Electrum won't recover full balance

[hosemary]

I don't know where they came from because I am sure I didn't generated that many addresses.

Those addresses are all generated from your seed phrase.
Note that electrum generating those addresses doesn't mean you generated them before. You can import any other seed phrase into electrum, and it can derive a very large number of addresses from it.

Locate the last transaction and copy the addres.. goto the console tab and type ;

Code:

wallet.get_address_index("the last txn address you copied ")

That should give you the index as the second value , copy it and extend the gap limit upto the index you copied.

This won't help.
That command gives you the address index, only if it has already been generated by electrum.

Pretty bad; it seems that it is deeper than 100k addresses.

I highly doubt OP generated such a large number of addresses.
If OP increased the gap limit to 10,000, but the address he is looking for still hasn't been generated, the problem is probably something else, and not the gap limit.

I planned to install Bitcoin core on my computer and set up watch only wallet and check addresses directly but it seems that it is unavailable for download:

Don't waste your time with Bitcoin Core. It won't help you.

[ovcijisir]

I figured out what happened in the end. When I generated last batch od deposit addresses I accidently replaced one word with another word of similar meaning. For some reason Electrum still generated wallet (don't have any idea how it passed checksum check?). That way I had two wallets.

The wallet with small amout was incorrectly generated wallet with one wrong word.
Today I got my hands on memory stick with seed backup and re-checked seed words and realised the mistake.

I am sorry guys for causing distress. But this was good learning opportunity for me to use Electrums advanced settings and learn something new. And thank you all for all the help you provided.

[hosemary]

I figured out what happened in the end. When I generated last batch od deposit addresses I accidently replaced one word with another word of similar meaning. For some reason Electrum still generated wallet (don't have any idea how it passed checksum check?). That way I had two wallets.

When you check BIP39, Electrum still generates a wallet even if the seed phrase doesn't pass the checkum. Electrum warns you about the wrong checksum, though.
Either you didn't notice Electrum's warning or your seed phrase still had a correct checksum. Even if you select the words randomly, there's still a 1/16 probability that you end up with a valid BIP39 seed phrase.

[ovcijisir]

I figured out what happened in the end. When I generated last batch od deposit addresses I accidently replaced one word with another word of similar meaning. For some reason Electrum still generated wallet (don't have any idea how it passed checksum check?). That way I had two wallets.

When you check BIP39, Electrum still generates a wallet even if the seed phrase doesn't pass the checkum. Electrum warns you about the wrong checksum, though.
Either you didn't notice Electrum's warning or your seed phrase still had a correct checksum. Even if you select the words randomly, there's still a 1/16 probability that you end up with a valid BIP39 seed phrase.

I haven't noticed any warning and I re-constructed wallet at least 10 times yesterday. I guess I had "luck" to generate wrong wallet with correct checksum. Thanks for explanation, it is good to know that.

To be honest I thought that these protections are more robust. 1 in 6 is pretty realistic chance to get correct checksum.

[hosemary]

I haven't noticed any warning and I re-constructed wallet at least 10 times yesterday. I guess I had "luck" to generate wrong wallet with correct checksum. Thanks for explanation, it is good to know that.

If the seed phrase doesn't pass the checksum, Electrum displays a message saying "BIP39 checksum failed". If Electrum didn't display that message, you are right. You still had a valid BIP39 seed phrase.

To be honest I thought that these protections are more robust. 1 in 6 is pretty realistic chance to get correct checksum.

You misread my previous post.
The probability of having a valid BIP39 seed phrase is 1 in 16, not 1 in 6.

[nc50lc]

To be honest I thought that these protections are more robust. 1 in 6 is pretty realistic chance to get correct checksum.

Although it's not entirely an issue with Electrum since you're using a BIP39 mnemonic.

In comparison, Electrum has higher bit of checksum in a form of "version number", e.g.: 12 Bits for the default SegWit seed phrase (1 / 4096).
Plus it wont generate a valid BIP39 mnemonic to prevent scenarios similar to this.

[BitMaxz]

I figured out what happened in the end. When I generated last batch od deposit addresses I accidently replaced one word with another word of similar meaning. For some reason Electrum still generated wallet (don't have any idea how it passed checksum check?). That way I had two wallets.

Why don't you tell us what word it is exactly? Because I am wondering how it is possible to accidentally replace one word unless you keep one of those words with a similar meaning in your mind.

Remember in BIP39 we only have 2048 words, and most of them actually have synonyms, but the problem is if you keep your seed for years, you can't just easily remember that you changed or accidentally replaced it with other synonyms.

And it's rare to accidentally replace one word since we usually copy and paste the phrase or manually type it from the backup paper. So I'm wondering maybe you keep it in your mind that you replaced one word with another.

[ovcijisir]

I figured out what happened in the end. When I generated last batch od deposit addresses I accidently replaced one word with another word of similar meaning. For some reason Electrum still generated wallet (don't have any idea how it passed checksum check?). That way I had two wallets.

~
And it's rare to accidentally replace one word since we usually copy and paste the phrase or manually type it from the backup paper. So I'm wondering maybe you keep it in your mind that you replaced one word with another.

