droark asked why are you bothering with armoryd (armoryd.py), not Armory as a whole

Have you completed this part of the readme, titled Running Armory?
I'm not sure downgrading to a less secure OS version is going to help.

Yes, it takes quite a while for first sync. 165GB of data, as well as some cpu time for verification, I think. As long as the block count keeps increasing, it is is working.

While you're waiting, you probably want to check you can restore your wallet backup in Armory. Having the address won't help without that.

Install dir is the directory that has bitcoin-qt.exe inside it. I'm getting the impression you are on linux, though?
Blank should find it if installed properly, but yeah bitcoin-qt and bitcoind are in bin on linux.
We can't give you an exact path because setups vary, dude, and you aren't giving us much info here about yours.

When you made your Armory wallet, you encrypted it with a password. You need to use that.

So with just that added you get to the green connected state? No RPC issues?

The GUI is there to act as a wallet and a node, together, and so it doesn't need to open itself up to anything external (including other processes on the same computer) in order to function usefully.
In contrast bitcoind is a daemon - daemons are headless and work in the background. If it didn't accept incoming connections or some form of external input by default, whether that be via bitcoin-cli or RPC, it wouldn't serve a useful function.
That is my understanding of it, at least.

Please try Armory 0.96.3.992 (RC3)
You also need to download and install Bitcoin Core.

And I just noticed there are no wallets in your Armory...

Yes.
127.0.0.1 is localhost - your local computer, so universal

Would whitelist=127.0.0.1 be better, perhaps? Not sure if that'd really help keep a slot open for it, though.
Using addnode=127.0.0.1 unfortunately has the side effect of Core constantly trying to connect to itself. Might be benign, but does flood the logs.

Incidentally, I set up a Windows 10 x64 VM, for testing, given that we've had what looks like a trend of issues on Win 10.
As is the case with HCP... bitcoind connects and plays nice once everything is up to date. When running bitcoin-qt manually the best I can get is Connected, but Armory thinks the RPC server is down. I can run the usual RPC commands with bitcoin-cli, which suggests the RPC server is, in fact available? (And it is enabled in bitcoin.conf).
Doesn't seem to be down to any internal firewalling, and it is running 0.96.4 RC3 and Core 0.15.1, of course.

I'm not wanting to confuse and hijack the thread - I don't need this Win10 VM to work - but think there is a common issue here.

Finished reindexing yet?

In Armory: File > Settings.
On the general tab, uncheck "Let Armory run Bitcoin Core/bitcoind in the background". Then save.
Close down Armory. Check Task manager and kill bitcoind or armorydb if they are there.

Start up C:\Program Files\Bitcoin\bitcoin-qt.exe
Any error messages? Is it catching up?

Oof. That Armory version is quite old. Usual procedure is to upgrade to RC3 if possible, and given the older versions you'll want to delete /Users/gransar/Library/Application Support/Armory/databases/

Running a more recent version of Bitcoin Core, I hope?

Tried ABC 0.16.1 as per the below?

I'd try adding "listen=1" to your bitcoin.conf

If droark doesn't get back to you, could you post your logs again? I remember trying to access them when you first posted, but it seems like cryptbin just hangs on your link.
You could try splitting the log manually into a few pastes and adding to pastebin... or separate dblog.txt and armorylog.txt pastes (They'll be in the same directory as your Armory databases subfolder, unless you've changed that)

No, but posting your log files will likely help.
Not a mac user, but I assume they live in ~/.armory  or somewhere similar.
Add dblog.txt and armorylog.txt to pastebin (or a site of your choice) and post the links here, please.

That would probably explain why your block count has been stuck.
Yes, generally the right thing to do, though will take some time. If you open up "D:\BTC datadir 96-2\debug.log" and look at the end of the file you should be able to see how it is progressing.

Sorry, that should have been:

Usually bitcoind is run from Armory, instead of bitcoin-qt, to update the blockchain. Something has been going wrong down the line there. Hoping that running qt manually on that directory will tell us more.

Going on your logs, you have a few issues. Increasing the fee isn't going to help if your Armory can't communicate with the network.
If I'm reading this right:
The Bitcoin blockchain and chainstate is downloaded to D:\BTC datadir 96-2\ (blocks and chainstate subfolder)
Armory is installed to D:\BTC datadir 96-2\Armory\

While it could work as is, nesting these folders is not a great idea. Please consider moving/reinstalling Armory outside this directory.

Unless you've fixed it you recently starting passing in this to Armory (As part of a shortcut?):
This is incorrect. Space between "--" and "datadir", and as far as I understand it, d:\btc datadir 96-2\ is your satoshi/bitcoin data directory, not your datadir (armory). Did you mean to pass it to Bitcoin Core?


From further back in your logs Armory has been scanning the blocks in D:\BTC datadir 96-2\blocks and can't find any more after #494345.
Are you sure Bitcoin Core has got an up to date copy of the blockchain in D:\BTC datadir 96-2\blocks ? Also saw a reference to D:\Bitcoin? A backup/original copy?

Close down Armory, check task manager for bitcoind and armorydb (kill them if they are there).
Then run this, please:
Bitcoin Core should open up. Wait for it to load then go to Help -> Debug window.
On the "Information" tab, what does it say next to "Current Number of blocks" ? If it isn't 504876 or higher, that copy of the blockchain is not up to date.

The usual procedure is to move your BTC to a new Armory Wallet (not just a new address). Let the transaction(s) confirm a few times.
Then export private keys for those now empty addresses. Import into the forks. Send to an exchange or wherever.
Basic rule being: Don't expose your private keys while there is BTC on them.