Tails with old Electrum (2.7.9) for cold strorge?

[A1exander]

I'm looking at Tails (https://tails.boum.org/) to make an offline wallet as described here: http://docs.electrum.org/en/latest/coldstorage.html) for some BTC. Tails system has Electrum included, but the version is a year old, 2.7.9. I have successfully created an offline wallet, exported public key and made a watching-only online wallet on my main system. It seems to be working, but are there any potential problems with using an old Electrum version? Obviously, at some time in the future I will want to move the coins from it. Will the described procedure (create an unsigned transaction, sign, broadcast) work or will I have to recreate the wallet using the seed?

[jackg]

I'm looking at Tails (https://tails.boum.org/) to make an offline wallet as described here: http://docs.electrum.org/en/latest/coldstorage.html) for some BTC. Tails system has Electrum included, but the version is a year old, 2.7.9. I have successfully created an offline wallet, exported public key and made a watching-only online wallet on my main system. It seems to be working, but are there any potential problems with using an old Electrum version? Obviously, at some time in the future I will want to move the coins from it. Will the described procedure (create an unsigned transaction, sign, broadcast) work or will I have to recreate the wallet using the seed?

It should work fine for you. Any bugs should be deleted by the fact it's not online. As long as you use a higher version on your computer.
One thing to consider, you won't be able to use segwit as those transactions are signed differently.

Obviously if you can update the wallet, you should always try to, but if you want to keep your operating system fully sandboxed then that might not be an option as you'll either need the Internet directly or have to place an executable directly onto the sandboxed machine.

[A1exander]

I'm looking at Tails (https://tails.boum.org/) to make an offline wallet as described here: http://docs.electrum.org/en/latest/coldstorage.html) for some BTC. Tails system has Electrum included, but the version is a year old, 2.7.9. I have successfully created an offline wallet, exported public key and made a watching-only online wallet on my main system. It seems to be working, but are there any potential problems with using an old Electrum version? Obviously, at some time in the future I will want to move the coins from it. Will the described procedure (create an unsigned transaction, sign, broadcast) work or will I have to recreate the wallet using the seed?

It should work fine for you. Any bugs should be deleted by the fact it's not online. As long as you use a higher version on your computer.
One thing to consider, you won't be able to use segwit as those transactions are signed differently.

Obviously if you can update the wallet, you should always try to, but if you want to keep your operating system fully sandboxed then that might not be an option as you'll either need the Internet directly or have to place an executable directly onto the sandboxed machine.

I'm aware of Segwit, but it is going to be a wallet for (relatively) long-term holding, not spending, so it should not be a problem. Current fees and transaction times are worrisome, however. As for updating, it is possible to update Tails to a never version, with all included software, using an ISO image. The image should be downloaded and verified on a "hot" system.

[mpufatzis]

I use a similar method using a Raspberry Pi instead, for cold storage.
As long as you keep safe your seed you can always create the wallet in a newer version of Electrum or a future Tail version being sure that it will be working.

I'm looking at Tails (https://tails.boum.org/) to make an offline wallet as described here: http://docs.electrum.org/en/latest/coldstorage.html) for some BTC. Tails system has Electrum included, but the version is a year old, 2.7.9. I have successfully created an offline wallet, exported public key and made a watching-only online wallet on my main system. It seems to be working, but are there any potential problems with using an old Electrum version? Obviously, at some time in the future I will want to move the coins from it. Will the described procedure (create an unsigned transaction, sign, broadcast) work or will I have to recreate the wallet using the seed?

[A1exander]

I use a similar method using a Raspberry Pi instead, for cold storage.
As long as you keep safe your seed you can always create the wallet in a newer version of Electrum or a future Tail version being sure that it will be working.

I'm looking at Tails (https://tails.boum.org/) to make an offline wallet as described here: http://docs.electrum.org/en/latest/coldstorage.html) for some BTC. Tails system has Electrum included, but the version is a year old, 2.7.9. I have successfully created an offline wallet, exported public key and made a watching-only online wallet on my main system. It seems to be working, but are there any potential problems with using an old Electrum version? Obviously, at some time in the future I will want to move the coins from it. Will the described procedure (create an unsigned transaction, sign, broadcast) work or will I have to recreate the wallet using the seed?

Raspberry Pi for cold storage? Interesting idea. Which OS do you use? I also have an old Raspberry Pi (model B) somewhere in my desk drawers.

[mpufatzis]

Here is an old post of mine describing how it works:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2289365.msg24280376#msg24280376

I use a similar method using a Raspberry Pi instead, for cold storage.
As long as you keep safe your seed you can always create the wallet in a newer version of Electrum or a future Tail version being sure that it will be working.

I'm looking at Tails (https://tails.boum.org/) to make an offline wallet as described here: http://docs.electrum.org/en/latest/coldstorage.html) for some BTC. Tails system has Electrum included, but the version is a year old, 2.7.9. I have successfully created an offline wallet, exported public key and made a watching-only online wallet on my main system. It seems to be working, but are there any potential problems with using an old Electrum version? Obviously, at some time in the future I will want to move the coins from it. Will the described procedure (create an unsigned transaction, sign, broadcast) work or will I have to recreate the wallet using the seed?

Raspberry Pi for cold storage? Interesting idea. Which OS do you use? I also have an old Raspberry Pi (model B) somewhere in my desk drawers.

[A1exander]

Here is an old post of mine describing how it works:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2289365.msg24280376#msg24280376

Thanks. So you even deleted everything and kept the seed only? That's right, there is probably no reason to backup the wallet.

