Sunsetting Incognito   

Step-By-Step: How I built a Virtual Node on World's Smallest Mini PC

#45

Thank you for putting this together. However, I feel many people are misled about setting up a virtual node as beginners. In the end, it appears we ALSO NEED to buy $3000 worth of PRV coin before a virtual node like this is even useful. I wish there was not such a high entry requirement of purchasing $3000 / 1750PRV in order to get started as a new, beginning, or home user.

#46

Hey @Poincare, from this perspective you should take a look at our Node. A Node has two staking options, one of them doesn’t require you to stake PRV.

Let us know what do you think about this option ?

#47

Yes, however, if I understand correctly… The user only receives 35%, quite the low value for such a profit-sharing option.

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#48

That is for a pNode with “funded stake”. If you run a vNode you get 100% of the validator rewards, also if you unstake the “funded stake” from a pNode and fund it with your own 1750 PRV your pNode would also earn the 100% validator reward

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#49

Hey @Poincare,

I just wanted to give some perspective here. I am staking my own pnode, and my average return is around 55% APY. So, from a numbers standpoint:

1750 x 55% = 962.5 PRV

If I roll those earnings into provide at 28% APY

962.5 PRV x 28% = 260 PRV

So for the year, I’m looking at around 1223 PRV per year

So your node out of the box, from a simplicity standpoint, looks to yield you

1223 x 35% = 428 PRV or $723 USD (at current PRV prices)

That is a pretty good return considering the incog team is fronting you the funds to run your node, and its just sitting plugged in somewhere in your home. Most nodes on other projects will cost you much more than what it does to run one for this network, requires more technical knowledge to set up, and they require you to fully fund it yourself upfront. Also keep in mind, that as the value of PRV increases, your USD value will continue to rise as you save up your PRV to fully stake the node yourself to receive the full 100% of the earnings.

4 Likes
#50

Thanks for this very clear explanation and math behind the APY earnings for pNode vs vNode.

By operating a vNode, yes I can confirm I’m enjoying the full 100% PRV earning rewards which is very impressive.

I too am following your approach @Thriftinkid and moving all my earnings from my vNode into “Provide” to earn additional compounding interest on my PRV :slight_smile:

Based on these returns, I project that my Larkbox Mini PC will pay for itself in about 1 more month. This is super awesome because all earnings after that is pure profit and I continue to support the network.

Special thanks to @andrey @Ducky @annie @Chucky @Jamie, @ojb34240 and others mentioned in this post that all helped me get my vNode up and running.

It goes without saying, a huge thank you to the Incognito team for providing this opportunity to earn an additional income and for allowing me to activity participate and support this “privacy first” network.

7 Likes
How to host a Virtual Node
How to host a Virtual Node
#51

Just an FYI you don’t need to actually forward any ports if you want to just configure/check the status of your node locally. You do need to forward 9334 to check the status of your node remotely. You do not need to forward the other ports. I think from a security standpoint the less ports opened up the better.

1 Like
#52

Thanks for your comment @Up2UrHeadlights.

@Jamie, can you please confirm this comment to be correct i.e. you only need port 9334 open for checking node status remotely, otherwise all other ports can be closed?

#53

Awesome! Thanks for sharing the experience with us!

1 Like
#54

Hello and thank you for that detailed DIY project.
I would be eager to set up one myself, but don’t have the required PRV stake yet. Is there any option to get the funding from the pool like the incognito pnodes with a similar split of earnings?

1 Like
#55

No. Otherwise everybody would do it…

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#56

That’s what I thought - sounded too good to be true, but thanks for confirming :slight_smile:

1 Like
#57

Hello @ Linnovations

Thank you for sharing such a detailed approach.

One question to the community is: does forwarding these ports #9433, 9334, 8545 and 30303 make your home network more vulnerable to external attacks (ransomware etc…)?

Thanks

2 Likes
#58

Only if the service that is running is vulnerable itself in this case
9433 9334 - p/vNode
8545, 30303 - Ethereum CLI (geth)

1 Like
#59

Does anyone know the official minimum latest specs needed for a computer to run as a node?

These are the node specs from Feb 2020:

Processor 4 - core 1.5Ghz quad-score Intel Celeron J3455 Apollo Lake (Goldmont), 4C/4T, 1.5 - 2.3 GHz, 14nm,2 MB L2, 10W TDP
Memory 4GB DDR3L-1600/1866 1.35V SO-DIMM
Storage 512GB SSD PCIe-Gen2. SATA3 6Gb/s
Communications Wifi (Intel Dual Band Wieless-AC 3168) Ethernet (1x Realtek RTL8168/8111 Gigabit LAN)

I found a mini computer on amazon with the same processor and I think the specs should be good to match the pnode, the storage is the where a lot is left to be desired. It can be expanded, but would it be possible to run it with only 64GB at all?

Specs of the mini computer:

of Cores: 4

of Threads: 4

OS: Windows 10 (64-bit); Support Linux
Processor: Intel Celeron J3455 (2M Cache, up to 2.3GHz)
Processor Base Frequency: 1.5 GHz
Burst Frequency: 2.3 GHz
Processor Graphics: Intel HD Graphics 500
Thermal Design Power(TDP): 10W
Capacity: 6GB RAM + 64GB eMMC.
Expand storage: 1 x M.2 2242 SATA SSD (up to 2TB,SATA 3.0 6.0Gb/s); 1 x SD Card(up to 128GB)
Ethernet: 1000Mbps LAN
WiFi: IEEE 802.11a/b/g/b, 2.4+5G

If all things are equal besides the hard disk space is it possible to set this up as a node?

Would the storage need to be expanded? If so, would these specs work with an increased storage capacity of 512GB?

#60

Hi, yes it is enough to run one node.

1 Like
#61

The storage is enough? 64gb

#62

Technically … yes – per the quoted post.

However keep in mind that the current blockchain database would be using 63% of your eMMC storage. That’s not accounting for the host OS. Add another ~8GiB for 18.04 LTS and you are using 75% of your eMMC storage.

That does not allow for much future blockchain growth.

In short – I would recommend starting with more storage. Anything less than 256GiB will likely become full long before the CPU ages out.

EDIT: eMMC is a rather pokey flash medium.


[source]

eMMC may bottleneck database performance during committee participation. This will become a consideration once slashing is live on mainnet. Validators with slow eMMC may be slashed from committee because they may not maintain consensus due to the slow read/write performance.

5 Likes
#63

I made an edit for clarity:

Your point still stands!

2 Likes
#64

Wow this is amazing. I’m lucky to have stumbled upon this article I don’t remember how I got here but I’m glad that I did lol. I have 2 pNodes up and running right now. Unfortunately both of them are being fronted by the Incognito team which means I’m not getting the exact amount of PRV rewards that I might be getting otherwise, so this is a very attractive looking option.

I love the idea of passive crypto rewards and will definitely bookmark this for some more exploration. I’ve spent dozens of hours trying to get my raspberry pi up and running for something crypto related to absolute frustration and no results so this trying this seems very promising - especially considering you seem to not be super tech savvy like myself lol xD

EDIT: Damn the LarkBox seems fairly difficult to get a hold of. Looks like it’s over $300 in most places and EU shipping mostly :frowning: In Canadian dollars, where I’m from, this would be able $500 CAD which is about what I paid for my pNode’s at the end of the day as well. So hmmmmmm!!! :thinking:

2 Likes