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Access files on password protected Vista when hard drive has crashed

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A customer’s hard drive has gone bad and I need to recover files from the drive. The drive has Vista installed and password protected with finger print scan. I am using USB to SATA cable. I can access the drive and see the folders (Users, etc.) but cannot access the contents within the folders. Does anyone know how to gain control of the folders to save the data?

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In reply to Access files on password protected Vista when hard drive has crashed

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have you tried

In reply to Access files on password protected Vista when hard drive has crashed

taking ownership of those folders?

if the folders are encrypted

In reply to have you tried

and comdr5 seizes ownership of the folder, that’s probably the end of it. The folder must be unencrypted before the ownership is changed, or it may not be possible to do the unencryption at all.

Ditto a forced password change by the Administrator.

Windows gives warnings to that effect. Believe them.

Concur

In reply to if the folders are encrypted

You be screwed if you mess with encrypted files.

Luckily not encrypted

In reply to if the folders are encrypted

so I was able to take ownership of the files but only after XP did a chkdsk. After a restart, it started doing the check and was then able to see the folders/files. thanks.

problem solved

In reply to have you tried

Sue T, thanks for the tip. When I first accessed the drive through my XP computer, I could not see the partition at all. I happened to restart the computer and when I did, XP started doing a chkdsk. I was concerned that since the drive contained Vista and not XP that it would somehow erase or render unaccessible the drive. Luckily, the chkdsk fixed some of the problems on the drive and then allowed me to see the folders/files. I then took ownership as you suggest and was able to recover the files. Luckily they were not encrypted! Thanks again!

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