I obviously cannot talk for KeepKey about their business plans.

I'm not leaving the Bitcoin scene no.
I do feel like a bit of a break from all things crypto over the summer though now that the weather's nice.

Thanks BitcoinXio !

It does feel like the end of an era for Gary and I I must admit, We've been working on MultiBit for years !
:-)

MultiBit is being sold to KeepKey LLC, manufacturers of the excellent KeepKey bitcoin hardware wallet.

More details:
https://multibit.org/blog/2016/05/25/multibit-is-being-sold-to-keepkey.html

Neither MultiBit Classic nor HD has the ability to delete a wallet via the user interface.
It was found to be too dangerous in Classic, as users would delete a wallet, then someone would send them bitcoin to an old address and they'd lose it. For this reason we did not put this functionality in HD.

Your best bet is simply to empty the wallet and change the wallet title to something like 'Empty blah blah wallet'

For Classic the default bitcoinj key derivation was used.

For HD we switched to Scrypt because we thought the algorithm was superior, and 16,384 rounds was the version used in the Scrypt description paper so we thought it was OK to use.  There are various different salts used in HD so that the same wallet words used for different wallet types (Trezor wallet, soft wallet) would not collide.

MultiBit HD uses exchange APIs to get the currency conversion.

If one exchange stops working/ responding you get that error.

Just go into Preferences | Exchange and choose another exchange that deals in your currency of interest.

It looks like it is having trouble with connecting to the Bitcoin network, rather than the wallet not loading.

You can check the 'Verify network' help for some tips on firewalls etc.

You can use your wallet words to recover you bitcoin on:
+ MultiBit HD on another machine (say a friend's)
+ Lighthouse (Mac/PC/Linux)
+ Breadwallet (iOS)

It is probably a good idea to upgrade to the latest code 0.5.19
IIRC the default fee went up - older versions of MultiBit include a too low fee for nowadays.

As you can create a new wallet and it syncs ok, it could be this:

https://multibit.org/en/help/hd0.3/verify-network.html
Section: "I see "There was an error in creating a connection to the Bitcoin network" in the corner

If so follow th instructions in the help

MultiBit Classic is a bit slow when syncing lots of open wallets, or a wallet with lots of addresses in (>500 or so).
There's not much you can do about it other than make sure your network speed is fast enough.

Also check you are on the latest version and upgrade if you are not.

If you are finding it just to slow to use then a good thing to do is actually move the wallet/ private keys to blockchain.info (and then your using their servers effectively.) There is a help article on how to do this in the MultiBit Classic help:
https://multibit.org/en/help/v0.5/help_movingAWallet.html

That decrypted file IS a wallet.
You should be able to load it up and print it out - there is a toString on the wallet object that takes a boolean to print out the private keys IIRC
Look at WalletManager for loading options.

What type of PC are you using ?
The only way I can think of MultiBit HD actually crashing your PC was if it ran out of memory (in which case the app should close and not the PC crash but I guess that depends on the operating system).

You can only really do it programmatically. All the backup/restore in MultiBit HD itself are based on you knowing your wallet words.

If you have a look at :

org.multibit.hd.core.crypto.EncryptedFileReaderWriter
org.multibit.hd.core.crypto.EncryptedFileReaderWriterTest

that's the code that encrypts and decrypts the wallet files with the password.

The codebase is here:
https://github.com/bitcoin-solutions/multibit-hd

-----BEGIN BITCOIN SIGNED MESSAGE-----
There is a new release of MultiBit HD at:
https://multibit.org

Version 0.3.0

This contains the following features:
+ Removal of client fees - you now only pay the miner's fees
+ Various bug fixes
+ Localisation update

Bitcoin signing:
This message text (starting with "There is a new release" and ending with "Jim")
is Bitcoin signed with the https://multibit.org donation address.

SHA256 hashes for files:
c4a80a95965940fcba4379b1b01c4111a1b265fae826c76602abee43de988fb9  multibit-hd-macos-0.3.0.dmg
d7abb124b409c8b840556045fa8d90db069dc4271d4bc28a6b64ce884c4b66f5  multibit-hd-macos-0.3.0.dmg.asc
f1903342a3b2c4eb215f7d4f7a1bf5a5a76353955ef648cd9aebc0d813291902  multibit-hd-unix-0.3.0.sh
0847069034b31a0a23d6d668e5f7430fba74382120063a1eab26dc3a42fbbdcd  multibit-hd-unix-0.3.0.sh.asc
d043b3efb88e595f96662c9458c345fef9321170e6ecc1448be1f156071fe4cb  multibit-hd-windows-0.3.0.exe
b61fd6afc4f76d88d2c7e2342a50f07efe07304206c1c3127c29068d8b3be67f  multibit-hd-windows-0.3.0.exe.asc
10670d36b24901866bd7f8b9fa9178b6de25a102f69eeedc3ef09abe63e5e84e  multibit-hd-windows-x64-0.3.0.exe
1b840e250291c2cc0769c098c694962680b5fae4b680afe543807d2b6535a4a6  multibit-hd-windows-x64-0.3.0.exe.asc

PGP signing:
You can verify the PGP signatures by installing gpg and importing the key id 0x79F7C572
from http://pgp.mit.edu. The files are signed with the subkey with id 0x23F7FB7B.

Jim
-----BEGIN BITCOIN SIGNATURE-----
Version: MultiBit 0.5.19
Address: 1AhN6rPdrMuKBGFDKR1k9A8SCLYaNgXhty

HB0w/LG1u5J1MoXiqohz3Cpuj66BReP9DETYxsKQG4FkYq1k44GEajUk/YZQVmvKEBVtJW6z0dX13KIqDOgQOXY=
-----END BITCOIN SIGNATURE-----

As mkabatek correctly spotted, we have removed the BRIT fees.

More details in the blog article:
https://multibit.org/blog/2016/04/18/multibit-hd-release-0.3.0.html

You should definitely see it after one confirmation

Have a look in the help at:
https://multibit.org/en/help/hd0.2/repair-wallet.html

which should help.

Obviously double check the address you've sent it to is the one in your wallet.

Try doing a Tools | Repair wallet.
This should reset things back to what is on the blockchain.

Try doing a Tools | Repair wallet.
This should reset things back to what is on the blockchain.