Vertcoin: Everything you ever wanted to know
The green cryptocurrency Vertcoin has entered the scene in the year 2014. It has recently erupted into the crypto-scene due to the implementation of the highly secure Ledger hardware wallet. What is so unique about Vertcoin? How does it relate to the more well-known cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin and litecoin? And, why is Vertcoin the ideal cryptocurrency for light miners?
What Will You Learn About Vertcoin?
- ASIC Resistance - Vertcoin Goes to Light Miners
- Vertcoin Mining
- Vertcoin Parameters
- Vertcoin Ecosystem
- Development and Vertcoin Roadmap
- Vertbase + Lightning Network = Moon?
- VTC Exchange Rate - What is Vertcoin's Rate and Price?
- Vertcoin Community
ASIC Resistance – Vertcoin Goes to Light Miners
Vertcoin has always been an ASIC-resistant coin. This means that Vertcoin is specifically designed for home mining and not industrial specialised crypto-mining hardware (i.e., ASIC = Application-Specific Integrated Circuit). On ASIC devices today, dozens of high-demand cryptos like Bitcoin, Litecoin, and Dash are being mined. These devices are effective; however, their production has been monopolised by one company in particular - Bitmain. The practices of this company have been debated time and time again in the past (Backdoor Antbleed, Bitcoin Cash Support). ASICs isn't that easy to access for light miners.
The main motivation behind Vertcoin was to keep the mining process in the hands of average users. After all, the motto of the project is "The People's Coin" - cryptocurrency for the people. Over the past few years, developers have initiated two forks to confirm their intention to keep it as an ASIC-resistant currency. The Vertcoin hash function was at first just like Litecoin - Scrypt. In 2014, ASIC miners were developed for this function, and Vertcoin switched to Lyra2RE. In the summer of 2015, another Lyr2REv2 fork came in an attempt to decentralise mining (the only mining company then controlled over 50% of the hashrate).
Vertcoin Mining
In general, Vertcoin mining is more user-friendly than other cryptocurrencies. Vertcoin developers have created the so-called One-Click-Miner for those who are not highly-skilled with IT, hardware, and software. In other words, VTC is going to benefit from the one-click process because more users will have the capacity and ability to mine. For example, if you own a gaming system and you want to monetise your hardware, you can help build Vertcoin and make money at the same time.
In the next sections, we will look more closely at One-Click-Miner mining and Simplemining. These methods are more suitable for mining using multiple graphics cards, mining rigs, and even entire farms.
Vertcoin Mining with One-Click-Miner
The One-Click-Miner (OCM) installation file is available on the official Vertcoin GitHub. The installation process is designed so anyone with a laptop can easily set it up and start mining. It's important to always download the latest version of the program.
Once installed, the green-grey OCM window opens. Here you need to set two basic data requirements. The first is your VTC wallet address where the payout will be sent, or what you will receive. We recommend the best and safest way to store private keys is with a hardware wallet. Vertcoin is integrated into the Ledger Nano S hardware wallet and is likely to be integrated in the future with the new Trezor T hardware wallet model that's already on the market. If you do not have a hardware wallet, we recommend using the Electrum VTC version. After that, just select the mining pool using the green Find P2P Pool Nodes button, select the miner (mining tool of your graphics card) and press START.
The above is all you need to start mining. If you want to fine-tune performance, noise, waste-heat, and power consumption, we recommend installing MSI Afterburner. You can adjust the core of the graphics card, memory, and especially the power limit and fan speeds. In the picture above, you can see Vertcoin mined with the NVIDIA GTX 1080 Ti, which is energy-intensive and delivers plenty of processing power needed to mine. If you use the MSI Afterburner to reduce the power limit to 80%, you will lose some Mh/s performance and reduce the consumption by at least 100 watts. This will significantly affect the ROI (return on investment) indicator.
Mining Vertcoin Using Simplemining.net
To understand the context, we recommend that you familiarise yourself with the How to mine cryptocurrency with Simplemining.net (INSTRUCTIONS). Follow the link to the article and see how to set up the Vertcoin mining program with the mining rig of six GTX 1060.
If you already understand the basics of Simplemining, you will be interested in one thing - which miner to use and how to set it up. For Vertcoin mining, whether via Windows or Linux (Simplemining), you need to use ccminer in the modified version of Tupruvot. In our case, you can find Simplemining Version 2.1. Since ccminer knows more algorithms, the miner needs to be set up which one of these to work with.
Choose the "-a lyra2v2" command, which is shown below. Then just specify the TCP address of the mining field and the appropriate port including the worker (mining rig). Let's take a look at the Miningpoolhub for Vertcoin.
