We recently got our hands on the newly release Ledger Nano Hardware Wallet. It is a hardware wallet designed to securely store your bitcoin private keys offline with a paper backup. By storing your private keys offline on a piece of hardware you eliminate the possibility of malware stealing your bitcoins. The wallet is so secure, that even if your machine is compromised, the provided security card renders the attack useless. For a cheap price of $50 the Ledger Nano makes a great gift for any bitcoin enthusiast and makes a great alternative to the Trezor which is priced at $99 or the Keep Key wallet which is priced at $239. Check out this video showing the unboxing of the Ledger Nano Duo Edition:

How to get setup:

Step 1: Plug in the Ledger Nano wallet into the usb port of your computer

Step 2: If you don’t have the Chrome browser download an install Chrome

Step 3: Go to http://my.ledgerwallet.com and install the Ledger Wallet App

Step 4: Follow the instructions to configure your new Ledger Wallet

When setting up your pincode you can either use the automatically generated pin, or use a manual pin (make sure it is not your birth year or your last 4 credit card numbers)

Confirm your newly created PIN code

Write down the recovery phrase shown in each of the 24 boxes onto the corresponding 24 boxes on your recovery sheet.

Confirm your recovery phrase by entering recovery words associated with the randomly chosen numbers from the recovery phrase provided earlier, this is to make sure you copied down the recovery phrase in the correct order.

Click the finish button to finalize your Ledger Nano’s configurations and create the wallet

Wait for the process to finish

Once the configuration finishes, you will be presented with a final screen telling you that the creation is complete and to unplug then plug the Ledger wallet in order to start using it.

After you unplug and plug the Ledger Nano, navigate once again to my.ledgerwallet.com. When the app opens, enter your previously set pin in order to unlock the wallet

That is it! When you unlock your wallet your will be presented with an intuitive GUI similar to that of Electrum or Bitcoin Core.

The difference is a much higher security because of the physical security card. Your average bitcoin wallet uses a simple password to sign the transaction and send the coins. A MITM (man in the middle) attack can hijack that password or even worse, a piece of malware such as a keylogger on your machine can log the password and steal all your coins. The physical security card provides an 2FA security feature which is unbreakable by any piece of malware on your computer or any other online based attack.

Also, don’t forget to check out this article for a list of comparisons of the most popular bitcoin wallets and a chart ranking them:

http://themerkle.com/charts/bitcoin-wallet-comparison-chart-reviews/

If you liked this article please follow us on twitter @themerklenews to get the latest updates on the hottest products, startups, and the most insightful technical analysis on select cryptocurrencies.