Electrum Wallet Problem

[scallywag007]

I recently decided to refresh my Windows 10 system, which basically saves all files but removes some programs.

One of the programs which was removed was Electrum.

After the refresh, I reinstalled Electrum. According to their documentation section on their site, this is what should be done to gain access to my wallet: "To restore your wallet from its seed phrase, create a new wallet, select the type, choose “I already have a seed” and proceed to input your seed phrase."

I did this, but when I entered the seed phrase, the 'next' button was greyed out, so I couldn't proceed to the next stage.

I had a backup of Electrum on an external hard drive, so I copied the Electrum folder and replaced the one on my PC with this, but it still didn't work.

The seed phrase I used was definitely correct.

Can anyone help solve this problem, please? Any help will be appreciated.

[odolvlobo]

Perhaps your seed is a BIP-39 seed. Did you try that option?

[BitMaxz]

Check the image below to find the bip39 option when restoring seed phrase in electrum.



Also, you can recover your wallet by importing back your wallet.dat since you just refresh your win10 OS and all files are saved all in your PC then you can get the old wallet.dat in your pc which you can use to restore your old wallet.

Check this folder in your PC C:\Users\admin\AppData\Roaming\Electrum and open the wallet folder and check if your old wallet still there.

[bob123]

I recently decided to refresh my Windows 10 system, which basically saves all files but removes some programs.

What do you mean with 'refresh' ?
Windows shouldn't delete any files/programs (programs are composed of files).

One of the programs which was removed was Electrum.

Did you ever backup your wallet file ?

I did this, but when I entered the seed phrase, the 'next' button was greyed out, so I couldn't proceed to the next stage.
The seed phrase I used was definitely correct.

Where did you generate this seed?
If you have generated it in another wallet it most probably is a BIP39 seed (Check the BIP39-button when entering the seed).

I had a backup of Electrum on an external hard drive, so I copied the Electrum folder and replaced the one on my PC with this, but it still didn't work.

Try to use the newest version of electrum and move the wallet file of your external drive into the electrum directory.
But make sure to rename the wallet file inside the directory (default name: default_wallet) so it won't get overwritten (just in case).

[pooya87]

take a closer look at the words you are typing in that box, a mistake can mean an invalid seed. for example if you type in "advise" instead of "advice" it would be invalid.
you can see the list of 2048 words that Electrum uses here: https://github.com/spesmilo/electrum/blob/master/lib/wordlist/english.txt
try verifying that you are typing the correct words using it.

~ importing back your wallet.dat ~

on a different note:
why do people call it "....dat" the wallet file for Electrum hadn't have an extension for a very long time. it is just a file without extension by default called "default_wallet" and if it were to have an extension it should have ".JSON" since it is a JSON file.

[Rayser]

From where you created this seed?

[Wipro]

After installation has been over you can find the prompt window to login to your wallet with the parity seed you have used on electrum wallet. If you done that correct. There you would not be get any problem to logging in to your wallet mate.

Else as Bitmaxz shows you on image you can check the BIP39 Seed checkbox and try to log into wallet mate. It will be working succesfully after final version has been released.

[Abdussamad]

I wrote this for people in your situation. See if it helps.

[HCP]

I recently decided to refresh my Windows 10 system, which basically saves all files but removes some programs.

What do you mean with 'refresh' ?
Windows shouldn't delete any files/programs (programs are composed of files).

Unfortunately... Microsoft's definition of "does not delete your data" is a bit different to reality. Don't ask me how I know this 

Doing the "refresh" in Windows 10 will in fact delete everything in your %AppData% directory which is where the wallet files for Electrum are stored by default. What it doesn't remove is the files in your "C:\Users\<USERNAME>" directory... ie. Downloads, Documents, Pictures, Music, Videos etc

[pooya87]

I recently decided to refresh my Windows 10 system, which basically saves all files but removes some programs.

What do you mean with 'refresh' ?
Windows shouldn't delete any files/programs (programs are composed of files).

Unfortunately... Microsoft's definition of "does not delete your data" is a bit different to reality. Don't ask me how I know this 

Doing the "refresh" in Windows 10 will in fact delete everything in your %AppData% directory which is where the wallet files for Electrum are stored by default. What it doesn't remove is the files in your "C:\Users\<USERNAME>" directory... ie. Downloads, Documents, Pictures, Music, Videos etc

there are different types of "resetting" or "refreshing" options in Windows 10 for doing this. one of them is to remove everything and return Win10 to its original state. that option (which i believe you chose) is the one that removes every installed program and its data/files from your disk.
you see under windows we have different "special folders"[1] and each of them are supposed to be a place for specific files. ApplicationData (which Electrum uses) is a place to put Application Data! and when you are removing everything, it removes Applications and their Data. it doesn't know you are storing your wallet files there also, it doesn't care. it just knows it should remove things in that folder.
it is not a big problem in my opinion but the fix is also simple, the /wallet/ directory can simply be switched to MyDocuments folder. you can also always choose another resetting option that is not so invasive.

[1] https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.environment.specialfolder.aspx

[bob123]

Doing the "refresh" in Windows 10 will in fact delete everything in your %AppData% directory...

...there are different types of "resetting" or "refreshing" options in Windows 10 for doing this.

What exactly are you talking about when saying 'refreshing' windows ?
The only option i can find in my settings is the 'reset'-option.

When resetting, windows does indeed ask whether to keep or remove files. It makes sense that in this case the AppData folder does get deleted.

I had a backup of Electrum on an external hard drive, so I copied the Electrum folder and replaced the one on my PC with this, but it still didn't work.

