diff --git a/arborist/cli.py b/arborist/cli.py
index 13a36b9..5041478 100644
--- a/arborist/cli.py
+++ b/arborist/cli.py
@@ -2995,29 +2995,16 @@ def _cmd_cold_unpack(args: argparse.Namespace) -> int:
     # directory; --hydrate-M picks the routing modulus. Each incoming
     # row lands on shard_for_document(root, M).
     if args.hydrate_shards_dir:
-        import sqlite3
         target_dir = Path(args.hydrate_shards_dir).expanduser()
         target_dir.mkdir(parents=True, exist_ok=True)
         M = args.hydrate_M
         target_paths = [target_dir / f"{i:03d}.db" for i in range(M)]
-
-        # #000067 bench-max: bump page_size before schema applies so the
-        # corpus uses 16 KB pages instead of SQLite's 4 KB default.
-        # Bigger pages → ~4× fewer page writes during chunk-fill →
-        # ~4× fewer ext4 metadata journal events (jbd2_log_wait_commit
-        # was the measured bottleneck on the 3090). page_size CAN ONLY
-        # be set on an empty DB; VACUUM finalises it. Idempotent on
-        # re-runs since fresh hydrate dirs are clean.
-        for p in target_paths:
-            if not p.exists() or p.stat().st_size == 0:
-                pre = sqlite3.connect(str(p))
-                try:
-                    pre.execute("PRAGMA page_size = 16384")
-                    pre.execute("PRAGMA secure_delete = OFF")
-                    pre.execute("VACUUM")  # commit the page_size change
-                finally:
-                    pre.close()
-
+        # NOTE: I tried PRAGMA page_size = 16384 on hydrate targets
+        # to reduce ext4-journal contention by emitting fewer
+        # page-write events. Measured WORSE on 2026-05-26 — narrow
+        # UPDATEs (~500 byte content per row) rewrite the whole
+        # page; 16 KB pages = 4× write amplification per chunk-
+        # content UPDATE. Stay at SQLite default 4 KB.
         targets: list = []
         for p in target_paths:
             t = connect(p)