password on a hard drive?

a friend bought a used Dell laptop last week, but when she started it up
she got a message that says the ahrd drive has password protection on
it. she cannot get past that message to do anyting with the drive or
the computer. If it were an ordinary desktop drive I could just
configure it as a slave and (hopefully) format it. Can that be done
with a laptop drive? If so, how do I make it a slave, and how do I
connect it to the laptop? Is there some other way to get rid of the
password? thanks,

"Steve Burns boeing.com >" <"stephen.d.burns2 <at> wrote in message
news:Hpxtz0.Erz@news.boeing.com...
 > a friend bought a used Dell laptop last week, but when she started it up
 > she got a message that says the ahrd drive has password protection on
 > it. she cannot get past that message to do anyting with the drive or
 > the computer. If it were an ordinary desktop drive I could just
 > configure it as a slave and (hopefully) format it. Can that be done
 > with a laptop drive? If so, how do I make it a slave, and how do I
 > connect it to the laptop? Is there some other way to get rid of the
 > password? thanks,

Short of getting the password from the previous owner you might be hosed.

I have been researching this issue after an experience with a friend, and my
Laptop. What I've discovered is that if the Laptop writes the password to
the hard drive, and stores it in non-volatile ram in the Laptop Motherboard,
you either obtain the correct password, or the Laptop is useless. If the
Laptop is one that writes the password only to the drive, you can replace
the drive, and be in business again. As to the password protected hard
drive, there are two possible password protection configurations, Master &
User. Most likely the Laptop sets the user password. Some also allow setting
the Master also. Either way the average user wont be able to access the
drive unless the password is known. I have confirmed that the data recovery
services can bypass the hard drive password protection on a hard drive (I
haven't discovered how yet), but it can be rather expensive.

I have confirmed that the password is written to the hard drive firmware,
and unavailable to the average user, but there is some indication that the
password is also written to the platter (I haven't confirmed that one way or
the other).

You will be unable to format, or access the drive in the Laptop, or a
desktop, as a slave or master without special software. In most Laptops you
would be prompted for the password. In the desktop the drive would be
reported as a failed drive.

Your best bet is to try a new hard drive in the Laptop to see if it will
operate, or obtain the password from the previous owner.

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