Fork November: Ledger wallet in "Legacy" or "Segwit" to get free coins?

[stman]

I've been in crypto not for long; in the beginning of september i bought some BTC, and put it on a Ledger.

My ledger asked me to choose between a segwit or legacy account, and i chose Segwit because word is that it's faster en has lower fees.
So now my balance shows up whenever i open my wallet as "Segwit", but when i choose "Legacy" the balance says 0 BTC.

With the upcoming fork in november, people are saying BTC holders get free coins of the newly created fork.

And I am wondering if it matters if the BTC wallet on the Ledger is in Legacy or Segwit mode to get these free new coins?
Because if it does,  i should transfer my BTC.

If searched the net like crazy, but nowhere i can find the answer to this...  

[mocacinno]

I've been in crypto not for long; in the beginning of september i bought some BTC, and put it on a Ledger.

My ledger asked me to choose between a segwit or legacy account, and i chose Segwit because word is that it's faster en has lower fees.
So now my balance shows up whenever i open my wallet as "Segwit", but when i choose "Legacy" the balance says 0 BTC.

With the upcoming fork in november, people are saying BTC holders get free coins of the newly created fork.

And I am wondering if it matters if the BTC wallet on the Ledger is in Legacy or Segwit mode to get these free new coins?
Because if it does,  i should transfer my BTC.

If searched the net like crazy, but nowhere i can find the answer to this...  

If i'm not mistaking, it shouldn't matter... Both legacy and segwit wallets use the same underlying blockchain (segwit was a soft fork). So, in case of a new hardfork, it shouldn't matter if you used a segwit or a legacy wallet, all transactions for both wallets were recorded on the same blockchain, and after the fork those transactions should be visible in the forked coin's wallet... Unless i'm missing something here.

[BillyBobZorton]

I've been in crypto not for long; in the beginning of september i bought some BTC, and put it on a Ledger.

My ledger asked me to choose between a segwit or legacy account, and i chose Segwit because word is that it's faster en has lower fees.
So now my balance shows up whenever i open my wallet as "Segwit", but when i choose "Legacy" the balance says 0 BTC.

With the upcoming fork in november, people are saying BTC holders get free coins of the newly created fork.

And I am wondering if it matters if the BTC wallet on the Ledger is in Legacy or Segwit mode to get these free new coins?
Because if it does,  i should transfer my BTC.

If searched the net like crazy, but nowhere i can find the answer to this...  

As far as I know, your bitcoins must be held on the legacy format in order for you to receive coins in the case of a network split. This is yet another reason to oppose hardforks. It is insanely annoying that you must be moving your coins around from segwit format, to legacy format every time a hardfork happens, if you want to receive free coins (and who doesn't).

And not only that, but you should move your coins to a different wallet, then once the wallet is empty on the legacy chain, you can export these private keys (or ideally if you are running a full node, just copy-paste the wallet.dat file on the folder of the full node of the fork's client because you want to avoid exporting and import private keys as much as possible).

So yeah, it is an annoying process, and if you don't know what you are doing, you can screw up badly. Some people were confused enough to send BTC into BCash addresses and lost their money. It is a shame that so many innocent people get screwed because of this. Not everyone is bright, we have to be realistic, most people aren't technically literate enough to deal with these things.

[stman]

Hmm, that's 2 different answers.... so there is obviously confusion over this...
I guess the safest would be to move my Bitcoins to the Legacy format then, just to make sure i can get the free coins.

I saw this video of how to split for bitcoin cash.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7_0m9aZrMo
I guess this is what BBZorton means with moving the new coins to a different wallet, right?

[mocacinno]

Hmm, that's 2 different answers.... so there is obviously confusion over this...
I guess the safest would be to move my Bitcoins to the Legacy format then, just to make sure i can get the free coins.

I saw this video of how to split for bitcoin cash.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7_0m9aZrMo
I guess this is what BBZorton means with moving the new coins to a different wallet, right?

