Bitcoin Mining Glossary

240V Outlet A high-voltage outlet providing enough power for full-size miners. Standard in homes for dryers and ranges. 51% Attack A theoretical attack requiring over 50% of network hashrate to double-spend or censor transactions. Air Cooling Standard miner cooling using fans and heatsinks. Simple and effective but can be noisy for home use. Apartment Mining Mining in an apartment requires quiet hardware and low power. Open-source miners like Bitaxe are ideal. ASIC A specialized chip designed exclusively for Bitcoin mining, far faster and more efficient than general-purpose hardware. ASIC Chip An individual mining chip that performs SHA-256 hashing. Modern miners contain dozens to hundreds of these. AxeOS Open-source firmware for Bitaxe miners. Web interface for pool setup, tuning, and monitoring. Bitaxe An open-source solo Bitcoin miner. D-Central is a pioneer manufacturer with the original Mesh Stand. Bits A compact encoding of the mining difficulty target stored in each block header. Block A bundle of Bitcoin transactions added to the blockchain. Miners compete to create each new block. Block Find Probability The odds of your miner finding a block based on your share of network hashrate. Low for small miners but never zero. Block Header The 80-byte section of a block that miners hash. Contains version, previous hash, Merkle root, time, target, and nonce. Block Height The position number of a block in the blockchain, starting from zero at the genesis block. Block Reward The Bitcoin earned by mining a block. Currently 3.125 BTC, it halves roughly every four years. Block Subsidy The newly created Bitcoin in each block, currently 3.125 BTC. Halves every four years until supply reaches 21M. Block Template A candidate block that miners hash. Contains selected transactions and metadata ready for mining. Block Time The average time between blocks, targeted at 10 minutes. Individual blocks vary randomly around this average. BM1366 A Bitmain mining chip powering the Antminer S19 XP and Bitaxe Supra. Efficient at around 21.5 J/TH. BM1368 A Bitmain chip used in Antminer S21 variants and the Bitaxe Gamma open-source miner. BM1370 Bitmain's latest mining chip in the Antminer S21. Industry-leading efficiency at approximately 15 J/TH. Break-Even The electricity rate where mining revenue equals power costs. Below this rate, mining is profitable. BTU Output Heat output in BTU/hr, calculated as watts times 3.412. Helps compare miners to traditional heaters. Coinbase Transaction The special first transaction in each block that creates new Bitcoin and pays the miner. Confirmations The number of blocks mined after a transaction, indicating how secure and irreversible it is. Control Board The management board in an ASIC miner that runs firmware, coordinates hashboards, and connects to the network. Custom Firmware Third-party firmware replacing stock software for better efficiency, autotuning, and monitoring features. Diagnostic Identifying faults in mining hardware using test equipment and systematic testing before repair. Difficulty A value that controls how hard it is to mine a Bitcoin block, adjusted every two weeks to maintain 10-minute block times. Difficulty Adjustment The automatic recalculation of mining difficulty every 2,016 blocks to maintain 10-minute block times. Dollar Cost Averaging Mining Continuously mining to accumulate Bitcoin steadily over time, regardless of price movements. Double SHA-256 Applying SHA-256 twice in sequence, the specific hashing method Bitcoin uses for block mining. Dual-Purpose Mining Mining Bitcoin while using the heat productively for heating spaces, water, or other applications. Duct Adapter A connector between a miner's exhaust and standard HVAC ducting for directing hot air where needed. Efficiency (J/TH) Energy efficiency of a miner in Joules per Terahash. Lower is better as it means less electricity per unit of hashrate. Electricity Cost The cost of power for mining, measured in $/kWh. The biggest ongoing expense, varying greatly by location. Epoch A 2,016-block period between difficulty adjustments. Each epoch lasts roughly two weeks. ESP32 A low-cost microcontroller powering open-source miners like Bitaxe. Handles WiFi, firmware, and chip control. Firmware The software running on a miner that manages hashing, pool connections, and hardware monitoring. Fork A split in the blockchain into two paths. Can be temporary from competing blocks or permanent from rule changes. FPPS A pool payout method paying miners a fixed rate per share including estimated transaction fees. Garage Mining Running miners in a home garage for noise isolation and easy access. A popular choice for residential mining. Getwork An older, less efficient mining protocol replaced by Stratum. Required frequent polling for new work. Halving The event that cuts Bitcoin's block reward in half every four years, enforcing digital scarcity. Hard Fork A non-backward-compatible protocol change requiring all nodes to upgrade. Can permanently split the chain. Hash The output of a cryptographic function. Miners search for block hashes below the difficulty target. Hash Cost The cost to produce one terahash of mining power. Mining is profitable when hash price exceeds hash cost. Hash Price Revenue per terahash per day. A key metric showing the economic value of mining power at any given time. Hashboard The main mining board inside an ASIC containing rows of mining chips. Most miners have 3-4 hashboards. Hashboard Repair Fixing malfunctioning hashboards by replacing failed chips and components to restore full mining performance. Hashrate The speed at which a mining device performs calculations. More hashrate equals more mining power. Heat Recovery Capturing miner heat for productive use like home heating. Makes mining economics much more favorable in cold climates. Heatsink A metal component that absorbs and dissipates heat from mining chips, critical for performance. Home Mining Mining Bitcoin at home. Requires managing noise, heat, and power while potentially heating your space. Immersion Cooling Submerging mining hardware in non-conductive liquid for silent, efficient cooling. Eliminates fans and dust. Immersion Tank A sealed container of cooling fluid for