When you thought Razer couldn't fall to a new low ...

[Findecanor]

I just happened to stumble upon this:
Razer SoftMiner uses your GPU to mine cryptocurrency.

What the ...

I had to check if that hadn't been posted April 1 or on a joke site....
Nope: It's official (twitter). Dated Wednesday.

Have a gaming rig on idle at home? Here's a new way to score Razer Silver: launch Razer SoftMiner on your PC and start racking up Silver—one step closer to the reward you want, for doing nothing at all.

So, if you run their "SoftMiner" app on your PC, it will mine cryptocurrency — for Razer — and in return you would get store credit.

A twitter commenter quickly calculated that to earn enough store credit ("Razer Silver") to buy a £199 keyboard, one would have to run the miner for 560 days ... but that would be impossible because each unit of Razer Silver would expire within 12 months.

...

[Leslieann]

Don't forget you also have to pay for electricity.
With a mid grade card you're looking at about $400 in power here in the US to earn enough to get a "free" $200 keyboard.

What a deal!

[tp4tissue]

does this factor in electricity ?

[Leslieann]

does this factor in electricity ?

Razer never mentions power at all.

[tp4tissue]

This might be an idea stage thing.. I don't think it's full roll out is it ?

[ramnes]

Thank you for the good laugh!

[Leslieann]

This might be an idea stage thing.. I don't think it's full roll out is it ?

It's beta software, but they have a full section of their website dedicated to it, including a catalog of what you can get.

I suspect this is an off-the-shelf miner they stuck their name on (it's known to trigger antivirus alerts), so basically if just a few people do this, they'll recover their investment.

[trizkut]

This might be an idea stage thing.. I don't think it's full roll out is it ?

It's beta software, but they have a full section of their website dedicated to it, including a catalog of what you can get.

I suspect this is an off-the-shelf miner they stuck their name on (it's known to trigger antivirus alerts), so basically if just a few people do this, they'll recover their investment.

They partnered with these guys:
https://www.gammanow.com/

[Leslieann]

This might be an idea stage thing.. I don't think it's full roll out is it ?

It's beta software, but they have a full section of their website dedicated to it, including a catalog of what you can get.

I suspect this is an off-the-shelf miner they stuck their name on (it's known to trigger antivirus alerts), so basically if just a few people do this, they'll recover their investment.

They partnered with these guys:
https://www.gammanow.com/

That whole site looks like someone trying to capitalize on venture capitalist B.S.
Lots of flashy gamer stuff and lots of buzzwords (BLOCKCHAIN!).

[tp4tissue]

Hrrrm just looked through that site..

I think the ability to cross over to real world material (keyboard) is only part of the deal.

But this is likely primarily an obfuscated -in game- item channel which are only buy-able via the mining-credits,  kind of like the obscure real world value of CS-GO knives..


It's not totally unfeasible an idea..  Assuming the number crunching they're doing is actual worthwhile calculation.. 

This could very well be marketable..

[xtrafrood]

TIL ICOs are now the new UPC promotions and or coupons. 

[Leslieann]

This could very well be marketable..

I see some serious problems with it.

Kids never see the electric bill and many have no idea how much this can increase a bill. Many parents have no idea how much it can also ramp up their bill.  If your system is using 300 watts, not an unreasonable number in a gaming rig, you could be looking at a $25 a month increase. Not a huge number, but it could be noticeable, especially in summer if you have to run the air conditioner more to compensate for the heat being dumped into the house and it could also be quite a shock, especially if you are on a budget. Now imagine the kid using a high end system with dual RTX 2080s. Worse, if the points don't roll over to the next year, you could spend all that time crunching and lose all of it.  So what happens if you spend $200 in electricity and you only get a mousepad, the rest gets lost because you didn't use them soon enough or get enough to get the next item you want? I think this could expose them to some legalities.

Lastly, it's not a sustainable system.
Razer is doing it, how about all of the websites also trying to do it? How many places can use your gpu to mine at the same time? I know this sounds like a stupid thing to consider, what do you care, but ads are run and done, cash spends anywhere. This is not, it's whoever has control at the time and they could end up starting an arms race on who gets to abuse your power bill. With or without your permission. All of this is going to result in the same thing... Lawsuits and regulations.

[Findecanor]

Don't forget you also have to pay for electricity.
With a mid grade card you're looking at about $400 in power here in the US to earn enough to get a "free" $200 keyboard.

A British commenter on Twitter noted that the cost of electricity would be £700 for a £199 keyboard. I forgot to include that in the OP, sorry.

