Electrum Windows client does not start after update

[robert10243]

Hi,

after having not used Electrum for almost five years, I successfully started the client today. After the synchronization I saw that for my version 3.3.4 an update was available. I downloaded the latest Windows Installer version from https://electrum.org/#download and started the installation. The "old" client was still running while the installation. In the middle of the update an error message was shown (something related to an .dll) and I closed the old client and clicked the "Wiederholen" button. Then the update ran until it showed "Completed".

But now the updated client does not start anymore. Neither clicking on the icon on my desktop nor clicking on the electrum-4.5.4.exe file or on the electrum-3.3.4.exe file in the system folder works.

My computer runs with Windows 10 Home, version 10.019045.

Can you help?

Thank you
Robert

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[mocacinno]

There used to be a problem with dll's on very old versions of windows (i think windows <=7).
Here's the thread: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5390032.0

Maybe you can verify if it's the same dll at least... if it is, you could read that thread and try out some of the sollutions (use your due diligence tough)

Other than that, maybe try to reinstall the latest version? If that doesn't work, install it on a different machine? If that doesn't work, there's alway bluewallet (they should support electrum seed phrases).

AFAIK, using a prebuilt binary on linux windows that is broken makes it rather hard to turn on debug logging... I think you need a terminal for this (on linux, there's a verbose flag).

BTW: are you 100% certain you downloaded the official binary? doublechecked the sigature? Just to make sure you're not running a fake wallet...

[Zaguru12]

The errors with electrum windows version were that of windows 7 as said above which means windows 10 should be ok. But first what you need to check is maybe you have pending updates on the windows 10 if there is then install them and reboot your system again and then try it once again,

if it doesn’t work try to back up the wallet by going to C:\Users\YourUserName\AppData\Roaming\Electrum and back it up separately and then come back and delete everything about the wallet and re install the latest version again and try to restore it

[BitMaxz]

Have you tried to check the task manager and maybe Electrum is stuck and running in the background?
If you find it on the task manager just right-click and choose "end task" and then reinstall Electrum again to fix the issue.

If it does not work maybe the antivirus is blocking Electrum I suggest you to try adding the Electrum to Antivirus> settings >exclusion folder/software. Reboot the PC and try to rerun Electrum.

[robert10243]

First: Thank you very much for your quick reply.

I followed your recommendations and did...

- checked the signature of the download --> the download was ok
- installed two pending Windows updates and restarted my computer --> no improvement
- checked the task manager --> the program does not show up there at all
- read the linked thread about the .dll problem and ran the electrum-4.5.4-debug.exe --> this is the output of the debugging

C:\Program Files (x86)\Electrum>electrum-4.5.4-debug.exe
PyInstaller\loader\pyimod02_importers.py:352: UserWarning: You are using cryptography on a 32-bit Python on a 64-bit Windows Operating System. Cryptography will be significantly faster if you switch to using a 64-bit Python.
  0.64 | E | daemon.Daemon | GUI raised exception: SystemExit("Error: Could not import PyQt5. On Linux systems, you may try 'sudo apt-get install python3-pyqt5'"). shutting down.
  0.64 | E | __main__ | daemon.run_gui errored
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "electrum\gui\qt\__init__.py", line 34, in <module>
ImportError: DLL load failed while importing QtGui: Die angegebene Prozedur wurde nicht gefunden.

The above exception was the direct cause of the following exception:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "electrum\daemon.py", line 620, in run_gui
  File "PyInstaller\loader\pyimod02_importers.py", line 352, in exec_module
  File "electrum\gui\qt\__init__.py", line 37, in <module>
electrum.GuiImportError: Error: Could not import PyQt5. On Linux systems, you may try 'sudo apt-get install python3-pyqt5'

During handling of the above exception, another exception occurred:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "run_electrum", line 458, in handle_cmd
  File "electrum\daemon.py", line 622, in run_gui
SystemExit: Error: Could not import PyQt5. On Linux systems, you may try 'sudo apt-get install python3-pyqt5'

1. Does this output says you anything?
2. If I want to reinstall the client, I have to backup the wallet file first, right?
Otherwise my bitcoins could get lost because the wallet saves everything locally on my machine. The wallet file is saved under C:\Users\<user name>\AppData\Roaming\Electrum\wallets --> Correct?

[NeuroticFish]

I would do something much simpler for start: I would make a test with the portable version. Yes, it's written that's unsafe, but that actually means you should not carry it around on your USB stick and plug it in to any unsafe computer.

So, get the portable version, check it, obviously, and start it in a local folder of your choice. You can create a complete new wallet there for a test or and/or you can restore your own wallet from seed (although please note that handling wallets like that is not safe: if your computer is compromised, your funds will be soon gone).
The portable electrum creates wallet files in one of the subfolders of the folder you've started it from, so it's easy to see which is which (especially after the initial test is over).

And this way you can see if there's anything wrong with your Windows, your wallet or your other Electrum installation.

2. If I want to reinstall the client, I have to backup the wallet file first, right?

Having the seed it most important. Having backup of the wallet file never hurts either. But I would try to recover from seed instead of reusing the wallet file after so many years.

[Stalker22]

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2. If I want to reinstall the client, I have to backup the wallet file first, right?
Otherwise my bitcoins could get lost because the wallet saves everything locally on my machine. The wallet file is saved under C:\Users\<user name>\AppData\Roaming\Electrum\wallets --> Correct?

As NeuroticFish pointed out, having a backup seed phrase is the most important thing. Since you mentioned this is a very old wallet, hopefully you have it saved and stored securely. Backing up (making a copy) of the wallet file doesn't hurt either, and you're correct about its location, provided you didn't manually change it during wallet creation. If you have the backup seed phrase and a backup copy of the wallet file, you can uninstall the Electrum wallet and try a fresh install to see if that helps.

[khaled0111]

The problem you faced maybe because you tried installing the newer version while the older one was still running which may have caused some conflict!
What I would do is to make a copy of the wallet file and export its seed and right it fown on a piece of paper, for extra security. Then I would completely uninstall the old version then download the latest one and install it.
The dll isuue is only for windows 7 so it shouldn't be a problem in your case.

[robert10243]

Uninstalling and reinstalling worked. Sometimes it is that easy. Thank you very much for your very helpful and quick support.  

[Pmalek]

Even if you uninstall Electrum from your computer, it's not going to remove the wallet files found under \AppData\Roaming\Electrum\wallets. They will remain where they are.

Your issue has been solved, but do you mind if I asked you what kind of backups you have for this wallet and any other for that matter? I am not asking you to tell me I keep one seed at my place, the other two at my sister's and parent's house, I am just checking if you have backups of your seed words and how you did that? Or do you perhaps only keep copies of your wallet files?