old electrum.dat cant open on newer version

[J1800]

i have an old electrum.dat and newer versions will not run, and i dont know what old versions will open it. I found some page which says they are upgraded automatically during an update but thats not helpful if i already have the latest version isnt it? nothing to update. how do i convert the electrum.dat into a modern wallet file manually? or what version of electrum will open this for me?

[Pmalek]

Electrum doesn't use .dat files. Bitcoin core does. Are you sure you aren't trying to restore a Bitcoin Core .dat file in Electrum? If you are, that wont work. Do you have your 12-word recovery phrase? You wont need a wallet file if your have the seed. Just download the newest version of Electrum, verify its signatures, and restore it from your seed phrase.

If you insist on trying an older version, you get those here >https://download.electrum.org/.
But you should know that versions older than 3.3.4 are vulnerable to phishing attacks and it's not recommended to use those. Some versions can't even connect to the servers anymore. 

[ranochigo]

Electrum doesn't use .dat files. Bitcoin core does. Are you sure you aren't trying to restore a Bitcoin Core .dat file in Electrum? If you are, that wont work. Do you have your 12-word recovery phrase? You wont need a wallet file if your have the seed. Just download the newest version of Electrum, verify its signatures, and restore it from your seed phrase.

Electrum used to use .dat format. The wallet file is called electrum.dat and it was changed with version 2.0 which shifted to a newer format.

What error is shown when you try to restore the wallet? Can you try opening it (with any text editor) and see the contents?

[Charles-Tim]

If you backup the seed phrase, then you can import the seed phrase on the new electrum version.

i have an old electrum.dat and newer versions will not run

Likely the wallet file is corrupt. What is the error message?

If having antivirus on your computer, try to first disble it and see if the wallet file will work.

[J1800]

If you backup the seed phrase, then you can import the seed phrase on the new electrum version.

i have an old electrum.dat and newer versions will not run

Likely the wallet file is corrupt. What is the error message?

If having antivirus on your computer, try to first disble it and see if the wallet file will work.

Just says

Cannot load wallet (1):
WalletFileException('Cannot read wallet file. (parsing failed)'

Might be just a watching wallet

There's a "seed" in the plain text but it's just a random code, not a list of words

I'm pretty sure it used to work with old version. I have to try installing something from before 2.0

[nc50lc]

Cannot load wallet (1):
WalletFileException('Cannot read wallet file. (parsing failed)'

Might be just a watching wallet

There's a "seed" in the plain text but it's just a random code, not a list of words

I'm pretty sure it used to work with old version. I have to try installing something from before 2.0

If it's not corrupted, it should work even if it's from versions below 2.0 (with some exceptions like very old versions 0.34 & below)

The error usually occurs when the wallet or some parts are corrupted.
Try to reassemble it in this format (create an 'electrum.dat' file and edit it using a text editor):

Code:

{'addr_history': {}, 'master_public_key': 'PASTE_YOUR_MASTER_PUBLIC_KEY', 'auto_cycle': True, 'server': '', 'blockchain_headers_path': '', 'seed': 'PASTE_YOUR_SEED', 'accounts': {}, 'proxy': None, 'seed_version': 4, 'column_widths': {}}

If it's encrypted (seed is longer base64 string), use this format:

Code:

{'addr_history': {}, 'master_public_key': 'PASTE_YOUR_MASTER_PUBLIC_KEY', 'auto_cycle': True, 'use_encryption': True, 'server': '', 'blockchain_headers_path': '', 'seed': 'PASTE_YOUR_BASE64_Encrypted_SEED', 'accounts': {}, 'proxy': None, 'imported_keys': {}, 'seed_version': 4, 'column_widths': {}}