Bitcoin Forum

Monday, July 6, 2015, I installed Bitcoin Core, v. 0.10.2 around 10 p.m. It's been more than 24 consecutive hours that the program has been running and it still tells me its "Synchronizing with network, 1 year and 4 weeks behind." This is the first time in my lifetime that a program has been installing for this length of time and has still not completed. Is this normal for it to take this long for the Blockchain to synchronize? I hate to bail out after waiting this long. I'm going to keep the computer running through the remainder of the evening through tomorrow but this is taking an intermitable length of time to get done.

During the initial syncing, you will need to download all the block data created ever since 2009. The files are huge (~42 GB on my disk) and so it will take quite a long time for the download to complete. Also, your CPU will need verify the files, and you may notice a significant CPU usage.

Depending on your bandwidth and CPU power, the time for the whole process to complete varies, but 24+ hours isn't abnormal IMO.

Thanks for the update. What you describe is exactly what I am seeing. I only have a dual core processor in a Toshiba Satellite Laptop so it's not the most powerful computer around. I have noted the extremely high processor usage. I'll continue to let it run through the night and then some to complete the installation. So far it's used at least 23-25GB. Appreciate your response.

It can also take a long time depending on your internet speed and bandwidth. Since it must download almost 40 Gb of data, having a slow network speed can make this download much much longer.

Today is Wednesday, and it's 2:10 p.m. and I still have 44 weeks to go to complete the synchronization. My bandwidth is 30MB down and 6MB up so I don't have a bandwidth problem. My AMD processor is still cranking at around 95+% most of the time. This entire process amazes me and I surely wonder if there must be a better way to do this. I can't believe that I'm running a program that takes 3 days to load and requires 50GB of hard drive space. I don't know much about bitcoin software, but surely this is not the best example of a Bitcoin Wallet. I'm a novice when it comes to Bitcoins. I'm not complaining mind you, just wondering out loud.

One question I have is will the program load any faster when you first load it, once full synchronization has been completed? Needless to say, I'm all ears, lol.

The full synchronization takes a while because it verifies everything.  Depending on you CPU/HDD it can take days (as you're seeing).  Once it's done, and you're all caught up, the software loads up pretty much like any other application you run.

There are other wallet clients out there ... but with the recent switchover to version 3, because of the way they work (SPV), you'll have to wait for a recommended 30 confirmations before you actually trust a transaction.  These types of wallets sync up considerably faster because they don't verify the transactions.

There are many other client you can use besides Bitcoin Core. Bitcoin Core is a full node, which means that it verifies and stores every block that it receives. Other software such as Multibit or Electrum are called SPV Clients. These are lightweight and speedy, if that is the kind of thing you want. They rely on full nodes to provide them the right data and don't do verification themselves. They take up less hard drive space and work must faster than full nodes but at the cost of security. Right now, I would not recommend using them since SPV clients are still vulnerable to the recent fork since the situation is still on going.

This is totally normal, I downloaded the full blockchain with Bitcoin Core around 18 months ago to a laptop & it took about 3 days. I didn't leave it downloading for the entire 3 days as I turned the laptop off at certain intervals but it still must have taken at least 48 hours to fully sync.

Once you've downloaded the entire blockchain it'll be fine though. You must keep it synced though. If you don't open Core for e.g. 2 weeks you'll obviously have to sync those 2 weeks of transactions ;D . Obviously that won't take hours though :) . Good luck bro.

Do not trust anyone's answer's on this site, unless you can verify YOURSELF the fact's.. bitcoin is syncing, but is no longer confirming ANYTHING. Why do you think they do NOT host the application at the top of the main page where the three red diamond's are? It's really simple.. they fucked it up!!

Evidence: 3 month's ago I synced an old wallet I had not used in some time, and it synced, and confirmed it's content's no problem. Yesterday, I sent the content's of another wallet to this wallet. I then started afresh with the wallet I found, including starting the download of the entire blockchain using the latest version. it now has less than 30 weeks left, and yet I have NO confirmations on transactions over three years old. Excluding the transactions I sent to this wallet yesterday, the rest should be confirmed by now.

Don say I neva eva warned ya.. the dev's are killing bitcoin to force the use of wallet's they can dissapear with.. notice they all say use an online wallet, in effect, saying: Give us your btc, we'll look after it, and mess with the bitcoin app so much, you'll have no choice but to trust us, taking YOUR control of YOUR bitcoin from you.

Fork in the chain?

At the same time this site removes the bitcoin-core application link from the top of the page, the first time in this site's history?

I'll be back to watch you all cry when you see how much your btc is worth, when you cant get any.

