Move Wallet to different computer

[stuvwxyz99]

I have Bitcoin QT installed on a macbook air. Syncing takes forever, and pretty much tops out CPU usage. So I'd like to move my wallet to a different computer (running Windows 7). Any advice on how to accomplish this?

[btcton]

I have Bitcoin QT installed on a macbook air. Syncing takes forever, and pretty much tops out CPU usage. So I'd like to move my wallet to a different computer (running Windows 7). Any advice on how to accomplish this?

To move just the wallet, just copy over the wallet.dat. If you want to copy the blockchain, it is located somewhere around %APPDATA% (I don't know the equivalent in mac).

[stuvwxyz99]

Thanks. Is it safe to move the wallet if Bitcoin-QT is not synced? The wallet itself is up to date (no recent transactions)

I assume the steps are:

1. Install a bitcoin client on the other PC (was thinking of MultiBit so as to eliminate block chain syncing)
2. Locate wallet.dat on the macbook
3. Copy wallet.dat to a usb drive
4. find the wallet.dat on the PC, rename it, and drop in the wallet.dat from the macbook.

Is that correct?

[zeta1]

copy the wallet.dat , but be sure the old wallet.dat is removed after you copied it to a new location

[orymh]

Thanks. Is it safe to move the wallet if Bitcoin-QT is not synced? The wallet itself is up to date (no recent transactions)

Yep, completely safe.

I assume the steps are:

1. Install a bitcoin client on the other PC (was thinking of MultiBit so as to eliminate block chain syncing)
2. Locate wallet.dat on the macbook
3. Copy wallet.dat to a usb drive
4. find the wallet.dat on the PC, rename it, and drop in the wallet.dat from the macbook.

Is that correct?

That's correct if you're going Bitcoin-Qt to Bitcoin-Qt. If you want to switch to a different client, you can either export your private keys from Bitcoin-Qt and import them into the other client, or send your Bitcoins from Bitcoin-Qt to an address generated by the new client.