Topic: How to create a Bitcoin-QT wallet paper backup? (Read 1222 times)

It would probably be easier to just load up bitaddress on an airgaped computer and print of a few paper wallets, and if you wanted you could import the priv key to your desktop client, which i wouldnt do personally but that is up to you.

You will need to use dumpprivkey for every single address that you have ever used. That command only returns the private key for one address, so it does not apply to any other address in your wallet.

If you are using a wallet made in Bitcoin Core 0.13.0, you can use dumpwallet and open the output file and get the master private key. Since Bitcoin Core 0.13.0 uses deterministic wallets, all you will need is the master private key.

For importprivkey, you will want to do importprivkey "" false. This will import your key into the default account (well hopefully accounting will be removed by the time you import so this won't matter) and it will not rescan. The very last key you import you will want to set that false to true so that it rescans the blockchain.

It depends. If you are using a wallet created in Bitcoin Core 0.13.0+, with the master private key, it doesn't matter. You can still send and receive.

However, if you use a wallet created in an older version, it does. This is because when you send and receive you are constantly generating new addresses. If you receive Bitcoin, you should be giving the sender a new address. If you are sending, you will produce change which will go to a new address. These new addresses is randomly generated so you won't have a backup of them.

Hey,
I do not fully understand how to create a paper wallet backup despite reading several FAQs and forum threads on the subject.

My setup:
I have a Bitcoin-Qt wallet with Bitcoins in it running on a Windows computer of mine.
I have several USB-backups stored elsewhere as well as a strong wallet password configured in Bitcoin-QT.

What I want to achieve:
A lot of numbers (no QR-code) on a paper that I store safely and if my computer and my backups are both destroyed I could start over completely and access all my Bitcoins with the long line of numbers I have stored on a paper.

So, FAqs and forum threads tells me to do the following actions as a "backup of wallet to paper" procedure:
1. launch your bitcoin client as usual and wait for it to load the blockchain and start up
2. click on 'help' in the menu bar (top right)
3. click on 'debug window'
4. select the 'console' tab
5. type: walletpassphrase "your walletpassphrase here" 600
6. type: dumpprivkey [your public key here]
this will return the private key, you can copy it now; ensure you clear your clipboard/history afterwards
7. type: walletlock

My questions:

A.
For action number 6, I am told to enter "listaddressgroupings" to get a list of my public adress. Doing so will give me a long list of all addresses I have previously used for transactions. Am I correct in assuming that using any of these addresses (and only that one) in action number 6 will give me the private key I need to have a paper wallet (and reach my goal of what I want to achieve (mentioned at the top of this text) ? Or do I need to repeat action 6 for every Bitcoin address I have received Bitcoins to (even if all Bitcoins are in the same Bitcoin-QT wallet) ?

B.
What is the corresponding actions that I need to take to "start over" if my computer and all USB-backups are destroyed? This is my guess:
- Download and install Bitcoin-QT to a new computer
- Action 1-5 above
- importprivkey [my private key from my paper wallet]        (any parameters?)
- Anything else?

C.
Someone wrote that if I do a "backup of wallet to paper" procedure of my Bitcoin-QT wallet (action 1-7 above) the paper wallet becomes useless if any transactions are sent/received from my Bitcoin-QT wallet? How can that be?
Even if I continue send and receive transactions from/to my Bitcoin-QT wallet should not the paper wallet work just as fine if I need to start over (as described in question "B" above)?

It feels like I have misunderstand some part of the concept but I'm not sure what exactly.....
Cheers!