Nvidia Geforce RTX 3060 (Photo: Nvidia)
In order to reduce the high demand a bit, Nvidia has artificially throttled the mining hash rate with the Geforce RTX 3060 by half. It is clear that resourceful inventors have bypassed this mechanism.
Even before the start of official sales of the RTX 3060 at the end of February, sellers were offering the Nvidia graphics card at absolutely exorbitant prices. But it wasn’t just speculators that made it difficult for gamers to get a new graphics card. Ethereum miners also need graphics cards to generate cryptocurrency. Nvidia responded by artificially halving the maximum possible mining hash rate for the RTX 3060. So the card should not be of interest to crypto miners. However, resourceful hackers seem to have turned the choke around.
Since the release of version 1.8y3 on July 10, 2021, the mining tool has become Minis It is able to bypass the hash rate brake of the RTX 3060. A beta version published on July 21st is also said to have fixed some stability issues in ether mining with the graphics card. According to the developers of miniZ, the program should allow a hash of about 40 MHz per second. However, due to the hashing brakes, 20-25 MBps should be achieved with one of the RTX 3060s.
The hashrate brake may have been canceled earlier by other miners
As early as March, screenshots posted on social networks showed that some miners may have deactivated the hash brake at this time. One of these screenshots appears to prove, for example, that at least one miner achieved a hash rate of just over 45 MBps using the RTX 3060. However, the screenshots could hardly be verified at the time.
In the long run, the Ethereum network should at least move away from power-hungry graphics cards. The network currently uses what is called a Proof of Work algorithm. For mining, complex mathematical tasks are solved, which, in turn, require powerful graphics cards. With the planned update to Ethereum 2.0, the Proof of Stake algorithm will be used instead. It is not yet clear when the time will come. Those who have had problems getting the desired graphics card due to high demand can also benefit.
