Was the wallet encrypted (did it have a password)? If it wasn't encrypted then attempting salvaging the coins will be easier than if it was.
There is an alternative to using pywallet, but it requires more time and effort.
If it wasn't encrypted you could use a hex editor capable of searching a whole hard drive to search for this string of bytes 0201010420. The next the thirty-two bytes after that string could be a private key.
If you find one you can change it from raw hex to a normal format by pasting the thirty-two bytes into an offline copy of this webpage, which will also give you its associated address.
https://www.bitaddress.org/This post explains how to use the webpage.
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1961924.msg19522772#msg19522772This hex editor is capable of searching a whole hard drive.
https[Suspicious link removed]ditor/
These screenshots explain how to open a disk, then search it for the hex string.
Click "devices", then "open disk device", then select the disk letter you want to search.
Click "edit", then "find".
This window should open. Paste the hex string into the the text box labelled "search", then click the button labelled "find all" and wait a very long time for it to search the whole drive.
If you try it run all software offline inside a virtual machine like virtualbox or vmware. Don't ever risk putting a private key on a computer that will ever be connected to the internet.
If you find any private keys you can install the electrum wallet and either import or sweep them into it using these instructions.
http://docs.electrum.org/en/latest/faq.html#can-i-import-private-keys-from-other-bitcoin-clientshttp://docs.electrum.org/en/latest/faq.html#can-i-sweep-private-keys-from-other-bitcoin-clientsElectrum should sync almost immediately and give you fast access to your coins.
Don't ever boot from that hard drive again because doing so could wipe all traces of your coins.
Hello I recently find back an old hdd which was having my wallet.dat with a few bitcoin in it unfortunately it was partially rewritten with new data... but i still want to be sure the private key is not there anymore.
So before doing it on my disk image i decided to test it on a simple wallet that i created my self using bitcoin core "recent version" and it don't find the "0201010420" when I open it using Hex editor. So I have a few questions ...
1) Does the byte before the private key have changes with the version of bitcoin core that was use to create the wallet.dat ?
2) When you mean encrypted wallet you mean the wallet as a whole or just the private key ?
Have a nice day
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