Recovery Of Bitcoin From Dead Computer

[rastof]

So about 3 months back I ordered $100 in BTC from Coinbase and transfered those coins to a wallet on my desktop. Then for some reason my laptop wouldn't boot into windows anymore. It just shows a black screen. I recently got a macbook, and I've tried hooking the hard drive up to the mac and also another desktop PC but I can navigate into the user profile on the hard because it was password protected. Is there anyway I can get passed this to recover the wallet.dat file? Anything would help I would hate to see this money go to waste.

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[hilariousandco]

You don't remember the password? Have you tried putting the drive in an external enclosure or is that what you did?

[shorena]

Its probably because the filesystem of the old windows (NTFS) is not allowing you access.

You can try this howto http://osxdaily.com/2013/10/02/enable-ntfs-write-support-mac-os-x/

And if that is not helping try using NTFS-3G for Mac OS with MacFUSE.

[BunsenBurner]

Can't offer any advice on recovering files as I have no knowledge on it.

To everyone reading this post, please make a few encrypted backups if you haven't done so.
You never know when your laptop get stolen, your HDD fails, or you spill coffee on your laptop...

[Swordsoffreedom]

It shows how important it is to have backups
I would say that if you can access the harddrive try using linux on it
Think this will work although I can't be absolutely certain best of luck solving this
http://www.wikihow.com/Access-Windows-Files-in-Linux

[MrBig]

You should be able to copy the wallet.dat file from your hard drive onto another drive. My laptop died too, so I popped the hard drive into a new laptop, booted Linux from a live CD, then I copied the wallet onto a USB stick. It didn't matter that I had a password on the Windows user account. Unless if you mean you had a password on your wallet, then you'd have to remember it or you've lost $100 of btc.

[BitcoinTraders]

You should be able to copy the wallet.dat file from your hard drive onto another drive. My laptop died too, so I popped the hard drive into a new laptop, booted Linux from a live CD, then I copied the wallet onto a USB stick. It didn't matter that I had a password on the Windows user account. Unless if you mean you had a password on your wallet, then you'd have to remember it or you've lost $100 of btc.

I think the same!
If you had a password on your wallet you should remember it or you've lost it!

[bitsmichel]

So about 3 months back I ordered $100 in BTC from Coinbase and transfered those coins to a wallet on my desktop. Then for some reason my laptop wouldn't boot into windows anymore. It just shows a black screen. I recently got a macbook, and I've tried hooking the hard drive up to the mac and also another desktop PC but I can navigate into the user profile on the hard because it was password protected. Is there anyway I can get passed this to recover the wallet.dat file? Anything would help I would hate to see this money go to waste.

Yes, you can access your windows harddrive (all your files) using a linux live cd or live usb.  This includes inside your user files.


These are the steps:
1. Get a usb drive (cost about $5 to $10 in a store)
2. Download http://unetbootin.sourceforge.net/  its a program that puts linux on usb
3. Select a distribution. Pick an easy one with graphical interface.  For example,  you could take the Ubuntu iso. Prepare for a short learning curve on the graphics interface, it is a little different from windows

4. Select your usb drive
5. Press ok. The program will now start downloading the linux, after that it will install it to the usb.
6. Restart your PC.
7.  (If you are lucky you can skip this step) Press F12 or F2, you will go into a program called BIOS.  Its a boring text program where you can add boot order
 set to USB boot first.
8.  Select Live CD. Try ubuntu without installing



9. You will then see a screen like this
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-P926BEXnarQ/UlEzEUtwChI/AAAAAAAAiwk/72MltC20ho0/s1600/UEFI_Ubuntu_LiveMedia_Desktop.jpg

press on the file archive. Go to your disk drive. Into C:\Users\Yourname\... (wherever you keep your wallet). Copy it into the usb
10. finished, you have your wallet file on the usb