Thanks for this. I've been trying to get a node up and running myself here. Very slow to sync, maybe a few weeks of blockchain history per day. I'm on a decent connection, ports are properly opened and I see lots of peers. CPU usually runs at under 10%. Set the cache to 500 MB, tried to increase the swap file to 2 GB, stably overclocked to 1100 mhz but not much luck with faster syncs. I'm trying to figure out my real bottle neck.

I'm using a 32 GB SanDisk Ultra: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B010Q57T02?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00

As well as a 128 GB Cruzer Ultra Fit: http://www.amazon.com/SanDisk-Ultra-128GB-Flash-SDCZ43-128G-G46/dp/B00YFI1EBC/ref=sr_1_5?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1445887029&sr=1-5&keywords=cruzer+ultra+fit

And a Wifi N dongle.

Now I realize the Cruzer Ultra fit doesn't have great sustained write performance. I guess I thought my connection + the USB 2.0 interface on the RPi was such a bottleneck it wouldn't make sense investing in a really fast USB 3.0 drive, and I liked the compact size.

What's my biggest bottleneck here, probably? Would hooking this up to Ethernet improve performance since all the USB ports are limited to one bandwidth? If it's the USB drive, what do you think about a cheap SSD like this: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00EZ2FRU2/ref=twister_B00PB9BSIS?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1

At some point this does get economically inefficient. For the price of the USB drive alone I could buy an old windows Atom netbook with a bigger drive and 2 GB of RAM- an all in one node solution. Now I'll admit this is a hobby project for me, but it does seem a bit wasteful to go about buying this high bandwidth stuff the RPi2 can't really take fully advantage over.