I think that this is what BillyBobZorton means, yes.

The thing is, bitcoin cash was a hard fork. This basically means that at a certain block height, bitcoin cash nodes started enforcing a new set of consensus rules. Bitcoin cash blocks could no longer be validated by non-bitcoin cash nodes. The end result is 2 completely different chains.
Up untill block x, both chains contain exactly the same blocks, and exactly the same transaction history, but starting from block x+1, each chain has it's own blocks and it's own (unique) transaction history. "core" nodes can not validate BCH blocks and vice versa.
Since both are now completely different crypto coins, but share the same transaction history, if you had 1 BTC before the chain split, you automatically have 1 BTC on the bitcoin blockchain and 1 BCH on the bitcoincash blockchain after the split.

Segwit was a soft fork, this means there is no chain split. Basically, legacy nodes get a stripped down version of exactly the same blocks as segwit nodes. So both have the same transactions in their blockchain, and exactly the same transaction history.

So, theoretically, if a new hardfork would occur on a chain during a softfork at height y, all previous transactions up untill this height would be in both chains, this would include transactions generated by both segwit and non-segwit wallets (legacy nodes don't receive the witness data, they see the transactions as anyone-can-spend outputs and redeems). Offcourse, i do not know if the chain that forks off has wallets and nodes that know how to handle historic transactions made by segwit wallets. I have no idear if they'll fork from the chain from a legacy node or from a segwit node... If they fork from a legacy node, they'll have blocks with segwit transactions but without witness data... I have no idear how they would handle those.

Conclusion : we need Achow101, DannyHamilton or somebody with more technical in this thread

[aleksej996]

Hmm, that's 2 different answers.... so there is obviously confusion over this...
I guess the safest would be to move my Bitcoins to the Legacy format then, just to make sure i can get the free coins.

I saw this video of how to split for bitcoin cash.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7_0m9aZrMo
I guess this is what BBZorton means with moving the new coins to a different wallet, right?

I think that this is what BillyBobZorton means, yes.

The thing is, bitcoin cash was a hard fork. This basically means that at a certain block height, bitcoin cash nodes started enforcing a new set of consensus rules. Bitcoin cash blocks could no longer be validated by non-bitcoin cash nodes. The end result is 2 completely different chains.
Up untill block x, both chains contain exactly the same blocks, and exactly the same transaction history, but starting from block x+1, each chain has it's own blocks and it's own (unique) transaction history. "core" nodes can not validate BCH blocks and vice versa.
Since both are now completely different crypto coins, but share the same transaction history, if you had 1 BTC before the chain split, you automatically have 1 BTC on the bitcoin blockchain and 1 BCH on the bitcoincash blockchain after the split.

Segwit was a soft fork, this means there is no chain split. Basically, legacy nodes get a stripped down version of exactly the same blocks as segwit nodes. So both have the same transactions in their blockchain, and exactly the same transaction history.

So, theoretically, if a new hardfork would occur on a chain during a softfork at height y, all previous transactions up untill this height would be in both chains, this would include transactions generated by both segwit and non-segwit wallets (legacy nodes don't receive the witness data, they see the transactions as anyone-can-spend outputs and redeems). Offcourse, i do not know if the chain that forks off has wallets and nodes that know how to handle historic transactions made by segwit wallets. I have no idear if they'll fork from the chain from a legacy node or from a segwit node... If they fork from a legacy node, they'll have blocks with segwit transactions but without witness data... I have no idear how they would handle those.

Conclusion : we need Achow101, DannyHamilton or somebody with more technical in this thread

You are confusing between Segwit and Segwit2x. Segwit soft fork already happened, there was no split there, as there are no splits in a soft fork.

What we are having in November is a Segwit2x hard fork, also known as S2X. However, it doesn't have replay protection, so getting free coins will never be a safe process. As soon as you send your coins to one address, someone will replay that transaction on the other network just because it costs nothing to do so. This will make users completely ignore one chain as they can't safely coexist in the overlapping user base.

