1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:05,280 When we started putting this video together, GPU prices were still pretty high, but the supply 2 00:00:05,280 --> 00:00:10,480 situation was starting to get just a little bit better. So does that mean that NVIDIA and AMD 3 00:00:10,480 --> 00:00:16,000 have found a way to make more chips? Not exactly. It turns out prices were gently dropping because 4 00:00:16,000 --> 00:00:22,000 of miners trying to liquidate their stock of GPUs. In fact, over in China, used graphics 5 00:00:22,000 --> 00:00:26,000 cards were practically flooding the market. I mean, think about how insane it is these days 6 00:00:26,000 --> 00:00:32,400 to get a 3070 for 400 bucks. You see, Ethereum is currently the most popular cryptocurrency that 7 00:00:32,400 --> 00:00:37,840 people are mining on graphics cards because unlike Bitcoin, it's still often profitable to do so. 8 00:00:38,480 --> 00:00:43,840 But similarly to Bitcoin, the difficulty of mining Ether is gradually getting harder and harder, 9 00:00:43,840 --> 00:00:48,880 meaning you get less of a payout for the same amount of computational power your GPU expends. 10 00:00:48,880 --> 00:00:55,520 This is all leading up to the launch of Ethereum 2.0, which won't rely on GPU mining at all. 11 00:00:56,000 --> 00:01:02,640 Or any mining. And yes, although we already have had the London hard fork, which some people believed 12 00:01:02,640 --> 00:01:08,160 would cause GPU prices to fall, we haven't gotten the full Ethereum 2.0 release just yet. 13 00:01:08,160 --> 00:01:12,880 The current Ethereum uses a consensus mechanism called Proof of Work, where you get rewarded 14 00:01:12,880 --> 00:01:18,640 because your system expended energy working on a cryptographic problem. But Ethereum 2.0 will scrap 15 00:01:18,640 --> 00:01:23,600 Proof of Work entirely and instead move to Proof of Stake. But don't worry if you're vegan, 16 00:01:23,600 --> 00:01:27,360 as there's no red meat involved. Proof of Stake means that Ethereum rewards 17 00:01:27,360 --> 00:01:32,560 won't be decided by how good of a GPU or ASIC miner you have. Instead, you'll need to already 18 00:01:32,560 --> 00:01:38,480 have some Ether on the network. Staked on the network. This is the stake in Proof of Stake. 19 00:01:38,480 --> 00:01:42,480 The more Ether you have staked, the higher the probability of being assigned 20 00:01:42,480 --> 00:01:46,880 transactions to validate and the higher the amount of cryptocurrency you'll ultimately get paid. 21 00:01:46,880 --> 00:01:51,760 Of course, this means you'll have to keep some Ether on the network instead of just selling it for 22 00:01:51,760 --> 00:01:58,320 real money, but you're just holding it all anyway, right? Now, this might sound not too great if you 23 00:01:58,320 --> 00:02:03,120 don't already have a fair amount of Ether saved up, but you can still grow how much you have over 24 00:02:03,120 --> 00:02:09,680 time with Proof of Stake. Even though the official amount needed to stake is 32 Ether, around $125,000 25 00:02:09,680 --> 00:02:14,800 US at the time we wrote this video, you should still be able to join a pool with far less crypto 26 00:02:14,800 --> 00:02:20,800 on hand, similarly how current mining pools work. We're all in this together. But why is Ethereum 27 00:02:20,800 --> 00:02:25,360 moving to Proof of Stake? Well, one big concern is the environmental impact of the current Proof 28 00:02:25,360 --> 00:02:31,360 of Work scheme. As you know, mining crypto on GPUs or ASICs is an incredibly power-hungry process, 29 00:02:31,360 --> 00:02:35,280 and taking the vast majority of the number crunching out of the equation, no pun intended, 30 00:02:35,280 --> 00:02:40,640 will go a long way toward a cleaner future for crypto. Another huge advantage is speed. Getting 31 00:02:40,640 --> 00:02:44,480 rid of Ethereum's dependence on Proof of Work means transactions can be processed much more 32 00:02:44,480 --> 00:02:48,800 quickly. Instead of its current rate of approximately 15 to 30 transactions every second, 33 00:02:48,800 --> 00:02:55,360 we could instead see numbers closer to 2,000 to 100,000 transactions per second, which 34 00:02:55,360 --> 00:03:00,160 may give Ethereum more appeal as a mainstream blockchain protocol. ThroughPit will also be 35 00:03:00,160 --> 00:03:05,440 helped along by a technique called sharding, where each computer doesn't have to hold a copy of the 36 00:03:05,440 --> 00:03:11,120 entire blockchain. Sharding with a D, guys. But when can we expect Ethereum 2.0 to replace the 37 00:03:11,120 --> 00:03:16,720 current system? Well, reports are indicating that it could happen by late 2021 or early 2022, 38 00:03:16,720 --> 00:03:20,880 so be on the lookout for this if you're a miner, or even if you don't care at all about crypto, 39 00:03:20,880 --> 00:03:25,920 and just want to play some games. Hopefully there will be actually an affordable used graphics card 40 00:03:25,920 --> 00:03:30,560 under your Christopher Shiori and your Easter basket as miners offload them. I'm assuming they 41 00:03:30,560 --> 00:03:35,760 don't just find something else to mine. Maybe this is a good time for us to launch Linus coin? 42 00:03:35,760 --> 00:03:38,960 So thanks for watching, guys. If you liked this video, hit like, hit subscribe, and hit us up in 43 00:03:38,960 --> 00:03:43,760 the comment section with your suggestions of videos and topics that we should cover in the future.