Mining Roundup: Multipools, Doge on Amazon EC2 and 11GH/s USB Sticks

With data centres full of mining racks and malicious actors dropping cryptocurrency mining libraries into mobile malware, new and unexpected technological developments still crop up to make things interesting.

Customers can utilize HashPlex's own mining gear, cloud-style, or mining gear can be sent to the company's data centre in the Seattle area - either mining units a customer already has or ones currently on order with mining manufacturers.

HashPlex's hosted pricing is based on kilowatts per month, and it has a listing at the bottom of its website of what typical mining equipment costs to be hosted in the HashCenter.

Multipools are controversial, and have the ability to weaken a coin by shifting computing power on a whim, and, recently, litecoin creator Charlie Lee proposed merged mining with dogecoin to create a stronger defence for the two coins against the threat of a 51% attack.

Multipools might be good for miners, but bad for the future of scrypt coins as ASIC miners arrive, having the potential to make them unstable.

Think that USB miners are worthless? What if you put six BitFury chips on one USB dongle? The Hex-Fury USB miner can actually pump out 11GH/s per stick at approx.

Hackers don't seem to care that regular computing power is practically worthless for bitcoin mining.

It's important to remember that it still costs more to mine dogecoin on Amazon EC2 and that the value of coins produced will be worth current prices - so these types of activities may not be worth it.

Electricity is becoming the single most important variable when considering the costs associated with a bitcoin mining operation.

Understanding these speculative aspects of the bitcoin price is important, because the prospects of long-term viability for mining may rest on whether BTC can become a currency that is popular for transactions.