Economics of farming

[Aspy68]

For a total investment $4500 CAD I have a slow plotter (4 K33s every 24 hours) and a farm with 12x8TB HDDs that hold 420 K33s.

At this time, the earnings on my bet work out to about $200 CAD per month. So I am actually looking at an ROI in two years.

I will soon be adding another array and 4x8TB HDDs ($500 CAD) which will easily keep me ahead of network growth (unless Chia price goes up which speeds network growth), and more later as long as fundamentals remain good. My plotting speed is also more than adequate to stay ahead of network growth.

@Keermalec

Therefore, the Samsung 980 Pro will produce around 857 plots before it dies its honorable death.

Please read the thread below to find out how wrong you are in your 980 death assumption, NVMEs are lasting far past warranted TBW. NVMe cost is pennies per plot.

Has anyone here personally killed an NVME ? (NVME Endurance)

I’m just wondering, with all the talk about TBW for the NVME drives, how many people here have actually killed one of them because they exceeded the TBW number? I know that number is for warranty purposes. So how far have you gotten beyond the specs? I think it would be interesting. Maybe we can begin to get a list of real world endurance of specific NVME models. I am running Samsung 980 Pro’s and 970 Evo Plus’. But I am nowhere near the TBW number. But I’ll keep an eye on them and post the numb…

And you got this completely wrong.

@Keermalec

The price of 93 TB of slow HDD space (to store 857 plots x 0.1089 TB) is around 2’200$.
Currently, you would therefore be spending 2’550$ and earning 520$ every two months: ie, loosing 2’030$ every two months.

You do not have to pay for your HDDs every two months and there is no almost such thing as a “slow” HDD for Chia farming. HDD replacement is many years away. Chia farming is easy on HDDs and they will last well past warranted dates as well.

The economics are not incredible, but they are more than good enough for me to continue rolling with my bet. If Crypto and Chia succeed and grow over the next 5 years then I will make a considerable profit on my bet.

Outside of failure, my happy hobby and bet will pay for itself in two years and then continue to provide a small income. If, on the other hand, POST and Chia take off, then I will have a small gold mine.

I would not recommend that you start your Chia farm now unless you have some deep pockets and understand that Chia is a bet, not an investment, but I am very happy that I started my farm early and think the economics are perfect. A low Chia price keeps the total network growth curve down. That network growth is actually your scariest economic opponent. At this price and network growth rate I can easily and cheaply stay ahead of the curve. If Chia price and network growth explode, then so does the value of my bet (which I would then be able to proudly call an investment, lol)! It would then even make sense for me to invest in a faster plotter and more and more storage.

Be well!