Bitcoin mining
You can also obtain Bitcoins by mining Bitcoins. For this you do need special hardware. Bitcoin mining is the backbone of Bitcoin, because in this way new Bitcoins are created and transactions are controlled. Bitcoin mining is actually the solution of complex formulas through which new Bitcoins are generated. However, the difficulty of these formulas changes every 10 – 12 days. If there are not enough miners it becomes a little easier, but if the price gets high and many people start mining to earn money, the 'difficulty' quickly increases.
Bitcoin mining through hardware
If you want to mine Bitcoins, you can buy special hardware. One of the best miners at the moment is the Antminer S5. It also requires some installation knowledge what the miner should be connected and then put in a pool. A pool is a group of people who mine together to solve formulas faster and the loot is divided into so-called hashpower. Hashpower is the capacity of the machines that a miner has. For example, an Antminer S5 has 1150 GH/s of Hashpower. The equipment requires quite a bit of power, because it is easily 600 watts per miner device that is on 24 hours a day. Read more here..
Cloud mining
It is often said that Cloud mining is the future, but I am not quite sure about this yet. Cloud mining is basically that the miner rents the equipment remotely. The advantage of this is of course no heat, no noise and no high electricity costs. The big disadvantage is that the miner himself has no influence on choosing the pool or any influence for that matter. If the company decides to close its doors tomorrow, your investment is gone. In addition, some large cloud mining companies are also ponzi schemes. This means that they pay investors with the money of the previous investor to keep them sweet for a while and then suddenly the flow of money stops. Of course, not all Cloud mining companies are scammers, but it is important to pay very close attention.
Bitcoin mining as an investment
The big question: "Is Bitcoin mining an interesting investment?". If you believe that the price will go up in the coming years, Bitcoin mining can be an interesting investment. You have to delve very deeply into the matter, but if you are convinced that the price is going up and you have the right strategy then there is absolutely money to be made with it. You can read more about this in antminer distribution EU'sarticle on mining.