<p>Mining by yourself requires that you have the whole blockchain. However, when you choose to mine as part of a pool, the pool operator maintains the full blockchain and just sends parcels of work out to the miners. (Of course, in this arrangement you have to trust the pool operator.)</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-01-22T23:14:16.590Z
2014-01-22T23:14:16.590Z
Greg Hewgill
<p>Just out of curiosity, I downloaded cpuminer, signed up at a mining pool site and started the miner.  It seems to be doing something.</p>

<pre><code>[2014-01-22 22:51:09] 1 miner threads started, using 'sha256d' algorithm.
[2014-01-22 22:51:09] Starting Stratum on stratum+tcp://stratum.bitcoin.cz:3333 
[2014-01-22 22:51:10] Stratum detected new block
[2014-01-22 22:51:12] thread 0: 2097152 hashes, 1600 khash/s
[2014-01-22 22:51:42] Stratum detected new block
[2014-01-22 22:51:46] thread 0: 56289640 hashes, 1652 khash/s
[2014-01-22 22:52:47] thread 0: 99121136 hashes, 1624 khash/s
[2014-01-22 22:53:48] thread 0: 97418224 hashes, 1599 khash/s
[2014-01-22 22:54:40] thread 0: 95913336 hashes, 1821 khash/s
</code></pre>

<p>I was under the impression that mining could not be done without first downloading the whole chain (that takes about 3 days to download).  Is cpuminer really doing something or just showing me some fake data?</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-01-23T00:24:33.660Z
the output in the picture shows the miner's current state. when it says "thread x: xxx hashes, xx khash/s" that just indicates the speed of the miner. it is refreshed periodically. "detected a new block" means that the pool is now working on a new block, and therefore all the shares you make will start going towards solving that block.
ZCoder
<bitcoin-core>
CPUMiner - Do I also need to download Bitcoin client and 15gb chain?
Allen King
# CPUMiner - Do I also need to download Bitcoin client and 15gb chain?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2014-01-22)

Just out of curiosity, I downloaded cpuminer, signed up at a mining pool site and started the miner. It seems to be doing something.

```
[2014-01-22 22:51:09] 1 miner threads started, using 'sha256d' algorithm.
[2014-01-22 22:51:09] Starting Stratum on stratum+tcp://stratum.bitcoin.cz:3333 
[2014-01-22 22:51:10] Stratum detected new block
[2014-01-22 22:51:12] thread 0: 2097152 hashes, 1600 khash/s
[2014-01-22 22:51:42] Stratum detected new block
[2014-01-22 22:51:46] thread 0: 56289640 hashes, 1652 khash/s
[2014-01-22 22:52:47] thread 0: 99121136 hashes, 1624 khash/s
[2014-01-22 22:53:48] thread 0: 97418224 hashes, 1599 khash/s
[2014-01-22 22:54:40] thread 0: 95913336 hashes, 1821 khash/s

```

I was under the impression that mining could not be done without first downloading the whole chain (that takes about 3 days to download). Is cpuminer really doing something or just showing me some fake data?

**Tags:** bitcoin-core

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: the output in the picture shows the miner's current state. when it says "thread x: xxx hashes, xx khash/s" that just indicates the speed of the miner. it is refreshed periodically. "detected a new block" means that the pool is now working on a new block, and therefore all the shares you make will start going towards solving that block.  

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## 1 answers

### Answer by username_2 on 2014-01-22. Score: 1 | Accepted answer

Mining by yourself requires that you have the whole blockchain. However, when you choose to mine as part of a pool, the pool operator maintains the full blockchain and just sends parcels of work out to the miners. (Of course, in this arrangement you have to trust the pool operator.)


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