In order to get free coins on the other chain, which you might never be able to use, you will have to own your private keys for your addresses. That is all. So unless you use an online wallet, you will have coins on the other chain.

[stman]

Oh man, this keeps getting more and more confusing.

However, it doesn't have replay protection, so getting free coins will never be a safe process.

In order to get free coins on the other chain, which you might never be able to use, you will have to own your private keys for your addresses. That is all. So unless you use an online wallet, you will have coins on the other chain.

You say it's not safe to get the free coins.
But you also say: if one has the private keys (like people with their coins on a ledger), you will get them automatically?
And you also mention: we will never be able to use them.

Every point you make is a contradiction to the previous  

[BitcoinNewsMagazine]

The safe play is to hold your bitcoin in a legacy account in a Trezor or Nano S hardware wallet. Both handled the BCH hard fork gracefully so no reason not to expect the same if SegWit2X occurs. Trezor did warn after the BCH hard fork that they will no longer publish timelines as they were pressured hard to give Trezor owners BCH as soon as possible. They did but were not happy about being rushed. Can't blame owners though they wanted to sell while price was high.

[stman]

I'm reading about this replay protection thing, or the lack of, and i'm beginning to see the problem now, i think

So if my newbie brain is getting this right:
Bitcoin core has no replay protection
Bitcoin S2x will have no replay protection.

If you have coins on both chains, and you send coins on one chain, there is a possibility you loose the same amount of coins on the other chain?

If i understand this right, this is a serious problem when holding both Bitcoin core and Bitcoin s2x...  

[TryNinja]

I'm reading about this replay protection thing, or the lack of, and i'm beginning to see the problem now, i think

So if my newbie brain is getting this right:
Bitcoin core has no replay protection
Bitcoin S2x will have no replay protection.

If you have coins on both chains, and you send coins on one chain, there is a possibility you loose the same amount of coins on the other chain?

If i understand this right, this is a serious problem when holding both Bitcoin core and Bitcoin s2x...  

TLDR: When you send a transaction, your transaction may be broadcasted in one chain, and be picked up by the other, making you spend your coins on both chains by mistake.

An attacker, or anybody in general, could pick up your broadcasted transaction on one chain, and relay it to a node on another chain. Since the transaction is valid on both chains, both nodes would accept it.

Source: https://themerkle.com/what-is-a-bitcoin-replay-attack/

[Dutchyyy]

I'm also reading different opinions and decided to play it safe about Segwit2x and keep the coins in Legacy mode.
You know, it's annoying to move coins here and there but if the new fork bring at least the same value like BCH, it's worth it.

[aleksej996]

You say it's not safe to get the free coins.
But you also say: if one has the private keys (like people with their coins on a ledger), you will get them automatically?
And you also mention: we will never be able to use them.

Every point you make is a contradiction to the previous  

They are not a contradiction

The point I was making is that you will definitely get the coins if you have your private keys. They will be on both blockchains and only you will be able to move them with your private keys. You will be able to move them and use them, however, you might not be able to move them separately, in which case, you kind of have to abandon one of them. Sorry if I wasn't clear enough.

I'm reading about this replay protection thing, or the lack of, and i'm beginning to see the problem now, i think

So if my newbie brain is getting this right:
Bitcoin core has no replay protection
Bitcoin S2x will have no replay protection.

If you have coins on both chains, and you send coins on one chain, there is a possibility you loose the same amount of coins on the other chain?

If i understand this right, this is a serious problem when holding both Bitcoin core and Bitcoin s2x...   

The truth is that it isn't just a possibility, it is near certainty. I said it might be possible to split the coins, but not by just sending them and hoping. Since, someone, somewhere will probably replay all the transactions. However, it might be possible to split them with other methods, that will not be 100% safe and the exact method will depend on the hashrate of both chains after the fork.

