diff --git a/_docs/03_implementation/jetson_harness_setup.md b/_docs/03_implementation/jetson_harness_setup.md
index d31d416..5f9cafd 100644
--- a/_docs/03_implementation/jetson_harness_setup.md
+++ b/_docs/03_implementation/jetson_harness_setup.md
@@ -58,7 +58,12 @@ ssh-copy-id -i ~/.ssh/id_ed25519_jetson_e2e.pub <jetson-user>@<jetson-ip>
 
 # Wire up ~/.ssh/config (gitignored, never committed). Add `Port <port>`
 # if the Jetson's sshd listens on a non-default port.
+#
+# IMPORTANT: the leading blank line inside the heredoc is intentional.
+# Without it, the appended block can fuse onto the previous file line
+# (`IdentitiesOnly yesHost jetson-e2e` was a real failure mode).
 cat >> ~/.ssh/config <<'EOF'
+
 Host jetson-e2e
     HostName <jetson-ip>
     User <jetson-user>
@@ -67,7 +72,7 @@ Host jetson-e2e
     IdentitiesOnly yes
     AddKeysToAgent yes
     UseKeychain yes
-    StrictHostKeyChecking yes
+    StrictHostKeyChecking accept-new
     ServerAliveInterval 30
     ServerAliveCountMax 4
 EOF
@@ -103,24 +108,23 @@ Then `sudo systemctl reload ssh`.
 
 ### 4. Verify the Jetson Docker + GPU pipeline
 
-`nvcr.io/nvidia/l4t-base` was deprecated in JetPack 6 — use
-`l4t-jetpack` (the official replacement) for the smoke test:
+`nvidia-container-runtime` mounts `nvidia-smi` + CUDA libs from the
+host into the container at runtime, so a tiny base image works for the
+smoke test (no need to pull the 5 GB `l4t-jetpack` image just to check
+GPU exposure):
 
 ```bash
 ssh jetson-e2e 'docker run --rm --runtime=nvidia --gpus all \
-    nvcr.io/nvidia/l4t-jetpack:r36.4.0 nvidia-smi'
+    ubuntu:22.04 nvidia-smi'
 ```
 
 Expected output: an `nvidia-smi`-style table listing the Orin GPU. If
-this fails with "runtime not found" or "no GPU devices", install
-`nvidia-container-toolkit` and `sudo systemctl restart docker`. If it
-fails with `pull access denied`, run `docker login nvcr.io` once (NGC
-API key from developer.nvidia.com — most public images don't require
-auth, but the registry sometimes prompts).
+this fails with "could not select device driver \"nvidia\"" or "no GPU
+devices", reinstall `nvidia-container-toolkit` and
+`sudo systemctl restart docker`.
 
-If `nvidia-smi` works on the host directly (it does — driver 540.5.0,
-CUDA 12.6, Orin detected) but the container can't see the GPU, the
-problem is always nvidia-container-toolkit, not the driver.
+If `nvidia-smi` works on the host directly but not inside a container,
+the problem is always nvidia-container-toolkit, not the driver.
 
 ### 5. Confirm disk + swap