[overview] Recover Bitcoin from any old storage format

[Asclepius34]

It depends on how much of the private key is revealed, it's not the same if the first few characters and half of the key are revealed. After all, why would someone have a large sum of BTC on paper wallet without backup or copies. It's just user's irresponsibility.

[Recover-(Y)]

Because back then it was interesting and didn’t cost as much as it does now, some people simply mined it for nothing and deleted their wallets

[Asclepius34]

I get your point about back then, but people who use paper wallet over software knows benefits of using paper wallets. It's like buying the most secure door lock and still leaving it unlocked when leaving your house. Still, doesn't make any sense to not have copies or backup of your BTC paper wallets.

[Recover-(Y)]

The paper wallet was created by the software, which at that time offered new opportunities since it had a QR code for quickly managing your balance (account) and at the same time had a digital-letter record, as you might guess, registering a key of 51 characters is not very convenient and practical, and reading QR code was just invented as a quick response technology and took a matter of seconds) something like this
As an ordinary and simple user, not many suspected that long-term storage of such things would entail partial loss of data! Once in 2012, I also did not take Bitcoin seriously and I have an old laptop with the first version of Bitcoin Core where I mined something but I I rewrote Windows and now it’s impossible to restore since I tried everything
Everyone who lost bitcoins has different stories, but the principle is the same

[LoyceV]

New:

Blockchain.info: In some cases, Blockchain.info (now .com) shows a compressed private key while the address was uncompressed. Read this topic.

Thanks to:

There's a chance here that Blockchain messed-up the WIF private key's encoding where it should be without the compressed byte flag.

[bamsterdam]

Hello,

I was wondering if somebody could help me. I have btc core v0.18.1. The blockchain is fully synced. My wallet.dat file is a copy from many years ago. It seems like it has trouble loading and keeps getting stuck at the "rescanning" I tried the wallet something like 1.5 years ago and it was still fine. How long can this rescanning take? Any ideas? Im afraid it wont load and my wallet version is not compatible anymore with the core client I run.

[NotATether]

Hello,

I was wondering if somebody could help me. I have btc core v0.18.1. The blockchain is fully synced. My wallet.dat file is a copy from many years ago. It seems like it has trouble loading and keeps getting stuck at the "rescanning" I tried the wallet something like 1.5 years ago and it was still fine. How long can this rescanning take? Any ideas? Im afraid it wont load and my wallet version is not compatible anymore with the core client I run.

Bitcoin Core wallets don't become "incompatible" with new wallet versions - newer versions automatically upgrade the file so that it is compatible with them. Subsequently, once a wallet is upgraded you can't open it in older version of Core.

Rescanning a wallet takes a few hours usually - longer if your hard disk is bad or old. But the private keys are still there so technically so is access to all your funds. It's just the transactions that it's loading.

[bamsterdam]

Hello,

I was wondering if somebody could help me. I have btc core v0.18.1. The blockchain is fully synced. My wallet.dat file is a copy from many years ago. It seems like it has trouble loading and keeps getting stuck at the "rescanning" I tried the wallet something like 1.5 years ago and it was still fine. How long can this rescanning take? Any ideas? Im afraid it wont load and my wallet version is not compatible anymore with the core client I run.

Bitcoin Core wallets don't become "incompatible" with new wallet versions - newer versions automatically upgrade the file so that it is compatible with them. Subsequently, once a wallet is upgraded you can't open it in older version of Core.

Rescanning a wallet takes a few hours usually - longer if your hard disk is bad or old. But the private keys are still there so technically so is access to all your funds. It's just the transactions that it's loading.

Thank you so much I will give it some more time and if it still doesnt work I will try the newest client and I understand you correctly it should rescan my wallet in the latest version eventually.

[LoyceV]

Thank you so much I will give it some more time and if it still doesnt work I will try the newest client and I understand you correctly it should rescan my wallet in the latest version eventually.

The new version may be a bit faster, but it probably comes down to your disk (especially if it's HDD). Last time I accidentally triggered a rescan it was done the next day. Just be patient, there's a lot of data to check from the past 1.5 years

[LoyceV]

Update:

Coinbase multisig Vault
If you have Coinbase multisig Vault, read this topic, this post and this post.
Cryptolator multisig physical coin
If you have a Cryptolator multisig physical coin, read this post (and the rest of that topic).

[LoyceV]

Bump