After a final test successfully passed, ethereumone of the most popular cryptocurrencies, and the second largest in the market after Bitcoin, has completed what is known as the largest update in its history when moving from the PoW protocol (Proof-of-Work or Proof of Work), at PoS-protocol (Proof-of-Stake or proof of participation). This update, known as ‘The Merge’, will now bring different advantages to the Ethereum ecosystem. Among them, and the most important, your mining will be much more efficient.
The Ethereum update does not present major changes for those users who own or invest in this cryptocurrency. The new protocol, in fact, mainly affects miners. The reason? The fact of moving to the PoS protocol makes mining no longer serves as a form of production of new blocks. Instead, miners will be able to act as validators. In other words, they will be able to dedicate themselves to verifying transactions as long as, yes, they pay 32 Ethereum to be able to access the block and transaction validation software.
The main advantage of this change, moreover, is the significant improvement in terms of efficiency and consumption. According to Ethereum Foundation, the network will be able to use 99.95% less energy than when using the PoW protocol.
The Mergefrom Ethereum, also benefits GPUs
‘The Merge’, the merger that turns Ethereum into a protocol network Proof-of-Work a Proof-of-Stake, also benefits the graphics card market. This component, let us remember, is a very precious asset for miners of cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin or, of course, Ethereum, since are used for mining. This, in turn, has caused the demand for GPUs to increase considerably, reducing the amount of stock and considerably increasing their prices. Something that, finally, harms those users who are looking for a graphics card simply for games, and not for other purposes.
That the Ethereum PoS protocol does not allow mining, therefore, means that miners will not need to purchase or use graphics cards, so demand decreases and, consequently, prices stabilize.
The Ethereum update, yes, is not something new. The foundation, in fact, has been working on it since 2016 and during these years it has suffered several delays.