Topic: Cheap, reliable computer to use for cold storage? (Read 1896 times)

Cheap Acer netbook does the trick for shure

Just use one without wireless module, it will not connect to internet unless you plug the wire.

Exactly.
For the detailed installing requirements and steps, you can refer to https://bitcoinarmory.com/about/using-our-wallet/

You only need to have the blockchain on the online PC with Armory, the offline PC only holds your wallet.

'Cause somebody talked about armory.

Almost any netbook would do the job.

I would just use a usb portable harddrive to store my wallet in, only reconnect it to the blockchain if any important updates or forks are happening.. else just keep sending my savings into the address of that wallet and one day sync it up and see the balance increase now and then.

What is insecure about a USB? Obviously you shouldn't be backing up to a single USB drive (or a single piece of any media for that matter), but it's plenty secure for bitcoins.

I would buy a new computer from a brand with no complaims about lots of failures(for example, HP is out of the list). You can buy the cheapest one you can find without problems.

I don't trust used computers for your purpose because you can never be sure what the previous owner did to the computer

Buy an old used netbook from ebay, format it and install ubuntu, simple as that.

I put that in bold I forgot to mention that point.  Have a second copy and make sure it works. 

If not you could lose it forever.  Both USB thumb drives and regular drives can go bad. 

Don't leave it in the open a safe spot/safe is a great thing.  Some good examples of hidden usb drives: http://www.instructables.com/howto/hidden+usb/ 

Get a cheap notebook. Depending on your level of paranoia you might want to buy it off the shelf from a local store as technically an attacker could modify the hardware to do nasty things like steal your private keys. I picked up a really sweet notebook brand new for $200.

Open it up and remove the Wifi and bluetooth, simply disabling them in the OS or BIOS does nothing as malware can easily re-enable them, they need to be physically disabled or removed.

When you initially set it up add all the GPG keys you need so you can verify all the software you are installing hasn't been modified. Use USB sticks to transfer data back and forth. Do NOT execute any code at all that hasn't been GPG signed by a key that you trust. If you are running linux you can use apt-offline to do updates on your offline machine, although you should only install updates if you absolutely need to.

You may also want to set up your OS to ignore any devices other than USB sticks to prevent against your USB stick being reflashed with malware. Use the smallest USB stick you can buy to limit the amount of data that could be exfiltrated.

Also if you are using a custom OS like raspbian be careful, the RNG could have a bug in it. the Linux RNG uses information from your mouse, keyboard, hard drive and network to generate random numbers so depending on your setup it may not be as good especially if you are buying something ultra portable. On top of that the way the RNG works can vary depending on your distribution, freeBSD does not use any real-world source for entropy for example which could be devastating if a bug was ever found in Yarrow.

You might want to use real-world entropy to generate your wallet seed or private keys yourself, by flipping coins or using a deck of cards for example. There are threads on this forum with more information on how to do that. It will mitigate much of the risk associated with RNG's.

Raspberry Pi is cheapest option in most cases.  If you do use a old laptop just because I'm paranoid if it's your cold storage I would reinstall windows and add virus protection, etc. Then have it dedicated to just cold storage.

Why do you need 64GB? You only need to store the wallet file (private keys) in your Ras Pi.

Raspberry Pi with 64GB sd card?

A cheap notebook or even an old laptop that is still working and running linux will work for cold storage. You can purchase notebooks now fairly cheap if that is all you are looking to do with the notebook which would be ideal, ensure to shop around though for the cheapest places or even look into people who are selling for themselves.

Instead of wring down the private key, it is IMO better to print it out.
Also, you can encrypt your paper wallet with BIP38.

USB is not secure at all. Writing to paper is ok (assuming you do not make errors).

Cold storage is not really a cause for headaches its simply requires a USB or just write your info on your diary.

An old laptop can do the work, it just have to run Linux on it.