Cant Remember all my Password to Wallet.dat UPDATE: Wallet Recovered!!!

[cdog]

Well, as embarrassing as this is, apparently I cant remember the password to one of my wallets. Ive been trying for the past two days with a text editor, writing down all the combinations that I think it could be but ultimately none has worked. The most frustrating part is I feel like I do remember it because Im not going crazy, but its just not working. 100% I know parts of the password so I do believe that recovery should be technically possible with some type of brute force attack.

http://www.walletrecoveryservices.com/ claims he can do it, however when I email him he said he is super busy right now, cant take the case yet and charges 20% of the funds recovered, which in this case is 10BTC or roughly $5,000 USD. Now, Im willing to pay that, as gross as it is, because 40BTC is better than 0 BTC however because 1) he cant even take the case yet and 2) when I tried negotiating a lower rate, he stopped responding to my emails, so for now Im looking to the community for help.

I think this could potentially be very easy, as I know that the prefix and suffix to the password is "XXX" and the words in between do not contain spaces or symbols, are ONLY lowercase letters and numbers and are probably only around 15 characters long, and I have some other good guesses about what they are. Brute force could maybe do this in a matter of days.

What are my options here? Im considering some type of homebrew solution, but my technical knowledge is extremely low as Im not a programmer or coder, just a miner/technology enthusiast. I have a bunch of GPUs! Surely these can help with PW cracking. Ive read this thread obviously: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=85495.0 but it seems a bit beyond my capabilities and Im not on Linux - just win7, and I have NO experience in this field.

If a known, reputable poster here has experience and ability in these types of solutions, please contact me via PM and we can arrange something. I would be sending you part of the wallet, not the whole thing. Im perfectly happy to pay for help, but sadly I dont have as many BTC as a lot of people on here who have been in the game for years, 50BTC is a lot for me, and its very hard for me to replace that amount. Thank you

[1715098780]

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[1715098780]

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[1715098780]

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[deepceleron]

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=85495.msg1768970#msg1768970

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=85495.msg2105150#msg2105150

You will need to have some good information about what the password might have been. Think about all possible things you could have been thinking. Picture where you were when you were typing it in, what else might have made you think of a password. Were you able to decrypt it before (not a typo, truly forgotten). Write down all or any parts.

Then you need to create a word list, using phrases you might have used in different combinations, prefixes and suffixes. Combine them using brute force dictionary generation tools (can be found online).

A good password is not easily cracked. What people commonly type in and reuse can be.

[walletrecoveryservices]

Hi
I'm sorry if I came across as not wanting to work on your wallet decryption. I've been very busy working to improve my software, so that the chances of decrypting your wallet is improved
I was only being honest about my capacity to deliver you a result in the next few days.
But, rest assured, I'm keen to help you. Ping me again, and I'll try to get to it as soon as I can.
Cheers
Dave
walletrecoveryservices.com

[cdog]

Write down all or any parts.

Yeah, thats the annoying part. I have used the wallet to send funds several times. Thats why this is so frustrating.

Thanks for posting Dave, its pretty much anybodys Bounty at this point, so I will ship you the info soon as well and lets see who can find it. I received a few PMs, and a few nice offers of help but please dont hesistate to PM me as the more people hunting, the better the odds! Im confident that it will be recovered through either my brain working properly or brute force, sooner or later. The BTC arent going anywhere.

[Mondy]

Good luck cracking it! hope you find someone.

[Dabs]

It seems Dave will find it before others can, with all that processing power his service can get.

I got some brain drugs you might want to try. hehehehe.. (just kidding) We have a local vitamin mix thing that is branded "Memo Plus Gold" sold in the local pharmacy.

If you can't find it in your area, I can buy it for you and ship it, payable in bitcoin of course.

https://www.google.com/search?q=memo+plus+gold

[dudebit]

I bought some memory enhancing vitamins but keep forgetting to take them. 

[cdog]

  HAPPY ENDING!!! So in preparing a big list of notes and possible password parts for Dave and a few others, I decided to once again go into the 200 password list I created and copy and paste every single one into bitcoin-qt. About 80% of the way through the list, it worked!!!! I had gotten one of my modifiers wrong, I was 99% sure it was "XXX" as a prefix and suffix, but it wasnt. It also is indeed a 22 character password as I had thought, so it was out of the range of pure brute force and I knew my only hope here was myself combined some clever programming (Dave was going to take my notes and take some sniper shots, rather than spray-n-pray). Despite wanting to fall into pits of despair, I kept at it and just kept at it with my notes and phrases and combinations, and eventually it clicked.

Suffice to say I feel like a new man and a huge, HUGE weight has been lifted off my shoulders. Honestly I was getting very negative and depressed about this whole situation, and even though its just money (and not even my rent money, just some extra savings) that I could be so stupid was pretty upsetting. It turns out, the password was INDEED so close that I could taste it, I just had to experiment with various combinations until my brain spat out the right one.

The reason I had forgot it was simple: I dont spend bitcoins everyday, maybe once a month or two. So my new resolve is to spend bitcoins at least once per week. Thanks again everyone for all your help, Im very relieved and ecstatic right now! Definitely going to celebrate, spend some bitcoins, relax, and get back to enjoying life.

[Mondy]

  HAPPY ENDING!!! So in preparing a big list of notes and possible password parts for Dave and a few others, I decided to once again go into the 200 password list I created and copy and paste every single one into bitcoin-qt. About 80% of the way through the list, it worked!!!! I had gotten one of my modifiers wrong, I was 99% sure it was "XXX" as a prefix and suffix, but it wasnt. It also is indeed a 22 character password as I had thought, so it was out of the range of pure brute force and I knew my only hope here was myself combined some clever programming (Dave was going to take my notes and take some sniper shots, rather than spray-n-pray). Despite wanting to fall into pits of despair, I kept at it and just kept at it with my notes and phrases and combinations, and eventually it clicked.

Suffice to say I feel like a new man and a huge, HUGE weight has been lifted off my shoulders. Honestly I was getting very negative and depressed about this whole situation, and even though its just money (and not even my rent money, just some extra savings) that I could be so stupid was pretty upsetting. It turns out, the password was INDEED so close that I could taste it, I just had to experiment with various combinations until my brain spat out the right one.

The reason I had forgot it was simple: I dont spend bitcoins everyday, maybe once a month or two. So my new resolve is to spend bitcoins at least once per week. Thanks again everyone for all your help, Im very relieved and ecstatic right now! Definitely going to celebrate, spend some bitcoins, relax, and get back to enjoying life.

Good on you! enjoy those refound bitcoins!

[Dabs]

You can spend some of those towards me.

I have a donation thread where all coins go towards feeding malnourished children.

Do it often, every week, so you don't forget your password.