PLEASE NOTE: the guide below was written back when Litecoin mining on GPU’s was profitable. I recommend the AntMiner L3+ Litecoin Miner (ROI in about 100 days, currently) or building an Ethereum mining rig by following my 6 GPU Mining Rig Guide as it is updated weekly and utilizes current graphics card and build options. Happy Mining!
Building a mining rig with more than 4 graphics cards has its challenges. There are operating system limitations, power requirements and hardware issues to sort out. However, following the success of our Budget Litecoin Mining Rig Build Guide and mid-range 4 GPU Litecoin Mining Rig Build Guide, we’ve decided to do the research and publish a guide showing you how to build a fully functional 6 GPU mining rig. Once assembled and configured correctly, this mining hardware is capable of roughly ~2,700 Kh/s of scrypt mining power. As of the date this guide was updated, a 6 GPU Litecoin mining rig like this, can generate over $250 USD worth of Litecoins per month. It will cost you roughly $1,800 to build. If you want to see the live current calculation yourself, click here for a Litecoin calculator. You’ll just have to enter your electricity rate to calculate your net profits. You can also use this rig to mine any other Scrypt based digital currencies like Dogecoin, Reddcoin, etc. Build time should be right around 2 hours. You can find an excellent photo set here of how this rig looks like all built.
6 GPU Litecoin Mining Hardware Build List
- Power Supply – $250 – 1300 watt Gold Rated PSU – If you are having a hard time finding these larger power supplies in stock, an alternative is to get two lower powered 750 watt Gold Rated PSU’s and connect them together with this add2psu adapter to power your rig.
- Motherboard/CPU – $160 – H81 Pro BTC motherboard coupled with the Intel G3220 CPU. If you can find one reasonably priced, the MSI Z77A GD-65 is also an excellent motherboard combined with the inexpensive Intel Celeron G1620 Ivy Bridge Processor .
- Graphics Cards (GPU) – 6x $200 – AMD Radeon R9 270. This GPU is capable of 450Kh/s. Running six of them will net you a total of 2,700Kh/s. I recommend the Gigabyte, Sapphire and MSI versions of this card. If the R9 270 is out of stock or overpriced, the R9 270x costs just a bit more for slightly more hashing power (480 Kh/s) and will work with everything else in this guide. I’ve also recommended several other GPU’s for crypto mining here. Just remember to calculate the power requirements for whichever cards you decide to go with and purchase an appropriately sized PSU or multiple PSU’s to run your rig. For example: you could build this rig with six R9 280x GPUs running at 750Kh/s and 280 watts each. You’d need to combine a 1kw PSU and a 750 watt PSU with this adapter to provide power. Everything else would stay the same, and you’d have a 4,500Kh/s rig for around $3,000 USD at today’s prices. All the other components would stay the same.
- RAM – $40 – 4GB Kingston DDR3 RAM – Since this will be a dedicated Litecoin Mining Rig, 4GB will be enough RAM. If you plan to use Reaper mining software for Litecoin mining or other scrypt based currency mining, you’ll want to put 8GB in this system.
- 1x to 16x Powered Riser Cables – $60 – (6x $10) PCI Express 1X to 16X Slot Flexible Extension Cable – These are to connect the 6 graphics cards to the motherboard and allow spacing between cards for heat dissipation. Powered risers are necessary when building a rig with this many GPU’s. The 1x male end of the riser cable plugs into either the 1x or 16x slot on the motherboard, and the 16x slot on the cable is where you plug the graphics card into.
- Hard Drive – $40 – Solid State Drive for installing Windows 8 and your mining software (alternatively you could boot BAMT from a USB flash drive)
- Custom Mining Case – $30-$80 – You can build one of these yourself with angled aluminum from your local hardware store, or ask around on the Bitcoin forum. There are several custom case builders selling them through the forum. I can personally recommend the custom built cases designed and built by Rich Chomiczewski. They are well built and reasonably priced.
