First, let’s see what happened. In the second half of February before the launch of the RTX 3060, Nvidia announced that Ethereum mining performance for the new graphics card will be restricted. There were two reasons for it. The first is to resolve the short supply issue that Nvidia was having with the RTX 30 series right after the launch. The second reason is that Nvidia was promoting a new device for Ethereum mining called Nvidia CMP.
The restriction worked. In the first seconds of Ethereum mining the RTX 3060 was giving out 42 MH/s, but then the hash rate was going down to 24-26 MH/s. Clearly, this made the new GPU less desirable for miners, so the Nvidia plan to tackle the short supply seemed to be working.
Everything changed at the beginning of March. There were rumors about the release of the special mode that removed hash rate restrictions. The information seemed fake at first, but eventually, the author shared more screenshots and proved that it was true.
Now, a week later, everything has changed. The new driver for the RTX 3060 removes Ethereum mining restrictions and it’s available to all users. We tested the update and can confirm that it’s working. The test results are below.
Nvidia RTX 3060 Ethereum Mining Hash Rate
Nvidia accidentally removed restrictions. The company released Nvidia Dev 470.05 Beta developer drivers. Miners tested the new software and noticed that it allowed the RTX 3060 to mine Ethereum at full capacity.
At first Nvidia added the drivers to the official website. But when they found out what the update could do, they deleted it. The webpage now says that the drivers are currently not available.
Luckily, miners uploaded the file to the cloud storage. You can download Nvidia Dev 470.05 Beta here.
The 2Miners pool team tested the drivers on the MSI RTX Gaming X 3060 12 GB. We were testing on Windows 10. The graphics card was connected to the external X16 riser. The test on Ethash lasted for about 40 minutes. No issues with the hash rate were detected. Additionally, the monitor was off throughout the whole test.
It’s important to note as according to the source mining was only possible with the monitor turned on. It turned out that the monitor is not a necessary condition.
As we found out later, the RTX 3060 12GB can maintain the hash rate only when connected through the PCI-E x16. So for mining with multiple graphics cards you need a motherboard with a lot of x16 ports. It's usually a server motherboard.
Regardless of the details, the test results are great. The RTX 3060 gave out 48 MH/s at the consumption of 120 W according to GPU-Z v.2.37.0. We used the T-Rex v.0.19.12 mining software.
Overclocking is set up through MSI AfterBurner v.4.6.3 Final. The core clock and voltage are set at a fixed Curve of 1150 Mhz and 850 mv. The memory is set at +1150.
We have a detailed guide on how to overclock GPUs for mining on different algorithms. Check it out. The article is for both beginning and professional miners.
We took more measurements. At the consumption of 105 W, the RTX 3060 gives out 44 MH/s. The temperature doesn’t exceed 50-55 degrees.
On other algorithms the hash rate is significantly lower. Ravencoin and Zcoin hash rates lag behind by 1-2% in comparison with the result of the Nvidia v.461.72 driver.
Nvidia RTX 3060 Profitability
Considering new facts, the 2Miners team adjusted the data in the 2CryptoCalc mining profitability calculator so that the information corresponding to the correct hash rate. You can expect to get $4.79 from mining Ethereum with one.
Once you adjust the profit for electricity costs that differ from miner to miner, the result will be slightly lower.
Here are the results of the RTX 3060 Ethereum mining for different time intervals. The graphics card can bring you $143 per month.
The situation is comical as Nvidia reassured everyone multiple times that the RTX 3060 mining block is secure but in the end it was them to give miners the possibility to get rid of the restrictions. So the current situation on the market is unlikely to change. New graphics cards will still be in short supply, while models in stock will be available at a much higher price.
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