From 5bfe93e74c5898de19d332f05004bd6feb2175d5 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Michael Vines Date: Wed, 2 Dec 2020 10:46:24 -0800 Subject: [PATCH] Add a ramdisk section to the validator start guide --- docs/src/running-validator/validator-start.md | 15 +++++++++++++++ 1 file changed, 15 insertions(+) diff --git a/docs/src/running-validator/validator-start.md b/docs/src/running-validator/validator-start.md index 511a332d33..b6e2eb88a4 100644 --- a/docs/src/running-validator/validator-start.md +++ b/docs/src/running-validator/validator-start.md @@ -366,3 +366,18 @@ systemctl restart logrotate.service Once your validator is operating normally, you can reduce the time it takes to restart your validator by adding the `--no-port-check` flag to your `solana-validator` command-line. + +### Using a ramdisk for the accounts database to reduce SSD wear +If your machine has plenty of RAM, a ramdisk +([tmpfs](https://man7.org/linux/man-pages/man5/tmpfs.5.html)) may be used to hold +the accounts database. + +Assuming your tmpfs ramdisk is mounted at `/mnt/solana-accounts` and writable +by the validator user, add the `--accounts /mnt/solana-accounts` argument to +your validator command-line to use it. Once your validator restarts, you should +now see activity in `/mnt/solana-accounts` instead of the `accounts/` +subdirectory of your ledger (`--ledger` argument) directory. + +For Mainnet Beta it's recommended that a ramdisk of 64GB be used. Note that if +your machine has less than 100GB of RAM in total, using a ramdisk is not +recommended.