admin password

noinoi WoW Philippines
edited February 2005 in Science & Tech
need help..
anyone tried the admin password of dell latitude model PP01L?

thanks.
br,
noi

Comments

  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    edited February 2005
    There's no way anybody can help you unless we know what you are talking about.

    There's no single "password" for every dell laptop in the world. Some person set a password.

    Are you talking about the password to the computer's BIOS, or the windows password?
  • noinoi WoW Philippines
    edited February 2005
    primesuspect wrote:
    There's no way anybody can help you unless we know what you are talking about.

    There's no single "password" for every dell laptop in the world. Some person set a password.

    Are you talking about the password to the computer's BIOS, or the windows password?

    ahh...my dell c640 series laptop when it turn on says " This computer system is protected by a password authentication system. You cannot acces tha data on this computer without the correct password"
    "Please type in the prrimary or administrator password and press (enter)"

    the only reason for this is when i change my harddisk(crash) to 40gig new one, then when i turn on, viola Admin password..any solution for this?

    thanks for the quick reply :thumbsup:
  • DexterDexter Vancouver, BC Canada
    edited February 2005
    The message you are seeing is because of security Dell puts into their systems. This is a BIOS password. The reason you are seeing it is because, according to you, you changed the hard drive. If that is the case, the new hard drive you put in is not being recognized, probably due to some CMOS checksum. So in order to make this hard drive acceptable to the BIOS, you need to login to the BIOS and make some changes. But you do not have the BIOS password, so you cannot.

    On some Dell laptops, you can clear this password by removing the CMOS battery from the motherboard temporarily. You may have to keep it out for up to 30 mins. However, most newer laptops store the password on a special chip that is outside the CMOS. Removing the battey does not help you. It can be done by actually physically locating the correct chip on the motherboard, and shorting it out. Then you need to actually reset all the info in the BIOS.

    If you are the original owner of this laptop, there is an EASIER WAY. What you need to do is to call your Dell Support centre. Give them the Dell service tag number, and then tell them the info you just told us. They should be able to give you the BIOS password.

    HOWEVER...This is a common problem with STOLEN Dell laptops. The laptop gets stolen, and the thief tries to change the hard drive because they cannot re-install everything without the Dell Setup CD. Once they install the new hard drive, they see this error message. Then they sell the laptop to an unsuspecting customer, usually on Ebay. The customer gets this message. They call Dell. Dell says, sure, no problem, can you please give me the name and address and phone number of the original owner (so they can transfer the ownership records to your name.) The new owner cannot do this, all they have is an Ebay username and maybe an e-mail address. And Dell says, Sorry, can't help you.

    Unless of course Dell has been contacted by the original owner, and notified that the laptop has been stolen. In that case, Dell says, oh, thanks for recovering the laptop for us, we'll send the police over to pick that up from you....

    So...if you are not the original owner...where did you get it? Did you buy it on Ebay, or secondhand from someone? Of course, there is also the possibility that you stole the laptop...I hope not, but it is possible. Especially since, if you hard drive crashed, all you had to do was call Dell and they would replace it for you. Or if you were the original owner, all you had to do was call Dell about the password problem, and they would have helped you....And if your hard drive did crash, you could just use your Dell Setup CD to reinstall everything...if you have it.

    For that reason, I'm not going to point you to the website that shows you, step by step, how to short out the security chip. :) But if you google hard enough, it's out there.

    Dexter...

    //EDIT: Just had a closer look at the site that tells you how to short the security chip...and apparently the c640 series does not respond to that short-circuit hack, so you'll be out of luck with that anyways. Best bet: call Dell, if you own the laptop legitimately. If you don't own it legitimately, you are out of luck.
  • noinoi WoW Philippines
    edited February 2005
    Dexter wrote:
    The message you are seeing is because of security Dell puts into their systems. This is a BIOS password. The reason you are seeing it is because, according to you, you changed the hard drive. If that is the case, the new hard drive you put in is not being recognized, probably due to some CMOS checksum. So in order to make this hard drive acceptable to the BIOS, you need to login to the BIOS and make some changes. But you do not have the BIOS password, so you cannot.

    On some Dell laptops, you can clear this password by removing the CMOS battery from the motherboard temporarily. You may have to keep it out for up to 30 mins. However, most newer laptops store the password on a special chip that is outside the CMOS. Removing the battey does not help you. It can be done by actually physically locating the correct chip on the motherboard, and shorting it out. Then you need to actually reset all the info in the BIOS.

    If you are the original owner of this laptop, there is an EASIER WAY. What you need to do is to call your Dell Support centre. Give them the Dell service tag number, and then tell them the info you just told us. They should be able to give you the BIOS password.

    HOWEVER...This is a common problem with STOLEN Dell laptops. The laptop gets stolen, and the thief tries to change the hard drive because they cannot re-install everything without the Dell Setup CD. Once they install the new hard drive, they see this error message. Then they sell the laptop to an unsuspecting customer, usually on Ebay. The customer gets this message. They call Dell. Dell says, sure, no problem, can you please give me the name and address and phone number of the original owner (so they can transfer the ownership records to your name.) The new owner cannot do this, all they have is an Ebay username and maybe an e-mail address. And Dell says, Sorry, can't help you.

    Unless of course Dell has been contacted by the original owner, and notified that the laptop has been stolen. In that case, Dell says, oh, thanks for recovering the laptop for us, we'll send the police over to pick that up from you....

    So...if you are not the original owner...where did you get it? Did you buy it on Ebay, or secondhand from someone? Of course, there is also the possibility that you stole the laptop...I hope not, but it is possible. Especially since, if you hard drive crashed, all you had to do was call Dell and they would replace it for you. Or if you were the original owner, all you had to do was call Dell about the password problem, and they would have helped you....And if your hard drive did crash, you could just use your Dell Setup CD to reinstall everything...if you have it.

    For that reason, I'm not going to point you to the website that shows you, step by step, how to short out the security chip. :) But if you google hard enough, it's out there.

    Dexter...

    //EDIT: Just had a closer look at the site that tells you how to short the security chip...and apparently the c640 series does not respond to that short-circuit hack, so you'll be out of luck with that anyways. Best bet: call Dell, if you own the laptop legitimately. If you don't own it legitimately, you are out of luck.

    whew!! cool, i buy this laptop dell second hand with another laptop package toshiba AS IS. i dont have any cd on it, im just replaced the hard disk and this what i see...anyways thanks for the info, but i really want it to remove the admin pass..maybe i can go to the repair shop(laptop) for to solve my problem. thanks
  • DexterDexter Vancouver, BC Canada
    edited February 2005
    When you buy a laptop, ALWAYS ask for the setup CD. And, make sure if it is a Dell or other similar manufacturer, always get the contact info of the original owners so that ownership can be transferred to your name.

    If you bought it secondhand, do you know who the original owner was, so you can contact them and then contact Dell and get it transferred to your name, then get the BIOS password?

    Dexter...
This discussion has been closed.