There are a lot of misconceptions about Chia plotting and farming. If you’d like to start farming Chia but don’t have the time to dig through forums and guides, you’ve come to the right place. Hopefully, this guide will help you avoid the trial and error I had to go through.

Today, we’ll be talking about Chia plotting, and specifically, which hardware to use to get the best return on investment. In this guide, I will explore both budget and high-end setups. Choose which one suits you the best.

chia plotting pc

chia plotting ssds

Why Using Separate Hardware for Chia Plotting?

Most Chia guides will tell you to simply grab a hard drive, launch the Chia plotter and call it a day. While this approach works, it’s far from being efficient.

Why should you care about efficiency, though? According to official sources, we reached a total of one million active plots. That’s a lot of competition, and if you want to earn any profit of Chia farming, you have to get a good rig for the least money possible. It’s all about knowing which corners to cut, and which ones to not.

Plotting and farming are two different processes that put load on different parts of your Chia hardware:

swar chia ploting

chia farming gui

Optimal Chia Plotting Rig Setup

Based on my own experience, as well as on what the community says, the best setup is to have one PC dedicated to Chia plotting, and another one (or more) for Chia farming. This way, you get good plotting speed while avoiding over-investing on several high-end PCs. However, it’s still possible to combine both plotting and farming on the same PC, as long as you have the proper storage setup, below you will find the best cases i could found to store lots of HDDs depending of how much you would like to invest.

Now, most people I know use the SWAR plotter, and try to run as many plots in parallel as possible. The average speed for most people seems to be 8 plots every 7-12 hours. I personally now use the MadMAx43v3r Chia Plotter instead that does serial plotting. With it, I can achieve speeds between to 25 and 30 minutes per plot. This guide will show you the hardware I’m using for that.

For plotting, you’d ideally want to have a:

madmax chia plotting 28 minutes

chia plotting pc gaming and mining

Here is my plotting PC. I already had it built for another project (LINK#1, LINK#2)

phanteks case chia plotting pc

noctua chia pc build case

ryzen 9 3950x chia plotting build

gen4 ssd chia plotting hardware

wd black sn750 chia plotting ssd

ssd m2 heatsink

wd black sn750 custom heatsink

wd black sn750 chia plotting heatsink

m.2 nvme pcie adapter

wd black pcie m.2 adapter

chia plotting pcie m.2 adapter

2x wd black sn750 for chia plotting

chia plotting pc

chia plotting ssds

Below, you will notice that the only two things that change between the budget and high-end versions are the CPU and RAM specifications. The PSU, motherboard and system SSD are the exact same for both lists, which means that there is always the option to upgrade your rig afterwards if you start with the budget version.

What also varies besides the CPU and RAM is the amount and type of plotting SSDs to use in the rig. I will be detailing which model and capacity to pick, too.

Best Chia Plotting Hardware

Part 1/3: Choosing the hardware

Optimal BUDGET Chia Plotting Hardware

This setup is both affordable and upgradeable. It’s a good way to getting started in Chia plotting without over investing.

Optimal MID-HIGH End Chia Plotting Hardware

This is arguably the best setup you can get at home. What’s nice is that it’s still a consumer-grade PC, meaning you can later use it for purposes other than mining Chia.

Part 2/3: Choosing the SSD for plotting

Best SSD’s for Chia Plotting

The drives you will be using for Chia plotting will depend on what kind of CPU do you go for. Obviously, you want the SSD speed to match that of the CPU to avoid any bottlenecking.

Sabrent Plotripper

The Plotripper is an upcoming model announced by Sabrent designed specifically for Chia plotting. Its selling points are insane TBW capacity, as well as allegedly reasonable pricing. We still have to wait to see the real numbers, though.

That was the selection of the drives I personally find the best for plotting. If you want to get something else, here are the main key aspects to consider:

1 TB vs 2 TB SSD’s for Chia Plotting

You probably noticed that my list includes only 1TB SSD drives, even though 2TB seems to be the popular choice nowadays. I’m basing this recommendation off my own tests. Here’s what I found out:

The madMAx43v3r plotter uses two different temporary directories while plotting, and a final directory where the completed plot is stored. I will go over the specifics in my Plotting guide but for now I will say that you really want to split the three directories on three separate drives to achieve the best performance:

As you can see, you can get away with one expensive, and one less expensive SSD for your plotting drives. You also don’t have to waste money on 2TB SSD’s since the plotter won’t use the extra space anyway.

Now, a common counterargument is that 2TB drives have higher TBW than 1TB ones. While true, let’s not forget that the real TBW of SSD drives is often higher than the one advertised. A good example is my WD_Black SN750 1Tb drive that has 77% of its advertised TBW value used but is still sitting at 54% health.

