You could settle & clear for The Ideal Reserve which makes an isolated Clearinghouse competitive on a half core 64-bit VPS with 500 MB RAM and a 7400 rpm laptop drive.
It will probably take some time before better hardware is required in most locations on the planet to remain competitive.
The dominant factors right now are clear fee competitivity since they are set by the Clearinghouse operators and proximity to the transferor because the fastest to clear, settle, and propagate books is most likely to receive the fee. A Clearinghouse is not throttled by hash difficulty or staking.
You've lost me a bit... What's the "Ideal Reserve"?