locked laptop

**crazyadi** · 6th July 2006

hi hope someone can help with a bit of a problem a friend of mine has, basically they bought a laptop of ebay a couple of years ago, and since they have had it have never been able to use it. all i can tell you is that it is an IBM and cost 400 quid.
when they turn the computer on, before it does anything it asks for a passcode this wasnt supplied with it, and when they emailed the vendor they were basically told tough you have bought it now and thats the end of my input!! clearly had i known this person 2 years ago i would have been able to offer some suggestions as to what to do about it but i didnt know them!!!
does anyone have any ideas about what to do? would changing the mother board be cost effective and would it actually work? im guessing the lock is in the bios, they have said thay have tried loads of different things, taking the internal battery out, had it in a shop too, plus some internet site says you can build a little circuit board and attach the laptop to your desktop and some bloke in australia can hack into it and disable the lock??
anyway i have less than no idea what to do and was hoping some of you intelligent ones on here could offer some guidance!!!!

thanks
crazy

**furrry** · 7th July 2006

Hi

most laptops dont store the password in the bios these days,its usually stored on a security chip and cant be wiped by clearing cmos or removing cmos battery,but this doesnt apply to all laptops. so give it a try if u can

you can also find various password crackers that might be of help,but could make the situation worse.

Probably the best method is to send it to a specialist company who can replace the security chip or read the passwod from the existing chip for a fee.

Do a google search along the lines of password removal on a (insert laptop make/model here) this will gve you an indication as to methods used by other people, and possibly confirm wether or not its on a security chip or not

hope thats of some help m8

regards

**blacksheep** · 7th July 2006

friend had similar issue with an ibm laptop and had to remove the chip build a reader and email off the data to a company that gave him the code. Best bet would be to google for it as furrry said above. But you may find that a 2+ year old �400 laptop may not be worth the grief and expense of unlocking it.

**Twincharge** · 7th July 2006

As already mentioned, the password is not in the BIOS and encrypted. So you would first have to extract it, then decrypt it so you can read it. Not an easy task by any means.

There are companies out there that specialise in this kind of thing. Best to get it done now rather than wait for the laptop to become out of date and worthless.

I will have a look for you to see if I can find the URL for these companies.

**furrry** · 7th July 2006

I have used this guy before,but not for password removal

http://www.laptop-repair-service.co.uk/

**FireBlade** · 7th July 2006

you might be snookered depending on how old it is you used to have to take it to bits unsolder the cmos battery then leave it a bit but for the last say 8 years most laptops store the bios password in a chip so it cannot be erased etc. If its legal and not a nock off email IBm and explain the problem they may give a master overide password.

**crazyadi** · 9th July 2006

thanks guys for all the info.
have spoken to ibm and they said they dont have a back door password and i need to send it to them to have it sorted but its 190 quid so not worth it!!
read somewhere that someone had shorted the eeprom that holds the password and it had reset it but not really sure what was done so dont want to go down that road!!
oh well looks like its a no go to get it sorte, was kindda hoping there were just some dip switches i could change to clear the stuff out!! or someone on here was in a postition to extrct the password!!

thanks again guys!

crazy

**cherokee** · 10th July 2006

have you looked into this ?

_http://www.ja.axxs.net/unlock/

**blacksheep** · 10th July 2006

thats what my mate did - well I guess so as he said he had to email the eeprom readout to some guy in Aus - it does work.

or

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/IBM-Thinkpad-B...QQcmdZViewItem

**kracken** · 10th July 2006

Almost all of the newer laptops store their BIOS passwords in a manner which does not require continuous power, so removing the CMOS battery may not work at all. IBM Thinkpad laptops lock the hard drive as well as the BIOS when the supervisor password is set. If you reset the BIOS password, but cannot reset the hard drive password, you may not be able to access the drive and it will remain locked, even if you place it in a new laptop. IBM Thinkpads have special jumper switches on the motherboard, and these should be used to reset the system.

Have you tried "merlin" (without quotes) ?

**crazyadi** · 11th July 2006

hi kraken do you know where the swtches are located? had heard you could do it this way, but then so many people say you have to use new chip or have current one read etc...seems a bit strange going to that expense if you can flick some switches???

the australia guy have heard about, the person who owns the laptop tried this and nothing ever came of it as for changing the chip, lol may as well cut out the hassle and just bin it before i start, electronics aint my strong point!! lol

thanks again guys and im sure out of all this something may work!!

crazy