Besides, it’s better to buy one high-end 1TB SSD with high TBW (such as the Samsung 970 PRO 1TB) than a mid-end 2TB drive. With the high end-drive, not only you get the same TBW, you also get better and more stable write speed.

Part 3/3: Choosing The Best Chia Plotting & Farming Case

Mid-End CASE: Fractal Define 5

I personally find Fractal Design Define R5 case perfect. It’s big enough to fit everything in it: it features 8x slots for 3.5 HHDs, and you can install up to 6 fans on it. It already comes with two. If you want to add more, I would recommend these: Fractal Design Dynamic X2 GP-14 Computer Fan – Silent Fan – High Airflow

chia farming case Fractal Design Define R5

chia plotting and farming case Fractal Design Define R5

High-End CASE: Fractal Define 7 XL

If you are taking Chia farming very seriously, the Fractal Define 7 XL might be a better choice for you. For the money, you get room for up to 20 (!!) 3.5 HDDs. You simply can’t beat this for the money. Just don’t forget to install enough additional fans to keep the whole system cool.

chia plotting and farming Fractal Design Define 7 XL

chia plotting and farming Fractal Design Define 7 XL 2

NOTE: I have selected this two specific cases because once you finish plotting you can turn your plotting pc to a farming pc as well, so any of these cases are perfect to get started even if you choose to create a mid budget or high end plotting pc. I personaly got the Define 7 XL

chia farming case fractal design define 7 xl

fractal design define 7 xl server nas chia farming conversion

chia farming and plotting fractal define 7 xl

chia farming fractal define 7 xl server conversion

Best Chia Plotting Hardware – Accessories and Parts

Since the motherboard has only 8 SATA ports that means you can store 8 3.5 HDDs only, just perfect for Fractal Define 5, as for the Fractal Define 7 XL we will need few more parts and accessories in order to fill up the case with 12 more 3.5 HDDs. Here is the list:

How to Plot and Farm Chia

Now that you have your plotting rig ready, it’s time to get started with the actual plotting. Below, you will find my Farming Rig Setup guide, as well as my full Plotting Guide:

Please share your feedback in the comments below. Thanks!

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The post Best Hardware for Chia Plotting – July 2021 – 30 Minutes per Plot?! appeared first on 1st Mining Rig.

You’ve heard about Chia before – some say it’s the new gold mine, others label it just another shitcoin and move on.

Unlike certain sensationalists out there, I took the time to follow and study the project for a bit before I decided to write this review. Hopefully, it will help you to better understand whether Chia is for you.

This is going to be part of my Chia series where I will be testing different hardware, and assembling Chia farming and plotting rigs, so if you’re interested in that, make sure to follow me.

Chia Network Review

What is Chia? The Basics

Chia is a new coin that aims to solve some of the issues we have with most of the currently used cryptocurrencies. Namely, the main aim of Chia is to move away from both Proof-of-Work and Proof-of-Concept models into a totally new territory.

Chia coin introduces a new concept – Proof of Space and Time (POST). It is meant to be way greener than POW, as well as more secure than POS. Unlike POW, POST is also meant to make mining more accessible for the average Joe since it requires storage space instead of raw hashing power. And by being less power-hungry, Chia mining should in theory be profitable even for those of us living in areas with expensive electricity.

POST vs. POW

The issue with proof of work is that it’s not eco-friendly at all. The amount of energy used worldwide by Bitcoin miners alone stands close to what a small country consumes. A lot of POW coins also struggle with centralization issues – we see more and more hashrate coming from huge mining farms with specialized equipment.

Proof of space, on the other hand, utilizes hard drive storage space. Unlike other projects like SIA and Storj, Chia does not offer decentralized storage. Instead, it’s basically CPU mining that requires a bit of CPU power and a lot of free storage to validate transactions on the network.

To prevent grinding attacks like on Burstcoins, Chia also implemented a proof-of-time concept. Plotting takes quite a lot of time and work, and that has been implemented on purpose to prevent people from abusing the system through constant plot overriding.

Chia Features

Chia was created by Bram Cohen of BitTorrent Fame. It is written in Chialisp, a lisp-like language. Just like Ethereum, it allows smart contracts. The Chia wallet already supports atomic swaps and multisig. Users can also build their own cryptocurrencies based on Chia called ‘Color Coins’. Users can then create their own rules how those coins work, and peg them to real world and/or assets, use them for reward schemes, etc.

Chia Plotting and Farming

Unlike most other minable coins, Chia mining consists of two parts:

• The first one is called ‘Plotting’. Plotting is the process of assigning a certain part of your hard drive to the Chia network. It’s a process that takes 5-15 hours per plot (depending on your drive speed and setup).
• The second part is called ‘Farming’. Every 10 minutes, 32 active plots are randomly selected to be allowed to mine 2 Chia tokens. Just like with Bitcoin, these rewards will be halved every 3 years until they reach a hard cap of 4 Chia every 10 minutes.

chia gui plotting

chia farming

Note: Chia mining was labeled as ‘farming’ by its devs to empathize the eco-friendly nature of the coin, as well as to prevent it from being associated with the less and less loved word ‘mining’. In reality though, the therm ‘mining’ is still technically correct, and the word ‘farming’ is just flair.

