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solana, the network that has the trump and melania memecoins on it, has completely seized up after hitting around 800 transactions per second. users are reporting 5+ hour delays in withdrawing SOL and USDC from CEX onto this network. coinbase has started to just cancel all of the stuck transactions. the largest DEX aggregator on the network is also shitting itself.

the solana developers lied about the performance of the network. they are claiming that it can handle thousands of TPS in the marketing materials but it is unable to deliver acceptable performance before it even hits 1000. the same marketing materials claim it has thousands (plural) of validators but the real number is slightly north of 1000, because it requires enterprise grade hardware to run a validator. these validator nodes are struggling to keep up even when run by seasoned professionals, as evidenced by the CEX issues.

this is just reinforcing my belief that big block scaling is not going to work. the solana developers shunned layered architecture and stuck with big blocks because it was the easy path. they were rightfully afraid of confusing their users with different layers and they built it as all one thing. this ended up destroying the user experience anyway.

you need layered architecture. the challenge is in building second layer scaling solutions that don't suck for the user. it should be easy and safe, and ideally the user shouldn't even notice that there are different layers. bitcoin and ethereum are the only two cryptocurrencies that are actively focusing on layered architecture and neither one is quite there yet. one or two UX issues are all it takes for people to disengage and go with a custodian or an altcoin.

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Discussion

goatmeal 11mo ago

I cannot stress this enough, the ONLY reason why n00bs were flocking to solana instead of some ethereum L2 with identical capability was because they didn't have to see or think about layers. they noticed that there was a difference in the user experience and they completely mistook it for a superior technology. for 99% of the population, better UX = better tech. it doesn't matter if it's wrong, that's what the users will do. you haven't reached the level of grandma friendliness until the layers are totally invisible.

shortwavesurfer2009 11mo ago

Perhaps a bit of both? You can't have layer 1 fees higher than the amount of justice you are seeking from the layer 2. Sure, Solana has broken at 800 TPS, which is only 114x what bitcoin can do on layer 1. Solana could scale down to say 400 TPS, add a layer 2 and put bitcoin completely to shame.

ede3d957... 11mo ago

BCH would likely perform better than propagandised Solana. At least they are having on-chain scaling as their number one priority.

Neda 11mo ago

Except that it wasn't the Solana network, but the applications trying to offer extreme amounts of trades in extreme volatility, with little slippage, while under attack by arb bots, etc.

But you're frustrated because you're a Coinbase user and you have your CEX stop working every time something exciting happens and you just have to vent your frustration, and that's a fine way of addressing the symptoms. On top of that your Solflare wallet is not only blocking your VPN connections, your Phantom wallet doesn't have enough infrastructure to handle > 8,000,000 transactions/minute.

Life sucks, but handling 800 TPS is not something the Solana network struggles with.