[stman]

You will be able to move them and use them, however, you might not be able to move them separately, in which case, you kind of have to abandon one of them. .....
The truth is that it isn't just a possibility, it is near certainty. I said it might be possible to split the coins, but not by just sending them and hoping. Since, someone, somewhere will probably replay all the transactions. However, it might be possible to split them with other methods, that will not be 100% safe and the exact method will depend on the hashrate of both chains after the fork.

Ok, thanks for making this all clear.
You probably saved me from losing Bitcoins!  
At the same time i wonder how many non technical Bitcoin investors will be duped here. It will give crypto a bad rep once again  

[mocacinno]

Hmm, that's 2 different answers.... so there is obviously confusion over this...
I guess the safest would be to move my Bitcoins to the Legacy format then, just to make sure i can get the free coins.

I saw this video of how to split for bitcoin cash.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7_0m9aZrMo
I guess this is what BBZorton means with moving the new coins to a different wallet, right?

I think that this is what BillyBobZorton means, yes.

The thing is, bitcoin cash was a hard fork. This basically means that at a certain block height, bitcoin cash nodes started enforcing a new set of consensus rules. Bitcoin cash blocks could no longer be validated by non-bitcoin cash nodes. The end result is 2 completely different chains.
Up untill block x, both chains contain exactly the same blocks, and exactly the same transaction history, but starting from block x+1, each chain has it's own blocks and it's own (unique) transaction history. "core" nodes can not validate BCH blocks and vice versa.
Since both are now completely different crypto coins, but share the same transaction history, if you had 1 BTC before the chain split, you automatically have 1 BTC on the bitcoin blockchain and 1 BCH on the bitcoincash blockchain after the split.

Segwit was a soft fork, this means there is no chain split. Basically, legacy nodes get a stripped down version of exactly the same blocks as segwit nodes. So both have the same transactions in their blockchain, and exactly the same transaction history.

So, theoretically, if a new hardfork would occur on a chain during a softfork at height y, all previous transactions up untill this height would be in both chains, this would include transactions generated by both segwit and non-segwit wallets (legacy nodes don't receive the witness data, they see the transactions as anyone-can-spend outputs and redeems). Offcourse, i do not know if the chain that forks off has wallets and nodes that know how to handle historic transactions made by segwit wallets. I have no idear if they'll fork from the chain from a legacy node or from a segwit node... If they fork from a legacy node, they'll have blocks with segwit transactions but without witness data... I have no idear how they would handle those.

Conclusion : we need Achow101, DannyHamilton or somebody with more technical in this thread

You are confusing between Segwit and Segwit2x. Segwit soft fork already happened, there was no split there, as there are no splits in a soft fork.

What we are having in November is a Segwit2x hard fork, also known as S2X. However, it doesn't have replay protection, so getting free coins will never be a safe process. As soon as you send your coins to one address, someone will replay that transaction on the other network just because it costs nothing to do so. This will make users completely ignore one chain as they can't safely coexist in the overlapping user base.

In order to get free coins on the other chain, which you might never be able to use, you will have to own your private keys for your addresses. That is all. So unless you use an online wallet, you will have coins on the other chain.

I don't think there was any confusion
The OP asked if he had to chose "legacy" or "segwit" wallets on his hardware wallet in order to get "free" coins after the segwit2x fork.
I then proceeded explaining that bitcoin cash was a hard fork, it now has it's own blockchain. I explained that segwit was a softfork, so both "legacy" and "segwit" wallets share the same chain.

So, i explained that when the segwit2x hard fork would happen, it did not matter if you chose "segwit" or "legacy" as your wallet type in your hardware wallet. After the segwit2x hard fork, transactions generated by both the "segwit" and "legacy" wallet's unspent outputs *should* be spendable on both the old chain, as they will be spendable on the segwit2x chain.

This is what i wanted to convey, and i think it's still valid....

