Well, it finally happened; the local SSD that one of my #Bitcoin / #BTC #Knots nodes is stored on filled up to red zone levels. 😭
I've been doing tons of local #AI LLM/image/video/audio generation experiments lately (running from the same SSD drive) & had NO idea that checkpoint models, diffusion models, LoRAs, text encoders, outputs & installations would take up drive space so aggressively (a single base model alone can EASILY be 5-30GB & you need many different models to accomplish different tasks). 🫠
All of these models need to be run off of an SSD so that performance isn't degraded to the point of non-usability, so it was finally time for a data re-org. 🤷♂️
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STEPS TAKEN:
1. Close Bitcoin Knots.
2. Copy/paste "Bitcoin" folder from existing SSD → Archival HDD.
3. When the copy is complete, change the name of the old "Bitcoin" folder to "Bitcoin-old" & re-open Knots (so Knots thinks the folder doesn't exist anymore).
4. Choose the new "Bitcoin" directory in the "New installation" prompt & uncheck all boxes to make sure you are still unpruned & verifying all blocks (it will falsely report the disk space available because it assumes the existing data in the "Bitcoin" folder is unrelated data).
5. Knots will then recognize & verify the existing blocks, then sync any new blocks that were found during the downtime.
6. Once you've verified that the migration worked & you're fully synced, delete the "Bitcoin-old" folder on the old drive.
That's it! You're migrated & fully up-to-speed without having to download the entire blockchain all over again. 🥳
IMPORTANT NOTE:
Make sure you are only copying your own verified blockchain so that you are sure that the block data is legitimate. DO NOT grab the blockchain from any other unverified source, as this can lead to incorrect data issues, misallocated funds & double-spend attempts. 🚨
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I'm happy to report that after 8 hours of downtime (I forgot how slow HDDs actually were at transferring data since I run most daily tasks off of SSDs), all drives are happy & I will be able to host this complete, unpruned blockchain node for another 5-8 years before having to re-org any data again (by which time it will be completely feasible to cheaply migrate to a completely dedicated SSD drive that will last for another decade or more before filling up). 💁♂️
Time to accelerate the AI experimentation into hyperdrive. 🚀
Thank you for coming to my TED talk. 🤙