- Extra Cooling – $30 – Box Fan (I find supplemental cooling from a box fan to be helpful in keeping the temperatures down on the graphics cards)
- Operating System – $0-$90 – Windows 8 supports 6 GPU’s, but if you’re familiar with Linux you can of course download it for free (some folks consider Linux to be the best OS for Litecoin mining, since it keeps your overall costs down, improving your litecoin mining ROI or return-on-investment). Keep in mind that undervolting/overclocking works better in Windows vs Linux for Litecoin mining due to better drivers in the Windows world. You can load almost any operating system with a thumb drive these days, but some folks might prefer to load the OS from an install CD, in which case you’ll probably want to pick up a $30 external USB powered DVD drive. Many laptops in the ‘thin & light’ category are shipping with no internal optical drive, so it will probably come in handy for other uses as well. I have one that I use fairly frequently around the house.
- Monitor, Mouse and Keyboard (to install the OS and configure the mining software, no need to buy more than one set since you only use this for setup)
TOTAL HARDWARE COST TO BUILD A 6 GPU MINING RIG: ~$1,800 for a ~2,700 Kh/s Custom Litecoin Mining Rig.
Assembling the Custom Litecoin Mining Hardware
- Un-package it all
- Build / assemble custom open air mining case
- Install processor and RAM on motherboard
- Plug in all riser cables
- Place motherboard in custom open air mining rig case and connect motherboard PSU connector (leaving PSU unplugged from the wall of course)
- Plug in SATA hard drive (or optional Linux on USB stick)
- Connect all GPUs to riser cables and fasten them to custom case. Drilling evenly spaced holes in the soft aluminum slightly smaller than the screws works best. You might need to experiment for optimal spacing to keep the cards cool.
- Plug in all power supply connections
- Connect mouse, monitor and keyboard and an internet connection (I use a USB WiFi adapter)
- Check all connections once more
- Fire it up! Install the OS if needed. Install Graphics card drivers. Install mining software. Make sure fans are fully functional. Start the mining software, tweak settings for maximum hash rates and let it run!
Sidenote: If mining isn’t your thing, and you are just interested in purchasing some cryptocurrency as part of your investment portfolio, I personally use and recommend FTX Global Crypto Exchange (Use FTX US if a US resident)
Since there are 7 PCI inputs on the motherboard, would 7 cards pose any problems assuming your power supplies were sufficient?
Running 7 cards you’ll run into stability issues and driver issues. I would recommend sticking with 6 unless you’re really adventurous and have some time to troubleshoot/tweak your build. 🙂
Hi could you tell me how much noise this 6vga rig makes?
Does it stay quiet enough when running at night in a bed room?
It’s loud. I wouldn’t recommend running it in a bedroom unless you like a lot of ‘white noise’. 🙂
Gigabyte Z87X-UD4H
Is this ok to use instead, i wanted a 4th gen haswel ?????
I’m sure it’s fine but Haswell draws more power than Ivy Bridge. Since you’re already pushing it with 6 GPUs on 1 PSU you might need a 2nd PSU.
Hi Admin! How do i connect two (or more) of these custom mining rigs to one single computer?
I didnt want to buy a monitor, keyboard and mouse for each one. And i dont have too much space.
You’ll want to use a remote access solution. I would recommend a lightweight program like Chrome Remote Desktop: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/chrome-remote-desktop/gbchcmhmhahfdphkhkmpfmihenigjmpp
I could find the GPU :
Sapphire AMD Radeon FleX HD 7950 OC 3GB GDDR5 2DVI/HDMI/2Mini DisplayPort PCI-Express Video Card 11196-17-40G
amazon linL :
http://www.amazon.com/Sapphire-Radeon-DisplayPort-PCI-Express-11196-17-40G/dp/B009MMJTUY/ref=lh_ni_t?ie=UTF8&psc=1&smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER
Can I use it instead of the recommended :
I would appreciate if you tell me ASAP because I have to order from amazon in the proper time frame to get it before holidays.
Thank you
You suggest to buy 6 riser 1x 16 but the mobo supports 3 (1x 16) and 3 (16x 16)
How come?
The 1x male end of the riser cable plugs into either the 1x or 16x slot on the motherboard, and the 16x slot on the cable is where you plug the graphics card into. I’ve added this to the guide, since this is a common question I get.
Are you guys concerned about the fpga miner coming or asics.
