Rocket Pool
Rocket Pool
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Overview
Guides
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Changing Execution or Consensus Clients

Under normal circumstances, you will likely just select an Execution and Consensus client when you first create your Rocket Pool node and will let them happily run for the life of your Node. However, there are a few situations where you may want to change your client selection. Here are a few examples:

  • Your client gains a supermajority share on the Execution or Beacon chains, and you want to change for the overall health of the network
  • A bug causes your client to stop functioning correctly, and you need to get back online quickly to resume validation duties
  • You want to try a new feature that a different client offers
  • A different client is better suited to your node's hardware (e.g. some clients are better on ARM systems than others)

Luckily, the Smartnode stack makes changing clients extremely easy. All it takes is a few changes in the Configuration TUI, and some optional extra commands to back up your existing client data before changing clients.

Changing Execution Clients

Prior to changing your Execution client, it's worth noting the following points:

  • Chain data is not shared between clients. Your new client will need to resync the Mainnet chain data, which can take some time (though each client supports snap sync, which the Smartnode uses to speed up resyncing).
  • By default, the Smartnode will leave your old client's chain data on your drive in case you want to revert back to your old Execution client and pick up where you left off. You may want to export it to a different location and delete it to free up space prior to changing clients, since Execution clients can use hundreds of gigabytes. We have steps below on how to do this.
  • While your new client is resyncing, most of the Smartnode CLI functions will be offline since they rely on the Execution client. You should have a fallback Execution client available before doing this to mitigate the downtime on your Smartnode.

(Optional) Export your Execution Client's Database

The first step in the process is an optional one: if you like, you can export your existing chain data for your current Execution client. This will let you free up valuable disk space on your node for your new Execution client, and you can keep the old chain data around in case you want to revert back to the old client and pick up where you left off.

Please refer to the Backing Up Your Node guide for details.

Change your Selected Execution Client

To change your selected client, run rocketpool service config to enter the configuration UI. Navigate to the Execution Client (ETH1) section, and select the Execution Client dropdown:

Open the dropdown with Enter, use the arrow keys to navigate to your client of choice, and press Enter again to confirm the selection.

Note that each client has its own unique options, so you may see some additional settings appear in this screen after you select a different client. Feel free to explore through them to see how they affect things.

When you're happy with your choice, press Esc to return to the main menu, then Tab to highlight the Review Changes and Save button. You will be presented with the review screen, which will show your client selection change:

Press Enter to accept the changes, and you're done! Your new Execution client will begin syncing immediately. As usual, you can follow it with rocketpool service logs eth1. We recommend you do this to verify there are no errors, and that it works properly.

NOTE

Now that the Execution and Consensus layers have merged, taking down your Execution client will also take down your Consensus client until your Execution client has finished resyncing. This means your node will stop attesting and proposing blocks, and it will leak ETH instead of earning it!

To avoid this and continue validating while your Execution client resyncs, please set up a fallback node.

(Recommended) Remove your Old Chain Data

This is not a required step, but we strongly recommend you remove the chain data from your old client now that you've switched to a new one so you can free up disk space for it.

To do this, simply run the following command:

rocketpool service resync-eth1

This will delete all of your Execution client data and start it over.

TIP

Since you just selected a new Execution client, it won't be affected by this - essentially, all it will do is delete your old chain data.

You should do this as soon as possible after switching clients to prevent unnecessary loss of progress on your new client.

Changing Consensus Clients

Changing Consensus clients is even easier than Execution clients, thanks to Checkpoint Sync. This feature lets you immediately sync a new Consensus client with the network, so there's no need to preserve your old chain data.

Start by using the rocketpool service config UI and navigating to the Consensus Client (ETH2) section. Next, select the Consensus Client dropdown:

Open the dropdown with Enter, use the arrow keys to navigate to your client of choice, and press Enter again to confirm the selection.

Note that each client has its own unique options, so you may see some additional settings appear in this screen after you select a different client. Feel free to explore through them to see how they affect things.

Next, verify that you're using a Checkpoint Sync provider:

If you don't have a Checkpoint Sync provider configured, you can easily use instructions from here to do it for free!

When you're happy with your choice, press Esc to return to the main menu, then Tab to highlight the Review Changes and Save button. You will be presented with the review screen, which will show your client selection change:

Press Enter to accept the changes, and you're done! Your new Consensus client will begin syncing immediately. As usual, you can follow it with rocketpool service logs eth2. We recommend you do this to verify there are no errors, and that it works properly.