Symphony of Destruction

[btctbots.com]

...

[racquemis]

If you want to see your balance and know your (old) bitcoin address you could just use blockchain.info:

https://blockchain.info/address/YOURBITCOINADDRESSHERE

Hope this helps.

[HCP]

You shouldn't need the passphrase to just open and view the wallet. The passphrase is only required for actions that deal with private keys (signing messages/transactions or exporting etc).

Have you tried rescanning? Shut Bitcoin coin down... Then make sure your "old" wallet.dat is the one in the Bitcoin data directory... Then start Bitcoin Core with the -rescan option.

This will force it to rescan the blockchain looking for transactions that involve the addresses in your wallet.