Bitcoin isn't showing in Bitcoin Core after Reinstall

[jimsx]

Hi,

My Macbook had Bitcoin Core installed. I was upgrading OS X via the Appstore but the upgrade crashed and I was no longer able to access OS X.

I took out my hard drive and saved the wallet.dat file and the blockchain and the whole directory actually.

I reinstalled OS X via USB and reinstalled Bitcoin Core. Replaced the wallet.dat file with the one I had backed up.

I let Bitcoin core download a fresh copy of the blockchain, but once it had completed, my Bitcoins still aren't showing.

I also tried a rescan via Terminal "/Applications/Bitcoin.app/Contents/MacOS/bitcoin -rescan". But no luck

I don't know a great deal about how this all works so any help would truly be appreciated.

Thanks!

[Itoo]

There's one step I didn't see you list. Did you copy your backed up wallet.dat into the new install?

The wallet.dat holds your bitcoin and when you reinstalled, it created a brand new wallet.dat. Of course, since they hold all your coins or your private keys, you want to be very careful that you never overwrite a wallet.dat with btc on it, make sure you have multiple backups in multiple secure places.

[jimsx]

Hi, yes I replaced the new blank wallet.dat file with the backup one

I reinstalled OS X via USB and reinstalled Bitcoin Core. Replaced the wallet.dat file with the one I had backed up.

Quite lost at this point

Thanks

[achow101]

Hi, yes I replaced the new blank wallet.dat file with the backup one

I reinstalled OS X via USB and reinstalled Bitcoin Core. Replaced the wallet.dat file with the one I had backed up.

Quite lost at this point

Thanks

Go to File > Receiving Addresses. Do any of those addresses look familiar? If not, then the wallet may not be your wallet.

Next we can also try to dump the private key to see if the wallet has it. Find an old address that you used before. Go to Help > Debug Window and click on the Console tab. Type into the box at the bottom

Code:

dumpprivkey <address>

where <address> is the old address.

If the address is in the wallet, then you should see black text appear in the console window that starts with a '5', 'K', or 'L'. That is the private key for that address, DO NOT SHARE IT WITH ANYONE. If you do see it, then that means that the wallet is yours. If you see red text with an error, then the wallet may not be yours. Try doing that for a few addresses to make sure. If for each address you do get the private key, then try rescanning again. If you do not, make sure that you properly copied the wallet file and that Bitcoin Core is actually reading that wallet file.

[Itoo]

Hi, yes I replaced the new blank wallet.dat file with the backup one

I reinstalled OS X via USB and reinstalled Bitcoin Core. Replaced the wallet.dat file with the one I had backed up.

Quite lost at this point

Thanks

woops I see that now, sorry.

[helloeverybody]

Maybe try copying in the old wallet.dat again. i had something like this happen before with either bitcoin or dash and even though i copied my backup wallet back in it got overwritten by the new one so i think all i did was copied it in again and then it finally ended up showing what it was supposed to.