Your guide to your first hardware wallet
Finally, I decided to get a hardware wallet and take my coins off the exchanges. I’ve been procrastinating seeing the ledger prices went up due to short supply in Ebay — — from 130AUD it now ells up to 500AUD. So, I thought to share my first-hand experience in setting up my first ever hardware wallet. Hopefully, you also learn from my experience and take the courage to get one for yourself.
To be honest, I am confused with all the buzz around hot/cold storage. I read up the difference between the two and why cold storage is the best and most secured way to store your cryptos. I did my due diligence and learned all the things I need to understand on how it works. For the very reason that I’m afraid to lost coins if I make a mistake in the process.
I’ve summarised those important lessons during my journey.
- There’s a Ledger App that you can download to view your coins in PC/Mac. I thought all along it’s just the ledger’s small screen that I have to do everything. I’m glad that there’s these app which is user-friendly and very intuitive.
- Some cryptos have their own specific wallet. Again, another misconception on my part. I thought all the wallets are in Ledger Manager.
- You can use a shorter pin. When setting my pin, I’ve used all the available digits (8). It’s a bit of a pain coz you will always have to key in your pin when doing transactions in your ledger. It’s much secure but it’s taking some time.
- Do a small transfer before moving everything. To take away some of your fears, just move a small amount first then if it works, you can transfer the rest.
- Take some rest. It can be daunting initially as you are still learning things in ledger. I only transferred one coin on day one, two more in day two, and another five coins in the next day. Each day I became confident on what I’m doing. I prefer to take things slowly and better be sure.
Now, I feel more secured on my stash that I have full control and I can sleep better. The best way to learn is to start doing it.