Here’s the thing: Just about any device capable of banging a few numbers together can contribute to a cryptocurrency mining pool, and that means almost any device can technically mine any cryptocurrency you choose, even Bitcoin.
Thing is, it might take you a little while.
For our tests to figure out how long it might take you to make, say, $1,000,000 in Bitcoin using just a couple laptops, we used user-friendly mining pool NiceHash. Getting set up on NiceHash is as simple as creating an account and downloading a free software suite. Once it finishes installing, connect your NiceHash wallet by signing into the app, and then all you have to do is click start, and you’ll be rolling in bitcoins in no time!
To figure out how long it’d take for us to strike it rich mining with just a laptop, we used an Asus ZenBook UX330UA with an integrated graphics chip. Just in case, we also had a couple others standing by — a Dell Inspiron 15 Gaming, a Dell XPS 13, a Microsoft Surface Pro, and a MacBook Pro 15.
First, we ran the ZenBook on its own for about 24 hours to establish a baseline, but pretty soon after that we realized our little pool was going to need more power if we wanted to come anywhere close to our goal of $1,000,000 in bitcoin, so we fired up all of our laptops, bringing some serious horsepower to bear on the task.
Doing that was as simple as installing the NiceHash software on each laptop and connecting them all to our NiceHash wallet. After we left ’em running for another twenty-four hours, we were starting to see some real results.
How much did we make with all of our laptops toiling away in the bitcoin mines? Well, we made about nine cents a day with just one laptop, and with all of them running we made around forty cents a day, give or take, depending on the current price of Bitcoin. That means it would take us an excess of 6,800 years to become bitcoin millionaires from mining off just a couple laptops.
So, while you can mine Bitcoin — or any other cryptocurrency — from any old laptop, you probably shouldn’t. Unless you have a couple thousand years to spare.
Acer’s Predator Atlas 8 finally has a US release date and price, several months after the company first showed off the handheld in May. The highlight is the Intel Arc G3 Extreme chip inside, which has been adopted by only a couple of other consoles besides the Atlas 8. This version will go on sale exclusively at Best Buy on November 1 for $1,299.99.
Acer originally said the Atlas 8 would arrive in North America in October, but left pricing open at the time. The launch came amid the ongoing DRAM crunch, which has made memory more expensive across the PC industry and complicated pricing for hardware makers.
Google DeepMind's AI world model Genie 4 can now build interactive worlds that you can explore and reshape as they run. It also generates ambient sounds, music, and dialogue that respond to your actions.
The new world model builds on Genie 3 with improved realism, more natural human movement, and better simulations of real-world physics. It could eventually help with everything from game development to training robots.
Apple has an incredible talent for making me admire its products while simultaneously questioning what on earth it's thinking with the pricing. This isn't even something as bizarre as a monitor stand, but the audacity for starting a new laptop lineup from $2,000 doesn't surprise me.
The newly announced 14-inch MacBook Pro with M6 is just the latest to showcase this. The funny thing is, I already know that it's going to be a reliable workstation. You get a powerful new 2nm M6 processor, a gorgeous Liquid Retina XDR display, and up to 24 hours of battery life. We were impressed by the M5 MacBook Air, so the high-end M6 powered MacBook Pro definitely won't let us down.