Mot too concerned. The only thing on the horizon is mid next year for fpga. aSIC will not mine scrypt. When people say “ASIC Ltc” there getting attention but must be cooupled with a lot of memory or something because it won’t work. Will be good for a year. Also the pricing looks stupid on the FPGAs I looked at. You’ll loose less power but spend 2X as much for the hardware. Any info you have would be appreciated brother 🙂
Thank you ,
one more question, I got 6 X PCIE 1x to 16x powered converter as you mentioned in the article, but why do I need 6 ? there are 4 PCI express connections on the board and 3 X 16 pin PCI . how am I gonna use these 6 ?
I am totally new to this world. I got really interested and ordered parts to make my first rig.
I have a noob question,
When using 1x to 16x powered riser cable, where should I connect the molex connector to ? Directly to pwoer supply ? in thsi case does the power supply have enough connector for 6 molex coming from the graphic cards ?
Yes. The molex connectors are for the power supply. Running 4-6 graphics cards exceeds the power usage the motherboard was designed for, so a powered riser keeps you from burning out your motherboard. The PSU should have plenty of molex connectors to go around. Most PSU’s come with additional molex splitters as well.
all power supplies have a line with several female molex connectors. be very careful with the risers. i have a drawer FULL of bad ones. the ends shed really easy. took me a month in the begining tracing my non working rig it to that. youll get it but you gotta earn your stripes. if it gets frustrating just step away for awhile. 🙂
Just a general question so what’s the power usage average and what kind of bandwidth usage are we looking at for a 6 card system?
If you have a broadband connection, bandwidth usage is trivial. Power usage depends on the cards you use and how much you undervolt them. This is why the AMD 7950s are the most recommended card for Litecoin mining, due to their lower power usage compared with other GPUs. Here’s a wiki page listing several GPUs and their power usage: http://www.lurkmore.com/wiki/Mining_hardware_comparison. I’d recommend adding 200 watts for ‘overhead’ from your motherboard, CPU, etc to your total calculations.
Hey op nice post!
Whats the expected lifetime of the system if i bought and built today! (11-23-2013) Will i be mining with it 2 years from now or is the litecoin difficulty progressing in such a manner that 1 year from now this hardware is useless? Is there a fear of asics raining in on litecoin?
There are GPUs mining Litecoin today that were purchased in 2011 to mine Bitcoin. Usually what starts to go first is the fans on the side of the cards. These can be either fixed or replaced fairly easily. I’ve been mining for around 9 months now and haven’t had any cards die yet. Just be sure to dust them off every 2 months or so (depending on how dusty the environment is that you have them running in) with some ‘canned air’ and they should be good.
…..”Also for the 16x slots, are you using 1x to 16x risers in the slots (with the 1x side in the slot on the board and the 16x attached to the GPU).”
I also would like to know this… Can anyone help? Much appreciated.
Yes, the 1x male connector on the riser cable fits into the motherboard’s 1x and 16x slots and the 16x female connector is where you plug the GPU into.
Hi I’m a newbie and would like to create this 6 Gpu, but I was wondering if I left it on all the time, what would my electric bill be like from this setup.?
11.2 usd/kWh
This will change based on the variables of difficulty and USD/Litecoin exchange rate, but I’d guess around $120 per month, netting you just under $600/mo worth of Litecoins (after electricity costs have been deducted) at the time of this comment. Here’s a link with your electricity costs entered:
https://www.litecoinpool.org/calc?hashrate=3800&difficulty=1486.12414801&power=1500&energycost=0.112¤cy=USD
hey a huge thanks for this amazing article!!
does the network diff increase on Scrypt? is profit going to reduce over time?
coops
The difficulty varies over time. Sometimes it goes up (when Litecoin is the most profitable Scrypt currency to mine) and sometimes it goes down (when all the multipools chase a more profitable currency). So yes, profit will vary over time.
Thanks for your help and for helping us all with your replies!! if you don’t mind I have a few more questions. do you undervoltage using special AMD software or the mining scripts? and do the cards need to be connected and setup in crossfire? coming from a nvidia background I would run my cards in SLI and see the best results. thank you again for a great tutorial.
Are you guys sure that those PSU you are speaking about can handle SIX OVERCLOCKED 7950 ?
Yes. The key is overclocked AND undervolted. Undervolting reduces the power requirements of each GPU, significantly reducing the overall power draw required by the rig.