If I cannot stay online for about fourteen consecutive hours (very hard to do on a satellite connection!), I actually get nothing at all.
Can Satoshi confirm whether the computations your machine had made carries on if the session was interrupted, or do you need to start all over if you disconnected before generating at least one block? If it carries on, maybe a little meter indicating the % left until your block completes can be a nice addition so people would have some hope (actually, it will be a nice addition anyway whether the computations get carried on after disconnection or not!)I generated 5 blocks today on my Pentium processor. Two of them were within 3 minutes of each other.
Ok, I just realized that I didn't understand how Bitcoin worked to begin with. The blocks get generated anyway whether you're generating coins or not. The average amount of creation conformed what I observed before (120/20 hrs, or 6/hr). This has got absolutely nothing to do with your CPU power, it's constant for all practical purposes. The CPU power determines the "transactions" that get created and "matures in xx blocks". My head just got a bit bigger now
This also means theymos that there was probably a coincidence or error for your 3-minute interval observation!