A few weeks ago, our furnace (technically a ductless heat pump) stopped working at the worst possible time of the year. But at least one room stays nice and toasty all winter long — thanks to my gaming PC.
Now, The Wall Street Journal is reporting this might actually be a trend: some bitcoin miners and gamers are warming their rooms, growing tomatoes, and even heating a chicken coop during the pandemic.
It made me wonder: how many Verge readers are doing the same?
Poll
Are you (intentionally) heating your home with gaming hardware?
- 60%
No
(240 votes)
- 30%
Yes, with my gaming PC
(122 votes)
- 4%
Yes, with my mining rig
(16 votes)
- 4%
Yes, with something else (share in the comments!)
(17 votes)
395 votes total Vote Now
Me, I keep my PC running all night long, folding proteins to help study COVID-19, which I highly recommend. (I just crossed 175 million points this week.) But I have to admit the room hasn’t been as warm since I swapped my own GeForce GTX 1080 back in. The impossible-to-find AMD Radeon RX 6800 definitely put out more heat, and we actually had to crack a window when I had an Nvidia RTX 3080 folding those proteins. I can’t speak for every model, but the Founder’s Edition runs hot.
Here’s hoping Mitsubishi delivers a new control board for my heat pump soon.