// from the trenches
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market notes · guides
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Migrating my Bitcoin node from Pi 4 to Pi 5 with NVMe storage
I finally made the jump from a Raspberry Pi 4 running MyNode on a Crucial X6 USB drive to a Pi 5 with a 2TB NVMe in an Argon ONE V5 case. What followed was three days of JMicron USB controller pain, an rsync blockchain transfer, power management flags in cmdline.txt, and a missing .mynode marker file that had me stumped for an afternoon. Here's the full journey — everything that went wrong and how I fixed it.
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APR
2025
2025
Building a volatility-aware DCA bot on Coinbase Advanced Trade API
How I analyzed 180 days of OHLCV data per coin, derived dip thresholds, and wired it into a Python bot with Flask dashboard and systemd services.
MAR
2025
2025
Running a Presearch node on a repurposed Raspberry Pi 4
After the Pi 5 migration, the Pi 4 got a new job. Installing Docker 29.4.1, staking PRE via Base/Coinbase Wallet, and keeping it running 24/7.
MAR
2025
2025
Adding a trailing stop to the DCA bot — protecting gains on altcoins
BTC is a cornerstone and never auto-sold. But for AVAX, ADA, POL and the rest — a 30% drop from the 30-day high triggers a 50% sell. Here's how I built it.
FEB
2025
2025
Fixing NVMe instability on the Raspberry Pi 5 — cmdline.txt power flags
The Pi 5's PCIe power management was causing my NVMe to drop off intermittently under load. The fix: three flags in cmdline.txt that took 20 minutes but saved hours of headaches.
FEB
2025
2025
Why I DCA into 8 coins instead of just BTC
The case for spreading small automated buys across a basket of major assets rather than going Bitcoin-only — and how I think about BTC as the anchor of the whole strategy.
JAN
2025
2025
Connecting Zeus wallet to a self-hosted LND node over Tor
Getting Zeus on iOS connected to the steve2z Lightning node — LND connect strings, Tor vs clearnet, and why I ended up preferring Zeus over Zap.