Host a Lightning Node on Umbrel - Advice of Channels

[BTC Zebra]

Hello All,

Apologies if this is not in the best place on the forum.

I have been in Bitcoin a long while and am comfortable operating of layer 1.

I am still quite new to using lightning despite knowing its been developing quickly for some years. Recently I have installed the Wallet of Satoshi and then quickly Phoenix wallet to get self custody which I am very much enjoying. As it happens my town has 5 or 6 businesses that will take lightning as payment.

Recently I have realised how straightforward some of the hardware requirements can be. I am not particularly technical so would likely look to order the Umbrel Home as simplicity will be supportive for me while I learn.

My question relates to opening and structing channels in a simple way or the simplest way to allow for a spending wallet and better privacy.

In the long run developing into a routing node might be good, but initially I have only some BTC I could commit to it especially while I learn. I know opening and closing lots of channels can be expensive and balancing inbound at and outbound liquidity is one consideration.

In short what is an inexpensive way to run a node and learn channel management and to get familiar with Lightning Network? Of course if I take to it I may wish to do more later. I am open to hearing about anyone's experiences.

[BattleDog]

Hello and welcome to BitcoinTalk. Hope you enjoy your stay.

My personal advice is to skip Umbrel Home completely, that is unless you want convenience tax. A used mini-PC + 1 TB SSD beats a Pi on I/O and lasts longer than SD cards. Run over Tor and put it on a cheap UPS.

Treat it as a spending node first. Fund once, then open two channels of ~1-2M sats to well-peered nodes you actually pay through. Let real purchases at those 5-6 local shops reveal good peers, then anchor to them.
Avoid many tiny channels and set base fee to 0 and a middle-of-the-road ppm so payments succeed. For inbound, buy or swap it when needed (Loop/LN+ style), or ask a merchant to open to you after a few payments.

You can use Thunderhub/Zeus to watch liquidity and do small rebalances. Keep your seed and the LND static channel backup in two separate places.

If you later chase routing, add a third channel to a different region and keep uptime high as the yield is small without active management.

[Donneski]

Hello All,

Apologies if this is not in the best place on the forum.

I have been in Bitcoin a long while and am comfortable operating of layer 1.

I am still quite new to using lightning despite knowing its been developing quickly for some years. Recently I have installed the Wallet of Satoshi and then quickly Phoenix wallet to get self custody which I am very much enjoying. As it happens my town has 5 or 6 businesses that will take lightning as payment.

Recently I have realised how straightforward some of the hardware requirements can be. I am not particularly technical so would likely look to order the Umbrel Home as simplicity will be supportive for me while I learn.

My question relates to opening and structing channels in a simple way or the simplest way to allow for a spending wallet and better privacy.

In the long run developing into a routing node might be good, but initially I have only some BTC I could commit to it especially while I learn. I know opening and closing lots of channels can be expensive and balancing inbound at and outbound liquidity is one consideration.

In short what is an inexpensive way to run a node and learn channel management and to get familiar with Lightning Network? Of course if I take to it I may wish to do more later. I am open to hearing about anyone's experiences.

Umbrel Home is perfect for beginners. Open a couple of small channels first and just get a feel for how liquidity moves. Then you pair it with Phoenix for spending and don’t worry too much about routing or balancing until you’re more comfortable.

You’ve been around since 2015, so I did expect a bit more progress by now but it seems you've not been consistent enough here but it's better late than never. Keep at it and stay consistent so you'll not come back years later to ask questions that you should know better.

[ABCbits]

I am still quite new to using lightning despite knowing its been developing quickly for some years. Recently I have installed the Wallet of Satoshi and then quickly Phoenix wallet to get self custody which I am very much enjoying. As it happens my town has 5 or 6 businesses that will take lightning as payment.

FYI Phoenix Wallet doesn't let you connect to your own node, so you may want to reconsider what you want to do.

Can I connect to any node? Can I connect to my own node?

Phoenix has been designed for less technical users, who don't know or want to run an always-on Lightning node on a server or to manage channels, with sensible trade-offs for those users.

There is some trust involved with Phoenix, which would make connecting to random nodes on the internet unsafe.

On the other hand, if you have the technical knowledge to run your own always-on Lightning node (therefore removing the trust assumption), then you do not need other trade-offs made with Phoenix and would be better off with a "remote-control" app to your Lightning node. This is a valid setup for more advanced users, who are not the target audience for Phoenix.

My personal advice is to skip Umbrel Home completely, that is unless you want convenience tax. A used mini-PC + 1 TB SSD beats a Pi on I/O and lasts longer than SD cards. Run over Tor and put it on a cheap UPS.

I agree Umbrel Home is rather pricey. But looking at https://umbrel.com/umbrel-home, it's not based on Pi and doesn't use SD card either. It's very similar with other mini PC, where it use NVMe SSD instead and Intel N150.