Bitcoin Core client extremely slow and unresponsive when synchronizing

MtRev

sr. member

Activity: 448

Merit: 250

Quote from: rubikus on June 11, 2017, 11:43:49 AM

Is there also a way to fix the original problem and use Bitcoin Core?
Or do you all use Electrum or some other light wallet?

I couldn't take it anymore. I downloaded the blockchain via torrent, waiting forever for it to index. Everything was good after.. . so I thought. After 4 days of not loading up the wallet, it took over 24 hours to resync! I gave in and moved all my coins to Electrum. Even that took forever

MtRev

sr. member

Activity: 448

Merit: 250

Thank you all for the keeping me informed and helping me get my wallet back in order.

I end up downloading a torrent for the blockchain and all is working again. I now moved everything to Electrum (and I now have a better understanding about HD wallets. thanks!)

HCP

legendary

Activity: 2086

Merit: 4361

I read on another thread that increasing the "dbcache" via the .conf file or commandline arguments can help with performance issues... syncing the blockchain does indeed take a while, it isn't just a matter of downloading 120gigs and you're done... The client has to verify every block which is what usually causes the bottleneck with the CPU etc...

Increasing the dbcache if you have enough RAM can help by reducing the amount of memory swapping while processing everything. Not necessarily a "magic Bullet" but it seemed to help speed things up a little.

rubikus

newbie

Activity: 2

Merit: 0

Is there also a way to fix the original problem and use Bitcoin Core?
Or do you all use Electrum or some other light wallet?

HCP

legendary

Activity: 2086

Merit: 4361

Ahhh yes... sorry, I forgot to mentiom to make sure you have dumped the privkeys for your "change addresses". Sad

If you want a shortcut to identify all the addresses in your wallet that contain coins, you can use "listunspent" in the debug console in Bitcoin Core. Make sure you have run dumpprivkey for each address listed as containing a UTXO.

Import those to Electrum and the balance should match up Wink

You can also see all the UTXOs if you turn on "Coin Control"... "Settings -> Options -> Wallet -> Enable Coin Control Features"... then if you goto send and click "inputs" you'll get a list of UTXOs... Change addresses will most likely be listed as "(change)"

HI-TEC99

legendary

Activity: 2772

Merit: 2846

Quote from: MtRev on June 10, 2017, 02:59:41 PM

Bitcoin address can automatically change? I feel so outdated or just not educated enough about this. This is all new to me

That feature's fairly new, it's called a hierarchical deterministic (HD) wallet. Last summer the core dev team merged HD wallet support into core's code. Instead of your wallet generating random addresses it generates a random 128 bit value and uses that to calculate 12 words. The 12 words are called your wallet's seed phrase, and you can use them to restore all the addresses your wallet will ever generate.

Your wallet can generate an almost limitless number of addresses from its seed phrase. Each time you send coins from an address it sends what's left over to a new address to store the change in. Not reusing addresses enhances your wallet's privacy. It makes it harder to figure out which addresses belong to the same wallet.

This is the announcement of the new feature on bitcoin.com.

https://news.bitcoin.com/hd-wallet-support-finally-coming-bitcoin-core/

Quote

HD wallets are an important use-case for the bitcoin ecosystem. This is because deterministic wallets don’t reuse bitcoin addresses, which helps with user privacy.

There's an explanation of HD wallets here.

https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Deterministic_wallet

MtRev

sr. member

Activity: 448

Merit: 250

Bitcoin address can automatically change? I feel so outdated or just not educated enough about this. This is all new to me

ranochigo

legendary

Activity: 3038

Merit: 4418

Crypto Swap Exchange

Quote from: MtRev on June 10, 2017, 06:46:18 AM

Okay, great! I followed your instructions and was able to load it on to electrum.

I do see my past history from back in 2014, but my balance remains zero.
Does it need time to update?

It's probably updated. I have a hunch that your Bitcoins may have been in one of the change addresses. Go to Bitcoin Core, Debug Window>Console and then type "listaddressgroupings". This should show you all your Bitcoin Addresses within the wallet, including the change address. Key in each one into Blockexplorer.com and import/sweep those with balance into Electrum.

HI-TEC99

legendary

Activity: 2772

Merit: 2846

Quote from: MtRev on June 10, 2017, 06:46:18 AM

Okay, great! I followed your instructions and was able to load it on to electrum.

I do see my past history from back in 2014, but my balance remains zero.
Does it need time to update?

Search for the addresses you think should contain coins at this block explorer website If both your wallet and that site says an address is empty then it's probably empty.

https://blockchain.info/

If you use that site to search for every address that shows in your Bitcoin Core client you might find one that contains coins. Maybe you forgot which addresses you sent coins to after all this time.

bnhjui

newbie

Activity: 20

Merit: 0

you can download blockchain and add it to you wallet. you can get it here https://blockchaindownload.nl/ or somewhere else and there is a tutorial how to do it: https://blockchaindownload.nl/en/how_it_works

HCP

legendary

Activity: 2086

Merit: 4361

If the icon in the bottom right corner is a green dot, it is synced. if it is a couple of blue arrows, it is still syncing...