However, you are completely right about the replay protection. I haven't dug into segwit2x, but if it doesn't have proper replay protection, you have to be carefull.
There are ways to circumvent the problem tough...It's not even hard to do:

how to avoid replay attacks:
you have a wallet, containing the private keys to spend unspent outputs spendable by address X. there are 2 unspent outputs spendable by you.

At a certain block height, there is a hard fork. You now have 2 unspent outputs on chain A and 2 unspent outputs on chain B.
IF you buy a pack of cigarettes using the unspent outputs on chain A and fund the seller's address directly, the seller can replay your transaction on chain B, and steal your funds... He can export his private key from his wallet on chain A and import it on a wallet on chain B...

However, if you create a NEW wallet on chain A, and a NEW wallet on chain B, then spend your 2 unspent outputs on chain A to fund an address generated by your new wallet on chain A, and do the same for chain B (spend all unspent outputs on chain B to fund an address from YOUR new wallet on chain B) the risk is gone...

Why? Because the cigarette seller has a wallet on chain A. You fund his address by using the unspent outputs in your NEW wallet. If the seller replays this transaction on chain B, it will not work because on chain B, there are no unspent outputs to spend.. The new walllet on chain A should have completely different addresses than the new wallet on chain B, unless you were *dumb* enough to generate an SPV wallet and used the same seed phrase to generate the new wallet on chain A and B... But i hope nobody will make that mistake.

[aleksej996]

I don't think there was any confusion
The OP asked if he had to chose "legacy" or "segwit" wallets on his hardware wallet in order to get "free" coins after the segwit2x fork.
I then proceeded explaining that bitcoin cash was a hard fork, it now has it's own blockchain. I explained that segwit was a softfork, so both "legacy" and "segwit" wallets share the same chain.

So, i explained that when the segwit2x hard fork would happen, it did not matter if you chose "segwit" or "legacy" as your wallet type in your hardware wallet. After the segwit2x hard fork, transactions generated by both the "segwit" and "legacy" wallet's unspent outputs *should* be spendable on both the old chain, as they will be spendable on the segwit2x chain.

This is what i wanted to convey, and i think it's still valid....

However, you are completely right about the replay protection. I haven't dug into segwit2x, but if it doesn't have proper replay protection, you have to be carefull.
There are ways to circumvent the problem tough...It's not even hard to do:

how to avoid replay attacks:
you have a wallet, containing the private keys to spend unspent outputs spendable by address X. there are 2 unspent outputs.

At a certain block height, there is a hard fork. You now have 2 unspent outputs on chain A and 2 unspent outputs on chain B.
IF you buy a pack of cigarettes using the unspent outputs on chain A, the seller can replay your transaction on chain B, and steal your funds...

However, if you create a NEW wallet on chain A, and a NEW wallet on chain B, then spend your 2 unspent outputs on chain A to fund an address generated by your new wallet on chain A, and do the same for chain B (spend all unspent outputs on chain B to fund an address from YOUR new wallet on chain B) the risk is gone...

Yeah, I read it again, you were correct.
The whole thing where OP called segwit2x "segwit" was confusing I probably thought you were talking about the other one or read it wrong, I don't remember by now. Sorry for calling you out when you were correct

As to further comment on your post I replied to earlier, if I understand everything correctly here, S2X will accept the witness data from this Segwit network. It wouldn't make sense for them to implement new and/or different segwit protocol.

[mocacinno]

Yeah, I read it again, you were correct.
The whole thing where OP called segwit2x "segwit" was confusing I probably thought you were talking about the other one or read it wrong, I don't remember by now. Sorry for calling you out when you were correct

As to further comment on your post I replied to earlier, if I understand everything correctly here, S2X will accept the witness data from this Segwit network. It wouldn't make sense for them to implement new and/or different segwit protocol.

no worries, this stuff gets pretty confusing
As for the rest of your post: thanks for the clarification... I haven're read up on the S2X fork (yet), so this information is pretty usefull to me.

