How long does a nano ledger s last?

[jerry0]

Doe anyone know how long it last?  For example doesn't the battery wear out after x amount of years?  Has anyone's nano ledger s malfunctioned and reset itself when connected to their laptop?  Has anyone's nano ledger s malfunctioned and reset itself just like that?  I'm curious who here has a ledger s the longest.  I mean is it going to last a long time assuming you don't damage it?  Also is it fine if you keep it like a usb stick and just put it in a bag or you have to protect it by putting it in the nano ledger s box if say you are bringing it with you?  Because its like a keychain so i assume it doesn't need much protection?  Like even if it drops on floor, its fine?


I know if you have the private key, then you are fine if something happens to your ledger s.  But obviously having the device is pretty important.  


But say if you lost the private key or cannot find it, the first thing you should do is immediately transfer the btc from your nano ledger s to say an electrum wallet?  Like say you cannot find the seed or think its compromised.  What is the first thing you should do assuming your nano ledger s works and you have it.  Because you cannot transfer it to another nano ledger s wallet since you have to reset it right?  So you basically need like electrum or coinbase? 


Another thing i want to ask is this.  When you connect the nano ledger s to a usb port on your laptop or computer, how do you pull it out where you don't damage it or the usb port?  Do you first close the bitcoin wallet ledger program first and then just pull it out of usb port?  Or you just pull it out of usb port?  Because with usb stick and external hard drive, you are suppose to eject it first to make it safe to pull it out.  But with the nano ledger s, i don't believe there is that option right?  So you basically just pull it out from the usb port?


I ask this because if you keep pulling it out, then aren't you going to increase the chance you damage it etc?  


I would like to know how many people here had to get a replacement nano ledger s and what was the reason?  Obviously if you get it stolen or lost it, well thats a different situation.  I mean like if you damage it, or break it or it just doesn't work anymore.  How common is this?  Because last time when i did an update to the firmware, it frozed and i thought everything was stuck because of that update.  


Would like feedback on this and also any tips on taking care of the nano ledger s.  I assume you could just treat it like a usb stick right?

[RGBKey]

• The ledger nano s does not use a battery. It is powered by the usb port it is connected to.
• As long as you have a backup of your word list, it does not matter if the hardware dies, because you still have control of your coins.
• If you believe your seed has been compromised but you are still in possession of your device, you can just transfer the coins to a different wallet, one you believe is secure. Whether that's an electrum wallet, Bitcoin Core, Coinbase, is all up to you.
• If you believe your seed has been compromised and you do not have your device, or your device was stolen, you can import your seed into another wallet that supports the BIP39 standard. Most people probably would use Electrum for this, but there are of course other alternatives.
• Pulling out the device will not damage it in any way, as it does connect via usb but is not a storage device or similar. You are confusing the ledger nano s with flash media. If a file operation is in progress and a flash drive is disconnected, data corruption can occur. This is why you always eject a flash drive before removing it. However, no such operations occur on the nano s (with the exception of updating the firmware/applications, which you should not disconnect the device during), so you can simply unplug it when you are finished using it.

[jerry0]

Hi there thanks for that information.  But if you are done with it you should not leave the nano ledger s stuck in the usb port then right?  Thus once you are done using it, just pull it out?  And thats exactly what you should do... pull it out from the usb port since its not a flash drive?


Because i wondered was it bad if i just leave it plugged into my laptop all day or just leave it plugged in when not using it.  That is probably bad idea right or it doesn't matter.


I just thought about something else.  So you can put the 24 word seed in electrum if your device doesn't work or gets stolen or malfunction to get your bitcoin.  Now what if you have other coins like bitcoin cash, litecoin, or those other type of coins?   Then how would you claim your bitcoin cash?  Which wallet would you have to download if you don't have another nano ledger s?  For litecoin, it would be electrum for litecoin right?  Now what if its all those other type of coins and not the popular ones.  What happens there?  So if you have like other coins, you have to download some other wallets in order to get it?  The thing that is confusing is wouldn't certain coin wallets not have 24 word seeds and have lesser word seeds?   Say you have dash and quantum.  Well electrum isn't going to work for that right?  So if someone has like 10 plus different coins, they going to need to download 10 different plus wallets assuming they cannot get another nano ledger s?