After signing up for the Miningpoolhub, you need to set up a worker, which consists of your login to the pool, the suffix of the worker itself and a simple password. The password is only for connecting to the pool; it is not a serious safety factor. Our top overclocker Michal Mikle uses a simple "x," for his password. For example, when selecting "elkimek" as the login and naming the rig "NV", the worker name is "elkimek.NV." The whole configuration for ccminer-tpruvot 2.1. then looks like this:
"-a lyra2v2 -o layer + tcp: //hub.miningpoolhub.com: 20507 -u elkimek.NV -p x"
To see if it works properly, verify it with the Simplemining.net administration on the RigList tab or directly via a monitor connected to the mining rig. The next step is to check SSH over any SSH connection application. Michal Mikle uses MobaXterm. SMOS is logged in by default using the username "miner" and password: "miner." Using the "screen-x miner" command, you can get to the main mining screen to see real-time mining results.
As shown in the picture above, one overclocked GTX 1060 gives approximately 25.5Mh/s (25,500kh/s). These are values that you can count using Whattomine.com. Whattomine.com answers your most frequently asked questions such as: What to earn, with what to earn, what is the return, etc.
Vertcoin is not the most profitable cryptocurrency to mine, so you have two options: Mine something else, such as ZenCash (ZEN) or anything profiting in dollars, or BTC, and change it to VTC, or the so-called HODL. (Find out more at the Bitcointalk forum).
I agree with everything that my colleague Josef Tětek wrote, and I myself have invested in Vertcoin. I stumbled upon a phrase from VTC fans: "Vertcoin is what the cryptocurrency really wants to be." I can't agree more. The year 2018 will be interesting not only from Vertcoin's point of view but also due to the opening of Vertbase and launch of the Lightning Network joined with Atomic Swaps. I also personally asked Vertcoin's chief developers James Lovejoy and Gert-Jaap Glasberg about Vertcoin's future. Their answers can be found below in this article.
As far as mining is concerned, I like Vertcoin's simple One-Click-Miner solution. Suppose that I'm a passionate gamer and I have a graphics card like the NVIDIA GTX 1080 Ti. I cannot play 24/7/365 and I also have to sleep sometimes and go to school or work. When I do not use the graphics card, I can turn on OCM and benefit from VTC. When mining with this card, I draw about 1.1 VTC per day. To this date, the exchange rate is only $4.15 per Vertcoin. Personally, I believe that it's only a matter of time before Vertcoin is $100, so take into account that you can make up to 100VTC by then. When VTC rate reaches (and it will) $100, the value of your Vertcoins will be $10,000. At this point, you have not only paid for the graphics card and the electricity bill, but also for the 4K ultra-gaming machine with two high-end slots and several monitors. Obviously, to some extent, this is speculation, but it seems like a very real scenario to me. And what about you? Are you still letting your machine sleep while you're away?
Michal Mikle
I'm an overclocker and enthusiast Bitcoiner. With computer hardware, any unused performance won't keep me calm. If there is the possibility of squeezing another drop of power from the hardware, I won't miss it. I love the adrenaline and pushing the limits, of the components and myself. This activity is rich with choices, but I mainly use liquid nitrogen and phase-change methods. I also set up a service to optimise Intel processors, delid.cz, building custom PC setups on demand and I enjoy security and privacy topics. Outside the digital world I'm interested in permaculture and other low time preference systems.
Vertcoin Parameters
Vertcoin is a copy of Litecoin's blueprint: the total number of coins will be 84 million in blocks of 1MB mined at an average interval of 2.5 minutes. Like litecoin, vertcoin has been using SegWit in 2017. The reward for an extracted block was initially 50 vertcoins and is halved every four years (the first half occurred in December 2017, and currently the reward is 25 VTC/block).
In practice, this means that while Bitcoin currently has 80% of all coins and Litecoin 65%, Vertcoins have been mined for only 51%. From the investor's point of view, it is necessary to expect a higher inflation rate in the following years (but in the past, most inflationary cryptos have been overtaken by the price increase resulting from growing speculative demand).
Vertcoin Ecosystem
Since October 2017, Vertcoin has been supported by the Ledger hardware wallet - it is therefore possible to store your currency with the same level of security as the coins from the top of the cryptographic list, such as Bitcoin, Ethereum or Litecoin. There is also an official desktop wallet (and full-featured node) Vertcoin Core where you can download the whole blockchain (currently 3.16 GB) and Electrum-VT, which is a lightweight wallet (without a blockchain download).
We're building the future of decentralised money with VTC. We believe that a currency should be controlled by the people who use it. By ensuring decentralisation, involving our community and by maintaining an open development process we keep the power in the hands of the users.
Gert-Jaap Glasbergen
Gert-Jaap Glasbergen has been working in the software engineering field since 1998, and he has been actively involved in cryptocurrency transactions since 2013. He recently joined the Vertcoin development team.