[mpufatzis]

If you want to check your BTCs you can install the Electrum in your PC and instead installing your Master Public Key, to install your addresses one by one.
I've read (not 100% sure) that if your master public key and one of your private keys would be known, your wallet could be compromised.

Where I live I can't buy yet anything with BTC, so using them is not an issue at the time being.

Here is an old post of mine describing how it works:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2289365.msg24280376#msg24280376

Thanks. So you even deleted everything and kept the seed only? That's right, there is probably no reason to backup the wallet.

[User365]

TailsOS with electrum as cold storage is a perfect idea, I use it for my coins too. Furthermore, I like the "watch wallet" function which I use on my phone.

The only downsides are that up to now you can´t use segwit and if there is a newer version of tails, you will have to install the update manually, because there are no over the air updates.

[Abdussamad]

Don't use tails because it has an old version of electrum that has trouble synching with servers. Use a debian live CD and install the latest electrum on it as per the instructions on electrum.org/#download i.e. using pip3.

[A1exander]

TailsOS with electrum as cold storage is a perfect idea, I use it for my coins too. Furthermore, I like the "watch wallet" function which I use on my phone.

Yes, that's very convenient.

The only downsides are that up to now you can´t use segwit and if there is a newer version of tails, you will have to install the update manually, because there are no over the air updates.

Tails system is never going to be online anyway, so manual update is perfectly suitable.

[A1exander]

Don't use tails because it has an old version of electrum that has trouble synching with servers. Use a debian live CD and install the latest electrum on it as per the instructions on electrum.org/#download i.e. using pip3.

The cold wallet will not be syncing with servers anyway, because the system will never be online. The only potential problem may be with wallet, seed or signature formats, not with server connections.

[jackg]

Don't use tails because it has an old version of electrum that has trouble synching with servers. Use a debian live CD and install the latest electrum on it as per the instructions on electrum.org/#download i.e. using pip3.

The cold wallet will not be syncing with servers anyway, because the system will never be online. The only potential problem may be with wallet, seed or signature formats, not with server connections.

Also, the issue with networking with servers is generally fairly easy to fix.
And to confirm, along with the above posts of people who have used it with tails successfully, there should be no signature differences for legacy transactions and you should also be able to send coins to segwit addresses, just not sending a segwit transaction from your wallet.

[A1exander]

Also, the issue with networking with servers is generally fairly easy to fix.
And to confirm, along with the above posts of people who have used it with tails successfully, there should be no signature differences for legacy transactions and you should also be able to send coins to segwit addresses, just not sending a segwit transaction from your wallet.

Thanks, that's probably all I need. Maybe I'll want to move my coins to a new Segwit address in the future, but now it is not needed at all.

[adaseb]

It should work fine with online version 3.x
I tried.

[User365]

The only downsides are that up to now you can´t use segwit and if there is a newer version of tails, you will have to install the update manually, because there are no over the air updates.

Tails system is never going to be online anyway, so manual update is perfectly suitable.

Well, considering that when you install tails you have to follow those steps, it is more or less time consuming:

- download the iso file
- install it on a USB drive
- boot from that USB drive
- install tails on the other USB stick
- format the first one

Compared to an over the air update which I imagine like that:

- Boot from your already existent tails
- press a button

Even if you have it not online except you need your money from cold storage, I would prefer over the air updates.

[jackg]

Also, the issue with networking with servers is generally fairly easy to fix.
And to confirm, along with the above posts of people who have used it with tails successfully, there should be no signature differences for legacy transactions and you should also be able to send coins to segwit addresses, just not sending a segwit transaction from your wallet.

Thanks, that's probably all I need. Maybe I'll want to move my coins to a new Segwit address in the future, but now it is not needed at all.

I'd recommend not using SegWit anyway yet at all in a wallet you're not going to spend from by any large rate as it doesn't save very much and there should be more to come so updating at every hard fork faced would just be to much of an arduous task to keep doing every hard fork (as there may be more to come and there's always segwit2x if that gets rescheduled.

[A1exander]

It should work fine with online version 3.x
I tried.

Good. I installed it and tried to send a small sum to it. Watching-only wallets work, both under Linux and Android.

[A1exander]

Well, considering that when you install tails you have to follow those steps, it is more or less time consuming:

- download the iso file
- install it on a USB drive
- boot from that USB drive
- install tails on the other USB stick
- format the first one

Compared to an over the air update which I imagine like that:

- Boot from your already existent tails
- press a button

Even if you have it not online except you need your money from cold storage, I would prefer over the air updates.

AFAIU, it can also be upgraded from a system running in a virtual machine, which is OK for me.

[A1exander]

Also, the issue with networking with servers is generally fairly easy to fix.
And to confirm, along with the above posts of people who have used it with tails successfully, there should be no signature differences for legacy transactions and you should also be able to send coins to segwit addresses, just not sending a segwit transaction from your wallet.

Thanks, that's probably all I need. Maybe I'll want to move my coins to a new Segwit address in the future, but now it is not needed at all.

I'd recommend not using SegWit anyway yet at all in a wallet you're not going to spend from by any large rate as it doesn't save very much and there should be more to come so updating at every hard fork faced would just be to much of an arduous task to keep doing every hard fork (as there may be more to come and there's always segwit2x if that gets rescheduled.

Thanks, I have a similar feeling and I'll follow this advice. It is not a spending wallet and will be used only when I decide to 'cash out' (partially) or need to move the coins to another cold wallet.