Engineers at Samsung 's C - Lab in South Korea have successfully turned old Galaxy S smartphones into a bitcoin mining machine . Cryptocurrency mining has become increasingly popular , with miners normally relying on computers with dedicated central processing unit ( CPU ) space to hold transactions carried out in bitcoin 's entirety . But the C - Lab team showed a special CPU was not necessary , and that the Galaxy S5s could even mine at a greater efficiency than a PC . Samsung’s Other upscaled devices created by C - Lab include a used phone that works as a fish tank monitor and a Galaxy tablet converted into an Ubuntu - powered laptop .
Engineers at Samsung 's C - Lab in South Korea have successfully turned old Galaxy S smartphones into a bitcoin mining machine . Cryptocurrency mining has become increasingly popular , with miners normally relying on computers with dedicated central processing unit ( CPU ) space to hold transactions carried out in bitcoin 's entirety . But the C - Lab team showed a special CPU was not necessary , and that the Galaxy S5s could even mine at a greater efficiency than a PC . Other upscaled devices created by C - Lab include a used phone that works as a fish tank monitor and a Galaxy tablet converted into an Ubuntu - powered laptop .