[manselr]

Ok so from what I've gathered and please someone confirm if this is correct, this is how you get ready for a hardfork:

1 ) Get all of your coins in legacy format addresses (the ones that begin with 1 that is)
2 ) These keys must be ideally in a full node of the legacy chain (so Bitcoin Core will do)
3 ) Wait for the split to happen
4 ) Split day is here, you recieved the same amount of coins you are holding on the forked chain (in this case segwit2x chain, but Bitcoin Gold chain or whatever also when it happens)
5 ) You move all of your coins to other addresses in the legacy chain
6 ) Your wallet.dat is now empty
7 ) Move this empty wallet.dat into a full node client of the forked chain
8 ) Once you sync it, your coins will show up there
9 ) Now you are in full control of the coins on both chains and you can send your segwit2x/BCash/Gold/whatever fork coins into an exchange and dump for free real BTC
10 ) Profit!!!

[achow101]

Ok so from what I've gathered and please someone confirm if this is correct, this is how you get ready for a hardfork:

1 ) Get all of your coins in legacy format addresses (the ones that begin with 1 that is)

No need to do that. Segwit2x is not disabling segwit.

6 ) Your wallet.dat is now empty
7 ) Move this empty wallet.dat into a full node client of the forked chain
8 ) Once you sync it, your coins will show up there

No, that will probably confuse the btc1 client. You should make and have a backup of your wallet.dat before you moved your coins and use that backup with the btc1 client after the fork.

[manselr]

No need to do that. Segwit2x is not disabling segwit.

Right, so when a fork also has segwit and you have your coins in the format that begins with 3 (not sure how this is called) or the bc1 format, you will receive the coins just OK on the other chain in the same addresses. Well this is good to go, but for long term storage and to receive coins of forks that may not have segwit i think its better to store them in legacy format. For example I think Bitcoin Gold has no segwit.

No, that will probably confuse the btc1 client. You should make and have a backup of your wallet.dat before you moved your coins and use that backup with the btc1 client after the fork.

Well I didn't exactly mean move, I meant to make a copy and paste it on the other folder. Let's see if this is the fixed full version:

1 ) Get all of your coins in legacy format addresses (the ones that begin with 1 that is) but if the fork supports segwit then you are good to do with segwit addresses too
2 ) These keys must be ideally in a full node of the legacy chain (so Bitcoin Core will do)
3 ) Wait for the split to happen
4 ) Split day is here, you received the same amount of coins you are holding on the forked chain (in this case segwit2x chain, but Bitcoin Gold chain or whatever also when it happens)
5 ) Make a backup of your wallet.dat elsewhere on another folder in several places just in case
6 ) Shut down Bitcoin Core and delete your wallet.dat
7 ) Open Bitcoin Core again and now you have a brand new empty wallet
8 ) Create new receiving addresses (use coin control to know how many addresses you will need to retain privacy)
9 ) Put these addresses in a .txt file
10 ) Close Bitcoin Core
11 ) Now rename this wallet.dat to emtpywallet.dat or something
12 ) Put back the wallet.dat that actually has your coins
13 ) Run Bitcoin Core again
14 ) Send your coins to the created addresses
15 ) This now empty wallet, is the one that you should move to the btc1 client or whatever other fork to access your coins
16) Open btc1 client and once btc1 client is synced you will see the coins, now you are free to send them to an exchange and dump them for the real BTC
17) Now close btc1 client and open Bitcoin Core again with the wallet.dat where you moved the coins
18) Create receiving addresses there and send your free BTC coins from the exchange where you dumped 2xcoin for BTC
19 ) Profit!!!

wow this gave me an headache, but I think its correct.

[stman]

Wow, this sounds waaaay to complicated for me to risk.

I think I'm just gonna keep my coins in legacy, and not touch the "2x"-coins until that team decides to implement replay protection.
I hope exchanges will reject their coin until they make it safe.

Or maybe Ledger will design a ready made application to safely split/send the 2x coins while keeping your BTC wallet untouched.