Why doesn't your backup work? Do you get any error message?
Or does it create an 'empty' wallet ?

[nc50lc]

I had a backup of Electrum on an external hard drive, so I copied the Electrum folder and replaced the one on my PC with this, but it still didn't work.

Why doesn't your backup work? Do you get any error message?
Or does it create an 'empty' wallet ?

Most likely, he has a backup of the "Electrum Folder" not the Electrum appdata folder.
@OP, what are the contents of your electrum backup?
cache, certs, forks and wallet folders together with 4 differently named files?

[HCP]

What exactly are you talking about when saying 'refreshing' windows ?
The only option i can find in my settings is the 'reset'-option.

When resetting, windows does indeed ask whether to keep or remove files. It makes sense that in this case the AppData folder does get deleted.

For the removal of all doubt... I'm talking about this:



This gives you two options, selecting the highlighted one deletes %AppData%:

there are different types of "resetting" or "refreshing" options in Windows 10 for doing this. one of them is to remove everything and return Win10 to its original state. that option (which i believe you chose) is the one that removes every installed program and its data/files from your disk.

Nope. I chose the one highlighted in red above... "Remove apps and settings, but keeps your personal files". Apparently, "Settings" == %AppData%... Somewhat foolishly, I believed that choosing this option meant that it was going to remove the "Program Files", "Program Files (x86), "ProgramData" and tidy up the Registry. As it turns out, it does that... and more

[pooya87]

Doing the "refresh" in Windows 10 will in fact delete everything in your %AppData% directory...

...there are different types of "resetting" or "refreshing" options in Windows 10 for doing this.

What exactly are you talking about when saying 'refreshing' windows ?
The only option i can find in my settings is the 'reset'-option.

true, the option is called "reset" as it should but the act is usually referred to as both "reset" and "refresh"
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/17085/windows-8-restore-refresh-reset-pc
https://www.onmsft.com/news/windows-10-reset-refresh-windows-10-installation-better-performance

Nope. I chose the one highlighted in red above... "Remove apps and settings, but keeps your personal files". Apparently, "Settings" == %AppData%... Somewhat foolishly, I believed that choosing this option meant that it was going to remove the "Program Files", "Program Files (x86), "ProgramData" and tidy up the Registry. As it turns out, it does that... and more

well i am not using Windows 10, everything i said is based on things i have read when i wanted to know where to store my application data using special folders. and from what i understand the applications do not store user data in %AppData%. for instance Visual studio that i have installed has a folder there:
AppData/Local: for general program settings that remains on the machine
AppData/Roaming: for general program settings for roaming user
when removing it, both these places will be removed. then there is my documents which it stores everything  that the user created: code snippets, projects, backups,... these  won't be removed.

https://superuser.com/a/1097399

[prissyme67]

im having the same problem , but my computer crashed and it wiped out everything , But I saved the seed phrase , But when I try to use it Is greyed out , now its a watch only wallet , any chance this can be fixed ?

[HCP]

im having the same problem , but my computer crashed and it wiped out everything , But I saved the seed phrase , But when I try to use it Is greyed out , now its a watch only wallet , any chance this can be fixed ?

If the next button is greyed out on the seed entry screen then it is likely one of 3 things:

1. You have entered the seed mnemonic incorrectly (ie. you typed a word incorrectly)
2. You typed it in OK, but you wrote the seed mnemonic down incorrectly when you first saved it (ie. misspelled a word)
3. It is not an "Electrum" seed mnemonic and is from another wallet (could be a BIP39 seed mnemonic)

See if all the words in your seed are in this list: https://github.com/bitcoin/bips/blob/master/bip-0039/english.txt

If they aren't, then there is a good probably that you wrote it down wrong. If you originally got the seed from a different wallet, you need to click the "Options" button on the seed mnemonic entry screen and then tick the "BIP39" option.

[scallywag007]

Perhaps your seed is a BIP-39 seed. Did you try that option?

I tried your suggestion, but it took me along another route where it asked for a new password and the old seed phrase and I ended up with a wallet with nothing in it.

[scallywag007]

Thanks to everyone for their suggestions. Sorry for the delay, I thought I'd receive email updates to my post, but I didn't.

I managed to gain access to my coins. This is the route I followed. 1. Tried the BIP-39 seed option, that resulted in getting into my wallet, but nothing was there. 2. Accessed the application data from my backup. 3. Copied the wallet from there and placed it in the wallets folder on my PC and chose to replace the existing folder.

Originally, I copied the whole Electrum folder from my backup and overwrote the one on my PC, but that didn't work.

Regarding Windows 'refresh', I have the latest version of Windows 10, it actually prompted me to consider a refresh. This keeps some programs, but removes quite a lot. Files stay intact. It has improved the running of my PC.

[odolvlobo]

Thanks to everyone for their suggestions. Sorry for the delay, I thought I'd receive email updates to my post, but I didn't.

I managed to gain access to my coins. This is the route I followed. 1. Tried the BIP-39 seed option, that resulted in getting into my wallet, but nothing was there. 2. Accessed the application data from my backup. 3. Copied the wallet from there and placed it in the wallets folder on my PC and chose to replace the existing folder.

Since you were able to recover your wallet, but unable to use your seed to do so, I strongly suggest that you find out why your seed did not work. Electrum can display your seed, so I would would first compare that to what you wrote down. If they match, then I would try to restore your wallet on a different machine.

[Abdussamad]

to display the seed go to wallet menu  > seed. to restore you don't need to use a different machine. you can begin the process on the same machine via file > new/restore, enter a unique name for the new wallet file and then copy on-screen prompts for the rest. to switch wallets use file > recently open or file > open.