# Mining is paused while downloading blocks **URL:** \ **Category:** Mining Support\ **Created:** [May 25, 2017, 12:52am UTC](https://forum.zcashcommunity.com/t/mining-is-paused-while-downloading-blocks/16210 "2017-05-25T00:52:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![finktunes](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/zcash/user_avatar/forum.zcashcommunity.com/finktunes/32/4672_2.png) [@finktunes](https://forum.zcashcommunity.com/u/finktunes)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2017, 12:52am UTC](https://forum.zcashcommunity.com/t/mining-is-paused-while-downloading-blocks/16210/1 "2017-05-25T00:52:20Z")
Hey everyone, I’m trying to get started on mining, but cannot get past the message “Mining is paused while downloading blocks”. It has been running for over 8 hours but hasn’t started mining. I tried starting it again but it is doing the same thing. Am I doing anything wrong? ![](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/zcash/original/2X/3/35555728c9a0929cd5026651af48a830450f4b59.png) **.zcash/zcash.conf:** addnode=mainnet.z.cash rpcuser=\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\* rpcpassword=\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\*\* gen=1 genproclimit=-1 equihashsolver=tromp ---
**Author:** ![Voluntary](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/zcash/user_avatar/forum.zcashcommunity.com/voluntary/32/4343_2.png) [@Voluntary](https://forum.zcashcommunity.com/u/Voluntary)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2017, 1:06am UTC](https://forum.zcashcommunity.com/t/mining-is-paused-while-downloading-blocks/16210/2 "2017-05-25T01:06:34Z")
Are you syncing from scratch? That’ll take a while - particularly as of the last few weeks there’s been some burdensome transaction activity that results in slow verification. [High transaction volumes causing problems for miners · Issue #2333 · zcash/zcash · GitHub](https://github.com/zcash/zcash/issues/2333) ---
**Author:** ![finktunes](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/zcash/user_avatar/forum.zcashcommunity.com/finktunes/32/4672_2.png) [@finktunes](https://forum.zcashcommunity.com/u/finktunes)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2017, 1:31am UTC](https://forum.zcashcommunity.com/t/mining-is-paused-while-downloading-blocks/16210/3 "2017-05-25T01:31:10Z")
Yes it is from scratch, I was just following the mining guide to get set up. Is there a faster way to get started up? ---
**Author:** ![Voluntary](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/zcash/user_avatar/forum.zcashcommunity.com/voluntary/32/4343_2.png) [@Voluntary](https://forum.zcashcommunity.com/u/Voluntary)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2017, 1:36am UTC](https://forum.zcashcommunity.com/t/mining-is-paused-while-downloading-blocks/16210/4 "2017-05-25T01:36:17Z")
Not unless you have a wallet that’s already synchronised on another computer… ---
**Author:** ![finktunes](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/zcash/user_avatar/forum.zcashcommunity.com/finktunes/32/4672_2.png) [@finktunes](https://forum.zcashcommunity.com/u/finktunes)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2017, 1:37am UTC](https://forum.zcashcommunity.com/t/mining-is-paused-while-downloading-blocks/16210/5 "2017-05-25T01:37:10Z")
Thanks for the info, I’ll just let this run for a while and hopefully it kicks in soon. Thanks! ---
**Author:** ![anon47418038](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/258eb7/32.png) [@anon47418038](https://forum.zcashcommunity.com/u/anon47418038)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2017, 5:01am UTC](https://forum.zcashcommunity.com/t/mining-is-paused-while-downloading-blocks/16210/6 "2017-05-25T05:01:27Z")
yeah initial syncing is one of the downsides of blockchains…at least its not the bitcoin chain, which takes over a week, best-case? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![styelz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/5f9b8f/32.png) [@styelz](https://forum.zcashcommunity.com/u/styelz)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2017, 4:15pm UTC](https://forum.zcashcommunity.com/t/mining-is-paused-while-downloading-blocks/16210/7 "2017-07-01T16:15:05Z")
It took me about 2 hours to download 141577 blocks. The current “ **Block Height** ” can be found here: [https://explorer.zcha.in/](https://explorer.zcha.in/)