silent mining. Eliminates fans and enables overclocking. Lightning Network A Layer 2 protocol enabling fast, cheap Bitcoin payments through off-chain payment channels. Longest Chain Rule Nodes accept the chain with the most proof of work as the valid blockchain. Resolves competing chains. Lottery Mining Solo mining with low odds but full block reward potential. The thrill of the possibility, every hash counts. Mempool The waiting area for unconfirmed transactions. Miners pick transactions from here to include in blocks. Merkle Root A hash summarizing all transactions in a block using a tree structure for efficient verification. Mining Using specialized hardware to validate Bitcoin transactions and earn block rewards by solving cryptographic puzzles. Mining Pool A group of miners who combine computing power and share block rewards proportionally. Mining Profitability Net financial return from mining after subtracting electricity and other costs from Bitcoin earned. Network Hashrate The total computing power of all Bitcoin miners combined. Higher network hashrate means more competition. Noctua Fan Premium quiet fans used to replace loud stock miner fans, making home mining feasible. Noise Level (dB) Miner sound output in decibels. Stock ASICs are 75-85 dB but can be reduced to under 40 dB for home use. Noise Reduction Techniques to quiet mining hardware for home use: fan swaps, enclosures, immersion, and acoustic insulation. Nonce A number miners change to produce different hash results when searching for a valid block. Open-Source Firmware Publicly available mining firmware that can be audited, modified, and improved by the community. Open-Source Mining Mining hardware with publicly available designs. Anyone can build, modify, and improve the hardware. Orphan Block A valid block rejected by the network because a competing block at the same height was accepted first. Overclocking Running mining hardware faster than default to increase hashrate, at the cost of more power and heat. PCB The circuit board that supports and connects mining chips. The physical foundation of a hashboard. PDU A power distribution device for feeding multiple miners from one circuit with monitoring and protection. Pool Fee The percentage a pool takes from rewards. Ranges from 0-4% depending on the pool and payout method. Power Circuit The electrical wiring and breaker serving mining hardware. Full-size miners often need dedicated 240V circuits. PPLNS A pool payout distributing actual block rewards based on shares contributed. Lower fees but more variable income. PPS A pool payout paying a fixed rate per share based on the block subsidy only, not transaction fees. Proof of Work Bitcoin's security mechanism requiring miners to expend energy to validate transactions and create blocks. Propagation Delay The time for a new block to spread across the network. Faster propagation reduces competing blocks. PSU The power supply that converts AC electricity to DC power for the miner. A critical component affecting efficiency. Public Pool A no-fee, no-registration solo mining pool popular with Bitaxe users. Full block reward goes to the finder. Reflowing Reheating solder joints to fix broken connections. A common repair for intermittent chip failures. Residential Mining Mining in a home setting, balancing hashrate with noise, heat, and power constraints of residential life. ROI The time for mining profits to pay back the hardware cost. Shorter payback periods are better. Sats per Terahash Mining revenue measured in satoshis per terahash per day. Shows BTC yield independent of price. SegWit A 2017 upgrade that increased block capacity by separating signature data and enabled the Lightning Network. Selfish Mining A strategy of withholding mined blocks to gain advantage over honest miners. Theoretical but rarely observed. SHA-256 The cryptographic algorithm Bitcoin uses for mining. ASIC chips are designed specifically to compute SHA-256 at high speed. Share A partial proof of work submitted to a pool to prove your miner is working. Used to calculate your reward share. Shroud A duct attachment for directing miner airflow. Essential for home mining heat management and noise reduction. Soft Fork A backward-compatible protocol upgrade. Old nodes still accept new blocks without upgrading. Solo Block A block found by a solo miner earning the full reward. Rare for small miners but hugely celebrated. Solo Mining Mining on your own without a pool. Low odds but you keep the full block reward if you win. Space Heater Mining Using miners as heaters that also earn Bitcoin. 100% of electricity becomes useful heat in cold weather. Stale Block A valid block not included in the main chain because a competing block was accepted first. Stranded Energy Energy that cannot reach consumers economically. Bitcoin mining can convert stranded energy into value on-site. Stratum Protocol The protocol miners use to communicate with pools. Stratum v2 adds encryption and miner-selected transactions. Taproot A 2021 upgrade adding Schnorr signatures for better privacy and efficiency in complex Bitcoin transactions. Target The threshold a block hash must be below to be valid. Lower target means harder mining. TDP The maximum heat output of a miner in watts. Equal to power consumption since all electricity becomes heat. Temperature Sensor Sensors monitoring chip and ambient temperatures to prevent overheating and control fan speeds. Thermal Paste A compound applied between chips and heatsinks for better heat transfer. Regular replacement improves miner performance. Timestamp The time recorded in a block header when the block was mined, used for difficulty adjustments. Transaction Fees Fees users pay for miners to process their transactions. Becomes more important as block rewards decrease. Underclocking Running mining hardware slower to reduce power, heat, and noise. Essential for home mining setups. Undervolting Lowering chip voltage to reduce power consumption and heat, improving efficiency for home mining. Version A block header field that indicates the block format version and signals support for protocol upgrades. Voltage Regulator Components that convert 12V power to the precise low voltage ASIC chips need. A common failure point in miners.