The syncing process is generally relatively quick, however it will be somewhat dependent on your internet connection. Having said that, i've not had it take more than a fewminutes to fully catch up a whole wallet after a restore.

Mind you, my history is only a year old... so if you have things going back to 2014 it could take a little longer Wink

MtRev

sr. member

Activity: 448

Merit: 250

Okay, great! I followed your instructions and was able to load it on to electrum.

I do see my past history from back in 2014, but my balance remains zero.
Does it need time to update?

HCP

legendary

Activity: 2086

Merit: 4361

you need to unlock the wallet first...

Code:

walletpassphrase "passphrase" timeout

Quote

walletpassphrase "passphrase" timeout

Stores the wallet decryption key in memory for 'timeout' seconds.
This is needed prior to performing transactions related to private keys such as sending bitcoins

Arguments:
1. "passphrase" (string, required) The wallet passphrase
2. timeout (numeric, required) The time to keep the decryption key in seconds.

Note:
Issuing the walletpassphrase command while the wallet is already unlocked will set a new unlock
time that overrides the old one.

Examples:

unlock the wallet for 60 seconds
> walletpassphrase "my pass phrase" 60

MtRev

sr. member

Activity: 448

Merit: 250

I'm getting an error message:
"Error: Please enter the wallet passphrase with walletpassphrase first. (code -13)"

I guess it's because I have a password attached to it, but I'm not sure how to work the comment now.

I tired:

PASSWORD dumpprivkey ADDRESS
dumpprivkey PASSWORD ADDRESS
dumpprivkey ADDRESS PASSWORD

They didn't work. I tired just the PASSWORD with nothing else, but that didn't work either. Any idea how do to do this, if I have a password attached?

HCP

legendary

Activity: 2086

Merit: 4361

I believe wallet.dat is used only by Bitcoin QT/Core isn't it?

Having said that, you should be able to dumpprivkey (or dumpwallet?) and then simply import the private keys into a "light" wallet like Electrum. You don't need your wallet to be synced to be able to do this... You might be better off "disabling the network activity" by clicking the network icon in the bottom right corner... that should stop the app from being slow and unresponsive while you try to extract the keys.

HI-TEC99

legendary

Activity: 2772

Merit: 2846

Quote from: MtRev on June 10, 2017, 02:05:49 AM

Thanks for the fee info. I understand now.

However, I'm still having problems with syncing. Is there a "light" wallet that uses "wallet.dat"?

Not that I'm aware of. However you can install the electrum light wallet, then use the instructions in the quote to export your private keys from your Bitcoin Core client and import them into electrum.

Quote from: HI-TEC99 on May 30, 2017, 04:55:20 PM

Click file, then receiving addresses. Find the address you sent coins to in the window that opens, right click it, and select copy address. Close the addresses window.

Click help, then debug window.

In the debug window that opens click console.

In the text box at the bottom of the window type

dumpprivkey yourAddress

where yourAddress is the address you sent coins to and copied earlier.

Press your enter key.

The private key for that address should appear in the console window. Copy it.

This is an example private key.

L48toSntMVhC2az4KAQCWscrQGfPbT55yCgzM5cmx9Ao69pTdwrq

Download and install electrum.

https://electrum.org/#download

Import your private key into it using these instructions.

http://docs.electrum.org/en/latest/faq.html#can-i-import-private-keys-from-other-bitcoin-clients

Afterwards your coins should be spendable.

MtRev

sr. member

Activity: 448

Merit: 250

Thanks for the fee info. I understand now.

However, I'm still having problems with syncing. Is there a "light" wallet that uses "wallet.dat"?

crazyjack

legendary

Activity: 1315

Merit: 1002

Quote from: MtRev on June 10, 2017, 01:48:01 AM

What's wrong with having a low transaction fee? Isn't this a good thing?

Well if you transaction fee is set to low you will have to wait for a very long time for miners to confirm your transaction. Please check below stated link for recommended transaction fee that will speed up your transaction.

https://bitcoinfees.21.co/

This is taken form above site.

Quote

The fastest and cheapest transaction fee is currently 390 satoshis/byte, shown in green at the top.

BlindMayorBitcorn

legendary

Activity: 1260

Merit: 1116

Quote from: MtRev on June 10, 2017, 01:48:01 AM

I actually have Electrum installed, but found out it doesn't support wallet.dat

I do have a balance in my old wallet, but having issues syncing.

What's wrong with having a low transaction fee? Isn't this a good thing?

Well, not if you want someone to include your transaction in the next block it isn't. The highest you can set it at is .0005 BTC per KB. If that's cool with you, then it's a decent wallet.

MtRev

sr. member

Activity: 448

Merit: 250

I actually have Electrum installed, but found out it doesn't support wallet.dat

I do have a balance in my old wallet, but having issues syncing.

What's wrong with having a low transaction fee? Isn't this a good thing?

Topic: Bitcoin Core client extremely slow and unresponsive when synchronizing (Read 3254 times)