In my opinion, the people at Razer responsible for this should be put in jail for trying to fool gullible kids in wasting power this way.
Also, we're living in a climate crisis here, and we need to learn how to save energy, not throw it away.
Also, investing in cryptocurrency mining when that has shown to be unsustainable (not counting global energy waste) ... (Not that idea of an electronic currency is a fundamentally bad idea in itself, but how it was done: systems competing in cracking cryptographic-grade hash sums. What a totally retarted idea ... unless you want to set up a Chinese lottery).

[tp4tissue]

It's fine, as long as the mining is doing real work like folding@home..

If the payout is not preposterously low,  it's workable..



As for tricking young children with 2080tis   , come on, any child whose parents buy them 2080 tis will receive no time out for burning a bit more oil.

As for energy conservation.. again, don't worry, Elon is on it..

If you really care, stop eating meat.. that makes a bigger difference in carbon footprint than driving less ever could..

If we still eat meat, we have no right to talk about saving the planet.. WHY ?  google it.

[xtrafrood]

Why are you defending Razer tp4tissue? Does tp4 have Razer stocks? Or is tp4 REALLY into mining random ICOs? Devil's advocate week? What gives?

[tp4tissue]

Why are you defending Razer tp4tissue? Does tp4 have Razer stocks? Or is tp4 REALLY into mining random ICOs? Devil's advocate week? What gives?

Cough.. Tp4 heavily invested in disease/death

Everybody eat lots of chicken please..


Not defending razer..  Defending the CONCEPT


Razer will probably put something up everyone's bum.. 

Looking at Tp4's 3x Dead razer blackwidow ultimates

[xtrafrood]

Why are you defending Razer tp4tissue? Does tp4 have Razer stocks? Or is tp4 REALLY into mining random ICOs? Devil's advocate week? What gives?

Cough.. Tp4 heavily invested in disease/death

Everybody eat lots of chicken please..


Not defending razer..  Defending the CONCEPT


Razer will probably put something up everyone's bum.. 

Looking at Tp4's 3x Dead razer blackwidow ultimates

No one said anything about chimken fren.  But seriously--we _definitely_ have plenty of landfill room, electricity, and recycling resources to accommodate the leftovers from ICO flops. No worries.

[Leslieann]

It's fine, as long as the mining is doing real work like folding@home..

Except that it's not.
It's purely a way for Razer to get free money by making fools waste energy.

In fact, it's just short of a pyramid scheme.

[9999hp]

Wouldn't think it would be worth it to begin with just because of wear on your gpu

[tp4tissue]

Wouldn't think it would be worth it to begin with just because of wear on your gpu

In the majority of cases, the gpu becomes obsolete prior to wearing out.

[Leslieann]

I'll be honest, i think the whole mining wears out a card is a bit over-rated.
It's electronic, yes, the fan can wear faster (unless under-volted, which can lead to issues), but the electronics not so much. Yes the caps can wear (and this is where under-volting can do damage, but not always), but odds are not in a year or two. Does your cpu wear out faster under load? How about the power supply? You are FAAAAR more likely to see an old GPU than an old hard drive.

Do I think people should buy mining cards? Only if it's pennies on the dollar. Let them wallow in the hell they created.

[Sintpinty]

I saw something on ReviewTechUSA that pointed out the problems with this. A graphics card can't be used for mining, it's the cpu that does all the decisions and work. Razer is getting more of the money than you are, and it would take at least 10 years to get one of their bad oranta chroma things.


This is exactly why i don't buy their stuff, it wears out quickly or isn't good.

[Sintpinty]

Don't forget you also have to pay for electricity.
With a mid grade card you're looking at about $400 in power here in the US to earn enough to get a "free" $200 keyboard.

What a deal!

Well said lad.

[Sintpinty]

Don't forget you also have to pay for electricity.
With a mid grade card you're looking at about $400 in power here in the US to earn enough to get a "free" $200 keyboard.

A British commenter on Twitter noted that the cost of electricity would be £700 for a £199 keyboard. I forgot to include that in the OP, sorry.

In my opinion, the people at Razer responsible for this should be put in jail for trying to fool gullible kids in wasting power this way.
Also, we're living in a climate crisis here, and we need to learn how to save energy, not throw it away.
Also, investing in cryptocurrency mining when that has shown to be unsustainable (not counting global energy waste) ... (Not that idea of an electronic currency is a fundamentally bad idea in itself, but how it was done: systems competing in cracking cryptographic-grade hash sums. What a totally retarted idea ... unless you want to set up a Chinese lottery).

This should be illegal. In addition, the program might be modified so they can see what the person is doing.

[xtrafrood]

Modified for data collection?  Who's to say they don't already have a data collection method in place?

[Nerd]

I thought this was a joke, until i saw this post.

[Leslieann]

Razer is now offering a credit card, complete with light up logo (not RGB).

So what are we going to see next year, Razer multi-level marketing?
Lanparties become Razer parties...