Last year we shared a guide with you, where we saw five reasons not to buy a graphics card used for mining. This handbook was very well received by our readers, and my arguments were very clear, although I was quite surprised to see the behavior of some who soon said things that were completely nonsensical, all because of to defend indefensible.

I will not repeat these arguments in this article, I am going to deepen in the reality we are beginning to see with the first waves of graphics cards to hit the used market, and in lies which are poured to reach a point of defense indefensible, because in the end they are a big problem that can take its toll on even more experienced users, and trusting the wrong person is something that can happen to any of us.

It is strange that most of these lies have appeared in the comments of the guide to which I left you a link at the beginning of this article, and they almost always appear in a society of some kind. request for blind trust in miners, in the mantra that they take care of their graphics cards like gold for fabric because they bring benefits.

They ask for trust, but when you limit yourself to the facts, you actually come across despicable situations. An example is the recent case of a user who bought a GeForce RTX 3080 from a miner, namely sold you a drive that came with 2GB of graphics memory disabled and a 256-bit bus. The graphics card has 10 GB and a 320-bit bus, but has suffered so much mining and it could only work that way. Fortunately, they take care of them like gold in a rag.

Graphics card used for mining: five lies

1.-They have been little used, they are new

Let’s be realistic and let’s start from the ground up, that you can’t know for sure what kind of use the graphics card used for mining has. This may give the impression that we should give confidence to a miner who kindly wants to sell us a graphics card that no longer works for him, but think a little and ask yourself these questions:

• Do you think she will admit that she had a lot and that she could be damaged? It would be throwing stones at your own roof.
• Do you think that a graphics card purchased a year or even six months ago for mining will have little use? Not at all, because when not in use, it did not generate income, so it was most likely on 24/7.
• It seems to you that the price at which it is sold is very good, but have you thought about how much useful life you can actually have left and what problems it could cause you in the short or medium term? It is not worth buying a GeForce RTX 3080 for 500 euros if it stops working after a few months.

Graphics cards used for mining did not show little use, even if they were bought just a few months agothat is very clear.

2.-They were stored at excellent temperatures

I do not deny that some miners may have been thoroughly modifying their graphics cards to reduce their operating temperatures, and even tuned consumption to reduce the load on the graphics card. However, let’s get to reality, Do you think that a miner who bought several tens or hundreds of graphics cards bothered with that?

In case someone got lost, to fully optimize the GeForce RTX 3080, to follow the example we gave, it would be necessary to fine-tune the voltage and it would also be necessary remove it to replace the thermal pad assembly, as the GDDR6X memory temperature is just one of the biggest problems encountered when mining with this graphics card. Think about the time and effort it all takes.

On the other hand, if we talk about a huge mining farm with many graphics cards glued to each other heat can be transferred and accumulatedeven if the space is open, with all that it means for each of these graphics cards and for the rest of the components that can be mounted on the mining equipment.

In reality, however, the graphics card has most likely been running at high temperatures for some time there will be someone who will tell you that theirs worked on 25 levels of GPU and 35 levels of graphics memory. Yes, it’s an absurd example, but it’s real because I know the people who used it as an argument. We have a temperature of 36 degrees C in my city right now, so this genius was able to keep the GPU below room temperature while extracting Etherea at full speed, “crack.”

3.-Mining causes very little wear

RTX 3080, which has suffered such wear and tear that it has only 8 GB GDDR6X.

This is another of the most recurring lies when he tries to sell us a graphics card used to mine cryptocurrencies. We start from the basis of using a graphics card always causes natural wear and tear the passage of electricity and the process of heat production and cooling. In this sense, electromigrationMade with ease of use, it is one of the most common causes of deterioration and failure when it comes to semiconductors, and its consequences can be fatal.

The graphics card obtained for mining has a very clear goal, as we have already said, generate income. You must be active to do this., that is, it must be mined, and if we use it for only a few hours, the performance we get will not be what it would be if we used it 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. If someone came to tell me that they only use their dedicated graphics cards for mining for a few hours a week, I couldn’t help but laugh out loud.

Maintaining graphics card extraction 24 hours a day, 7 days a week generates enormous wear and tear and is equivalent to abnormal use. Keep in mind that a normal person who plays 4 hours a day used their graphics card in total 1,460 hours per yearwhile the miner who has used it continuously for a year will have accumulated it 8,760 hours of use. In fact, in just two months, he would have collected almost the same hours of use as the average player.

Don’t be fooled mining causes very high wear Although it is done by “pampering” graphics cards, and the reason we have just seen. Now imagine what a graphics card can suffer 24 hours a day, 7 days a week if not properly cared for and maintained. It should come as no surprise, then, that mining graphics cards have entered the market with burned-out memory chips or the remaining two days of life.

4. -They are advantageous due to the low selling price

It is another of the great lies that are held almost as if it were a mantra. To say that second-hand graphics cards that were used for mining are on sale It’s not having an idea of ​​the reality behind it, or having very few scruples. Yes, I know people who bought a graphics card that was used for mining, and the move went well, but the opposite also happened many times.

Graphics cards used for mining are not advantageous, are a risky investment with all the letters. This means that you can be lucky and you will have no problem, but you can also spend money for nothing. If you’re going to make a small investment and the price really pays off, I understand you want to take a risk, but if you’re going to spend 300 euros or more, I think the risk is too big, and it’s better to buy a new graphics card.

Think about it, in the end, even if you paid 400 euros for a graphics card that costs 800 euros, this saving will be useless to you if he dies after a few months, or even if barely a year has passed, because he will have to pay at least another 400 euros again. eur. Buying this new model would cost you more money, though you will have a minimum three-year warranty.

In the current situation, see that stocks do not stop growing and Graphics card prices are still falling, and that the miners are still trying to maintain a certain bubble in the used market, I think there is no argument that would allow us to consider them a “bargain”. Let’s be honest, buying a graphics card launched two years ago for half the price, when in just one year it got the kind of use it would normally have for more than 8 years, it’s not a good thing, it’s a bad idea.

5.-They are a way to punish retailers

This is something that sounded with more or less force both at the time of the first breakthrough in the cryptocurrency sector, at the end of 2018, and at the second breakthrough that occurred recently. With this lie, miners are trying to shift the blame to the retail channel and wake up consumers desire for revenge which leads them to retaliate against the channel and eventually buy their graphics cards from them.

The idea is “win-win” for miners, but the truth is In the end, the miners are the real culprits for not being able to buy a graphics card for the current price for the last year and a half. It’s not hard to understand, they’ve spent more than $ 15,000 million on graphics cards in that time, and now that they’re no longer useful to them, they want to convince you that they couldn’t blame the shops for the bad people who wanted to sell.

If you buy a graphics card from a miner you used to mine because you think you’re doing something good with it, or that you’re giving the seller a well-deserved penalty, you’re actually wrongand to the extent that you do the exact opposite, because in the end you will give money to the real source of the problem. Not buying a single graphics card from miners is the best way to go back they gave us when they ran out of graphics cards this year and a half, and let’s not forget that they boasted about it.