<p>First of all if you have not done it yet, I would encourage you to make a backup of the wallet.dat file (e.g. copy it a usb stick).</p>

<p>One solution would be to let bitcoin-qt show you the private key for the address for which you received bitcoins back in 2011. Then you could import (actually "sweep") them with Electrum. See the following help:
<a href="https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Transferring_coins_from_Bitcoin-Qt_to_Electrum" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Transferring_coins_from_Bitcoin-Qt_to_Electrum</a> </p>

<p>This should also work with version 0.8.5 and you don't need to wait for bitcoin-qt to have downloaded the blockchain or anything. </p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-11-17T20:07:23.927Z
2016-11-17T20:07:23.927Z
Bjarne Magnussen
<p>I've salvaged my old netbook with Windows XP and have been able to access a couple of Bitcoins that a friend sent me back in 2011 (!) when he was getting into this new cryptocurrency thing. BTC was beyond my skill set then and just out of reach now -- the wallet.dat is running on Bitcoin Qt v. 0.8.5 beta. </p>

<p>The coins have 155140 confirmations but Qt is running 162 weeks behind -- it takes forever to load, and will never catch up to the network on this ancient machine (have kept it running for days now) -- would like to move the BTC somewhere else -- have tried sending a test amount (0.01 BTC) to a new Mycelium account on my phone but each time get this error:</p>

<p>Runaway exception A fatal error occured. Bitcoin can no longer continue safely and will quit. St13 runtime_error CDB() can't open database file wallet.dat error -30974</p>

<p>Am at a loss what to do next -- any help or straightforward advice on what steps to take in order to move the wallet.dat to another machine for an inexperienced Bitcoin layperson would be most welcome...</p>

<p>Thanks much</p>

<bitcoin-qt-setup>
Fatal Error Help/Advice
John_Driftwood
# Fatal Error Help/Advice

(Asked by: username_0 on 2016-11-17)

I've salvaged my old netbook with Windows XP and have been able to access a couple of Bitcoins that a friend sent me back in 2011 (!) when he was getting into this new cryptocurrency thing. BTC was beyond my skill set then and just out of reach now -- the wallet.dat is running on Bitcoin Qt v. 0.8.5 beta.

The coins have 155140 confirmations but Qt is running 162 weeks behind -- it takes forever to load, and will never catch up to the network on this ancient machine (have kept it running for days now) -- would like to move the BTC somewhere else -- have tried sending a test amount (0.01 BTC) to a new Mycelium account on my phone but each time get this error:

Runaway exception A fatal error occured. Bitcoin can no longer continue safely and will quit. St13 runtime\_error CDB() can't open database file wallet.dat error -30974

Am at a loss what to do next -- any help or straightforward advice on what steps to take in order to move the wallet.dat to another machine for an inexperienced Bitcoin layperson would be most welcome...

Thanks much

**Tags:** bitcoin-qt-setup


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## 1 answers

### Answer by username_1 on 2016-11-17. Score: 1

First of all if you have not done it yet, I would encourage you to make a backup of the wallet.dat file (e.g. copy it a usb stick).

One solution would be to let bitcoin-qt show you the private key for the address for which you received bitcoins back in 2011. Then you could import (actually "sweep") them with Electrum. See the following help:
<https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Transferring_coins_from_Bitcoin-Qt_to_Electrum>

This should also work with version 0.8.5 and you don't need to wait for bitcoin-qt to have downloaded the blockchain or anything.


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