I really appreciate the folks on this forum. All the responses I have received here have been excellent and to the point. I picked Bitcoin Core for my wallet because it looked like the best one all around. I am sure it will do me well and I continue to learn more about bitcoins and the ways you send and receive them. I'm still investigating the best ways to acquire bitcoins and that is certainly going to take a bit longer.

I only have about 40 more weeks to synchronize and that should keep me set for awhile. I have been running the computer 24 hours a day and only stopped the download to install pending updates to other software and then I restored BitCoin Core. So far it's looking good and I hope to have it completed today. I'd like to thank everyone who commented on my initial post and for the excellent comments and suggestions that I have received.

I've been working with computers since my first Sinclaire back in the 70's, but this business of learning about digital currency is new to me. It's been many years since I first used my PGP program, but I think I will be restarting and using it again. Once more thanks to everyone.


/s/ ClayPigeon723

Well here it is day 4 of the Bitcoin Core installation and synchronization. Still have 34 weeks to go. I must admit, I shut the computer down last night. I was beginning to become concerned about the possible over heating of the processor since it continues to run 95-99% all the time while Bitcoin Core is running. The processor temperature is 80 deg C.

I wonder if this would have completed sooner had I installed the 64 bit version. I didn't because not all my computers are 64 bit and I wanted to be able to backup this program to other computers. Anyone know whether it would have been better to install the 64 bit version? Would it start over again if I installed it now? Any thoughts on the matter?

You should have installed the 64bit version if you have a 64 bit OS. It shouldn't need to redownload or reindex as long as you keep the data directory. The same data directory can be brought to other computers as long as they are the same OS (e.g. windows to windows, linux to linux) since windows to linux and vice versa causes a reindex for some reason.

Thanks for that information knightdk. I have downloaded the 64bit version of Bitcoin Core and it is running now. It absolutely installed flawlessly and picked up the synchronization where the 32bit version left off. You are correct in it immediately using the data directory without having to download the block chain from the beginning. It will be interesting to see if this helps speedup the process. Only 33 weeks to go so I'm here for the duration.

/s/ ClayPigeon723

i think there is already a Bitcoin Core, v. 0.10.3.


for me the last time i need to do that was arround 5 months ago, it took me more than 2 days to sync, like a full weekend, so yes this is more than normal and i was under a pretty good internet connection.

dont worry and be patient.

The latest stable version is 0.10.2. https://bitcoin.org/en/download
There is a 0.11 version, though it is currently in the RC 3 phrase only. https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/releases

I may be setting a new installation record here. It's the 5th day of Synchronization and I still have 20 weeks to go. It's just getting into February 2015. As I said before, my download speed is running around 25MB and upload around 6MB. The program is the 64bit version running under Windows 8.1 on a Toshiba Satellite Laptop. Processor = AMD E1-1200 APU with Radeon HD Graphics.

Has anyone exceeded the 5 day installation and synchronization? Just wondering, I might be in contention for entry into the Guinness World Records. I'm just going to keep trucking on. In the interest of full disclosure, I admit I shut the program down for 8 hours Wednesday and Thursday evening.

/s/ ClayPigeon723

No, I can't say I've ever waited 5 days for the core to synchronize... unfortunately, you're doing this on some pretty low-end hardware.  That 1.4GHz dual core AMD CPU isn't going to set any records, and chances are you've got a 5400RPM mechanical drive in there as well.  Sorry it's taking so long for you.

You're right on all counts. In any event it shouldn't make too much difference when it finally completes. I don't mind waiting for it to finish. It's been an experience to say the least. It has also been a great learning experience. Besides, it's given me a week to get more familiar with bitcoins, their history and application. It's been worth the time.


/s/ ClayPigeon723

Dude.. You don't have the full blockchain, therefore your wallet doesn't know the transactions. It won't report things if it knows it's still syncing.


@ClayPidgeon723: Copy the blocks and chainstate folder to the other machines ~/.bitcoin folder. When you run bitcoin core on your second machine, it will only have to do a quick reindex before being ready to go.

Just find your bitcoin-core folder inside C:\Users\<user>\AppData\Roaming.
Then copy it into your second machine.
Also someone is offering torrent downloads of the blockchain just search.

This should be my last post to this thread. It is day 6 of my installation and synchronization of the bitcoin wallet. The last blockchain finished and the program had completed. Although I have no bitcoins yet, I encrypted the wallet and also backed up the wallet.dat file and copied the entire blockchain to an external hard drive in case I need to reload it on this or another machine. I notice from the small icons at the bottom of the screen says "wallet is encrypted and currently locked."

Just wondering, is there any special procedure to "unlock" the wallet? I imagine this is probably a dumb question at this point, but I am a week old Newbie so I'm authorized dumb questions. I think I have done all that I can for now and my next step will be to acquire a partial bitcoin.