In January 2018, the network has over 250 active nodes running a full-fledged Vertcoin Core client. Vertcoin, like all the serious cryptographic projects, is an open source with its own GitHub repository.
Development and Vertcoin Roadmap
Vertcoin's main developer is James Lovejoy, a student of the prestigious MIT University and a researcher at the MIT Digital Currency Initiative. Interestingly, the founder of Litecoin Charlie Lee is a graduate of the same university. Perhaps that's why Vertcoin is the only one mentioned in the 017 Litecoin roadmap in connection with the development of the Lightning network and Atomic swap (P2P exchange of coins between two block-chains).
And this is not the only case: Loshan, who worked on Loafwallet for Litecoin, confirmed cooperation on an iOS wallet for Vertcoin. It is noteworthy to point out developers in the top 10 cryptos are fully supporting Vertcoin and working to elevate it to a top-tier crypto.
This brings us to the Vertcoin development plan (The Roadmap). On Trello, this plan is continuously updated, and everyone can see what developers are currently working on and what they plan to do in the future. According to the Roadmap, we should expect Vertcoin to implement Stealth Address Technologies, which will provide users with more privacy in transactions. In the future, there are plans to implement Trezor hardware wallets (currently only Vertcoin is supported by the competitive Ledger) and listing more cryptographic stock exchanges.
Vertbase + Lightning Network = Moon?
The two most anticipated events this summer are at Vertcoin's launch of the US Vertbase exchange office and the implementation of payment channels on the Lightning Network. Vertbase has the ambition to become one of the main gates connecting the world of electronic money and cryptocurrencies. The Vertbase exchange office will be operated from the United States and will target primarily US clientele. Vertbase also plans to offer USD/VTC currency exchanges.
The successful launch of Vertbase would be very positive for the development of the Vertcoin users. Vertcoin currently cannot be purchased directly under the fiat currency and must be acquired using Bitcoin. The highest liquidity (i.e. the highest trade volumes) of Vertcoin can be found on the Bittrex crypto-currency exchange, which is currently introducing USD trading pairs. This allows for VTC:USD exchanges, which is a huge step forward for Vertcoin.
Vertcoin is the cryptocurrency that rises above the hype. We believe in pursuing technical progress over celebrity endorsements and fake partnerships and plan to be the premier coin for payments in 2018. By staying true to the original goal of cryptocurrency, money owned and operated by its users with as many people as possible sharing the benefits; Vertcoin will be able to progress technologically faster than other coins because the incentives between the various stakeholders will be aligned. Through Lightning Network integration into our wallets and point of sale solutions, Vertcoin will soon be able to scale and process transactions quick enough to be a real payments currency.
James Lovejoy
James has been involved with programming in various forms since he was 10 years old. Currently, he is the chief developer of Vertcoin, as well as a researcher at the MIT Digital Currency Initiative, where he is working to implement a decentralised monetary policy.
In the course of this year, the testing and deployment of Lightning Network (LN) based applications, i.e., the tools to open extra block channel payment platforms, should allow for instant and cheap transactions. Although LN was primarily created as a bitcoin scaling solution, it can be deployed on other coins - especially those that are bitcoin clones, making them compatible with bitcoin solutions. These coins have already been activated for a long time by SegWit, which is a prerequisite for deploying LN. This includes Litecoin and Vertcoin, but this "SegWit family" also includes Viacoin and Groestlcoin.
The Lightning Network provides the possibility to virtually integrate coins across multiple blockchains allowing for a free exchange of cryptocurrencies.
A prerequisite for fulfilling Lightning Network's aspirations of exchanging multiple cryptocurrencies relies on sufficient liquidity for P2P atomic swaps. It is also possible to deploy untapped technologies, such as the recently-proposed channel factories - Bitcoin will hopefully become the dominant cryptom that will not need other coins.
VTC Exchange Rates – What is Vertcoin's Rate and Price?
All cryptocurrencies are volatile entities, and Vertcoin is no different. It can fluctuate often, which is expected of exchange rates. The current rate for the Euro is, 1VTC=2.95EU, and Vertcoin does not even rank among the first hundred of its total market value. You can see the real-time rates in the interactive chart below.
Vertcoin Community
For full awareness of the development of Vertcoin, we recommend visiting the following communication channels:
You can help developers contribute to key projects on Vertcoin.org.
Josef Tětek
Josef is an economist and analyst influenced by the Austrian school of economics. He works as an analyst at TopMonks and is a fellow at the Czech Liberal Institute. Co-author of the paper Bitcoin Peer Banking. Author of Bitcoin: Separation of Money and State. @SatsJoseph on Twitter.
