Do I really need to spend 300usd to set up a bitcoin node? Just ball-parking it on a raspberry pi based node with a 2tb ssd.
Discussion
yeah, pretty much. but you dont need to do it today or tomorrow. just do it when its not a huge inconvenience.
Maybe, but raspberry pis got expensive and they don't run nodes very well. What's your goal? A fully indexed archival node serving the network, or just a pruned node validating for your own benefit?
I learn by doing so mainly wanting to understand how a full node works. After that maybe I’ll be ready to explore other branches of it like a pruned node or go off into lightning stuff.
The pi does okay as a full node but has trouble when attaching more functions to it like a lightning node. You'll become frustrated with its constant crashing and slow lookup times. Try a mini PC or old computer first. And, yeah, I suppose to do a full node you'll spend several hundred.
Just get an old PC
Or mini pc they're like 60 bucks
The drive is the expensive part; not the Pi.
No. A lot of old hardware can be used as well.
How much does old hardware cost? 😅
Somewhere between free to pocket change.
From 1st Gen Mac minis with $65 worth of upgrades. (Additional time replacing firmware to take advantage of added ram )
To just adding a larger drive to an old Dell optiplex that someone didn't want.
Under $100 for something to experiment with is a pretty reasonable target.