I tried to remember the seed phrase, as it was complicated for me to get memory stick every time when I wanted to generate new batch of receiving addresses. The memory stick with seed phrase is on remote location, so I have to go there, get the memory stick write seed on paper, go home to run it on Tails, generate receiving addresses, and finally destroy the paper with seed.

I have repeated this proccess two times and didn't want to do it third time as I didn't want to go to remote location again, so I just remembered seed phrase. The problem was that I accidently remembered one word wrong and switched to word with similar meaning (I subsequently checked and this word is not on BIP 39 list but when I typed automatically I didn't gave attention to that). I was 100% sure that I remembered everything right.

That night I was in panic mode as I couldn't recreate right wallet and I didn't have access to memory stick as it was late night.

The next day I decided to double check every step, and when I got memory stick I immediately realised my mistake and noticed that I swapped one word.

Why don't you tell us what word it is exactly? Because I am wondering how it is possible to accidentally replace one word unless you keep one of those words with a similar meaning in your mind.

Sorry but I'm not really comfortable sharing such information about my cold wallet but as I said I switched word with another thst is not on BIP 39 list. Electrum automatically highlights word if it is BIP 39 but I was frustrated just watched the keyboard when I typed the words.  I realised that switched word is not BIP 39 next day when I cooled down a bit.

[promise444c5]

Locate the last transaction and copy the addres.. goto the console tab and type ;

Code:

wallet.get_address_index("the last txn address you copied ")

That should give you the index as the second value , copy it and extend the gap limit upto the index you copied.

This won't help.
That command gives you the address index, only if it has already been generated by electrum.

Yes, you’re right.. tested it properly after your comment (only tested existing addr before )
Thanks for correcting that..

[BitMaxz]

Sorry but I'm not really comfortable sharing such information about my cold wallet but as I said I switched word with another thst is not on BIP 39 list. Electrum automatically highlights word if it is BIP 39 but I was frustrated just watched the keyboard when I typed the words.  I realised that switched word is not BIP 39 next day when I cooled down a bit.

Is sharing one word could compromised the whole wallet? I don't think so; we don't even know in what position this word is placed. It's just one word, but if you don't want to share, that's fine. I just wanted it to ask to know why it is not in the BIP39 and how Electrum accepts that word and turns your seed into BIP39 because I am going to do some experiments to see if it would also work on my seed phrase and place one word because it's rare that Electrum passes its checksum.

[hosemary]

I just wanted it to ask to know why it is not in the BIP39 and how Electrum accepts that word and turns your seed into BIP39 because I am going to do some experiments to see if it would also work on my seed phrase and place one word because it's rare that Electrum passes its checksum.

If you have checked "BIP39", Electrum allows you to generate a wallet even if your input isn't a valid BIP39 seed phrase. It warns you about your input not being a valid seed phrase, though.


Here are all possible cases.

• If you check "BIP39", all your words are in the BIP39 wordlist, and the seed phrase passes the checksum, Electrum won't display any message, and will allow you to generate a wallet.
  
• If you check "BIP39" and you have a word which is not in the BIP39 wordlist, Electrum will display a message saying "Unknown BIP39 wordlist" but still allows you to generate a wallet.
  
• If you check "BIP39", all your words are in the BIP39 wordlist, but your seed pharse doesn't pass the checksum, Electrum will display a message saying "BIP39 checksum failed", but still allows you to generate a wallet.
  
• If you don't check "BIP39" and enter any random words or characters, there's a very very small chance that you end up with a valid Electrum's seed phrase and can still generate a wallet.
  
• If you don't check "BIP39" and your input isn't a valid Electrum's seed phrase, you won't be able to generate a wallet at all.
  

[Cricktor]

In my opinion, OP is playing with fire and I wouldn't be surprised if at some point of time desaster is calling.

I don't consider a memory stick (aka flash memory, sometimes of questionable quality) as a secure and long lasting storage media. It also requires a computer to read from it. If your mnemonic recovery words are on that memory stick you shouldn't touch it with any computer that has been online in the past or will go online in the future. That's quite limiting...

Memorizing recovery words is doable, but not reliable, especially when you don't practice and recall AND check your memory regularly. And because you need a reliable offline storage of your recovery words to verify your memory, you can skip the human memory at all (at least that's my opinion, YMMV).

It's entirely possible that you also have redundant offline non-digital copies of your recovery words which you didn't mention. If so, that's fine. If not, I would highly recommend to reconsider your backup storage scheme.


I didn't much think about what you did with the receiving address generation. I might miss something, but I wonder why you don't let Electrum manage its pool of receiving addresses on its own.

If you only need receiving addresses from your wallet to deposit coins, you would at first only need a watch-only copy of your wallet. When you request a receiving address from Electrum, Electrum will always by default retain a pool of 20 new empty receiving addresses. You can't really run out of those, because Electrum will replenish its pool of addresses automatically.

Are you sure you know and understand what you're doing with your wallet?

If you increase gap limit to absurd numbers, you'll likely only run into trouble, because you force Electrum to monitor a ton of addresses which commonly public Electrum servers don't like that much, because you're demanding unnecessary ressources from them.

Well, good luck in the future...