[bob123]

Doe anyone know how long it last?  For example doesn't the battery wear out after x amount of years?  

The lifespan (on average) would be 10.000 to 100.000 (write-)cycles.

But if you are done with it you should not leave the nano ledger s stuck in the usb port then right?  Thus once you are done using it, just pull it out?  And thats exactly what you should do... pull it out from the usb port since its not a flash drive?
Because i wondered was it bad if i just leave it plugged into my laptop all day or just leave it plugged in when not using it.  That is probably bad idea right or it doesn't matter.

Well.. there is no reason to let it plugged in.
You theoretically expose yourself a higher risk when having it plugged in all the time (e.g. new vulnerability gets found, better to have it not connected in this case).

But practically, it probably won't make any difference. But why risking?

I just thought about something else.  So you can put the 24 word seed in electrum if your device doesn't work or gets stolen or malfunction to get your bitcoin.  Now what if you have other coins like bitcoin cash, litecoin, or those other type of coins?   Then how would you claim your bitcoin cash?  Which wallet would you have to download if you don't have another nano ledger s?  For litecoin, it would be electrum for litecoin right?  Now what if its all those other type of coins and not the popular ones.  What happens there?  So if you have like other coins, you have to download some other wallets in order to get it?  The thing that is confusing is wouldn't certain coin wallets not have 24 word seeds and have lesser word seeds?   Say you have dash and quantum.  Well electrum isn't going to work for that right?  So if someone has like 10 plus different coins, they going to need to download 10 different plus wallets assuming they cannot get another nano ledger s?

You can use your seed to generate all the private keys.
There has been an 'agreement' on how to derive keys from a seed.

So, regarding coins which don't have a wallet that accepts mnemonic seeds, you can just use a tool to derive the private keys you need, which then can be imported in any wallet.

And yes, if they hold 10 coins.. and prevoiusly used one wallet for those 10 coins (e.g. nano s), they have to use 1 wallet per coin (assuming one wants to use official wallets).
But there are also wallets which accept 100+ coins (e.g. mobile wallet: coinomi [1] - desktop wallet: exodus).


[1] https://coinomi.com/
[2] https://www.exodus.io/

[hugeblack]

It is better  to know how a nano ledger s works to get clear answers to all the questions in your mind:
When the device is turned on for the first time, it’ll generate aforementioned 256-bit seed [Read this for more information’s https://github.com/bitcoin/bips] "You must type these words and save them in a safe place" then you will enter a PIN to access your cryptocurrencies if you have this device or your 24-words seed if you lost your PIN/device.
Read:
IMPORT YOUR LEDGER BACKUP IN ANOTHER WALLET
How Do Hardware Wallets like the Ledger Nano S Work?

[DigitalFox]

Reliability of ledger nano is my first concern, that's why I haven't bought it yet. So far there are no solid reviews on how the divice works after a year or two, fault reports etc.

[European Central Bank]

the place to keep up on how things pan out for owners is the r/ledgerwallet reddit sub.

ledgers seem to arrive dead or are fine and continue being fine. from the occasional report it seems the buttons can fail. other than that there's not much to go wrong. i've only read a couple of instances where the screen died.

one thing i read which i haven't quite understood is that the secure element has a finite number of transactions it can sign. i don't know if that means at once or it has an overall lifetime limit and can't do anything beyond that.

But say if you lost the private key or cannot find it, the first thing you should do is immediately transfer the btc from your nano ledger s to say an electrum wallet?  Like say you cannot find the seed or think its compromised.  What is the first thing you should do assuming your nano ledger s works and you have it.  Because you cannot transfer it to another nano ledger s wallet since you have to reset it right?  So you basically need like electrum or coinbase?

you mean seed? if it's unencrypted and you don't know where it is then you have to move your coins to a new account immediately.

if somebody else has your nano they have three guesses at the pin before it wipes itself.