Chia Mining Hardware Requirements

In theory, Chia can be mined/famed on virtually any PC that has at least 250 GB free storage space. Even though every plot takes about 100GB of space, the plotting process requires you to have a headroom of about 250 GB. There are no minimum requirements regarding CPU power, as long as it’s not a totally outdated model.

While this sounds simple enough on paper, the reality is obviously a bit more complex (Just a bit, I promise!… with my fingers crossed behind my back). Here are some things you need to know before farming Chia:

1. Hard Drive Speed Matters a LOT

Slow hard drives offer slow plot times, which translates into less profits.

In POW mining, we have something called hashrate, and the more a piece of mining gear hashes, the more profit it brings. Chia mining is the same, except that what counts is drive speed rather than computational power.

Now, as we know, the speed of a drive is determined by the drive itself, its connection type (SATA, PCIe, etc), as well as the motherboard port types. This means that ultimately, Chia mining speed still varies depending on the used gear, and the differences might be huge.

Here is a list with what most of the users use to create Chia plots (i wil have my own list of NVMe ssds in the next article):

2. You’ll Need A TON of Plots

At the time I am writing this, the average chances for one plot of finding a block are very thin. According to the calculator built into the official Chia farming software, the average time it will take one plot to hit the jackpot is 13 years. This number can easily double in the next month as more miners join.Basically, if you want to get any sort of profit off of Chia mining, you’d need at least 40-50 TB worth of high-speed storage.

3. Chia Farming Kills Consumer-Grade SSDs

If you’re planning on mining on your gaming PC, Chia plotting can easily kill your SSD drive. During the plotting process, the drive has to read and write terabytes worth of information. If you don’t know already, every solid state drive has its write limit (called TBW). Basically, there is a certain amount of information the SSD can handle before it dies.

Chia farming will kill most consumer-grade SSD’s pretty fast. Most of the drives won’t last more than two months. An expensive enterprise-grade drive however might survive Chia mining for up to two years.

4. You Might Need a Dedicated Chia Plotting Rig

With how long it takes to create one single plot, the Chia miner software offers you the option to create several plots in parallel. While this comes in handy if you have several drives connected to your PC, creating more than one plot at a time applies a considerable load on your CPU and RAM usage.

Having all of that in mind, if you want to have a chance of profiting off farming Chia, you might want to get a dedicated Chia mining rig with enterprise-grade SSDs, decent CPU and RAM.

This is what i am using right now for plotting Chia, in the next article i will have a more detailed list for both budget and high end plotting and farming rig:

chia plotting pc

chia plotting ssds

Chia Mining Competition and Possible Issues

The mining landscape is shaped by the amount and size of active miners. Ideally, home miners should be only competing with other home miners but it proved to not be the case with POW coins. Most POW coins are dominated by big companies that own huge mining farms, and take advantage of regions with cheap or free electricity.

Chia mining is not power-intensive, so that’s a plus. As a downside, a lot of the existing data centers all around the globe can easily become Chia mining farms. Server-grade storage drives are perfect for Chia mining thanks to their high access speed and durability.

If you’re mining at home, you might want to get into the project asap before the network gets too saturated. There’s a catch, though:

Chia Pool Mining

Yes, that amazing thing called ‘pool mining’ isn’t yet officially available for Chia. Why is it important?

Just like with conventional GPU and ASIC mining, there is a fixed amount of coins mined every day, and the more units mine the coin, the lesser are the chances for each of them to get the reward.

Now, since Chia does not have any official mining pools, everyone has to solo mine. This is what produces the lottery ticket effect – as a miner, instead of a constant slow stream of cryptos that’s based on your plot count, every tick you either get nothing or two entire Chia tokens (XCH), purely based on luck. While adding more plots increases your odds, there is always that chance that someone with one plot comes and shamelessly steals the jackpot.

Currently, only community pools are available for use but they don’t seem to be reliable. Official pools are planned to be released next month.

In Conclusion

Chia is a new cryptocurrency is gaining a lot of traction. It has been listed on exchangers very recently, and over the past month, the list of exchangers the coin could be bought from expanded from 3 to 17. With its price currently hovering between the 600 and 700 dollar mark per coin, Chia is one of the coins that might be worth mining, at least until big storage providers step into the game.

I am working on several guides on how to farm Chia efficiently, so stay tuned! Next one will be about the best hardware for plotting Chia.

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Chia useful links:

Official website: https://www.chia.net/

Forum: https://chiaforum.com/

Farming Calculator: https://chiacalculator.com/

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