than enough for eight;
• CPU: Intel G4400;
• Memory: 8 GB of DDR4;
• Operating system: HiveOS, installed on an SSD;
• Risers: V010S+ models with double capacitors;
• Frame: a custom structure, long enough to leave enough space between the cards;
• Cooling: 100 CFM fans on one side, really powerful but a little noisy, and 50 CFM fans on the other side for extraction.

How The Mining NFT works, as presented by the project

The project links a mining farm to a collection of NFTs depicting pixel-art graphics cards. Each NFT has its own characteristics (card colour, number of fans, etc.), which give it more or less power on the mining farm.

According to the project, holding one of these NFTs entitles you to a share of the mining income, paid as rewards in a token called GPU. The NFT can also be resold on NFT marketplaces, and its promoters say it may gain value.

A first batch of NFTs was already reserved for a private sale, at several hundred euros each. There was no public sale at that stage: one was planned for a second batch.

A formula close to cloud mining

We compare this model to cloud mining, where you rent computing power. Here, you buy an NFT and receive a return from mining in exchange, without having to look after the hardware. We also point out its limit: it is probably a little less profitable than owning your own hardware, even though you then have no breakdowns, warranties, after-sales service, maintenance or power cuts to deal with.

In our view, it is an interesting project that combines mining and NFTs. We also had caps and T-shirts made, mainly intended as gifts for customers.

What about today?

This video presents the project as it was in 2023; we do not comment here on how it has developed since. The context of GPU mining, however, has changed: after the end of Ethereum mining in September 2022, the arrival of Kaspa ASICs in 2023 made Kaspa GPU mining marginal. Before taking part in a project of this kind, check its current situation.

To see in detail how a rig like these is built, read our tutorial on building an 8 × RTX 4070 Ti rig. Would you rather hand over the upkeep of your machines? Have a look at our miner hosting, or contact us with any questions.

This article summarises the content of the video and does not constitute investment advice.