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Compaq Hard Drive Password

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by majik503

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I set a hard drive password via the bios in my old notebook the motherboard broke, and I let it sit on a shelf for a few years. Now I want to get information off the drive, but I have forgotten the password. I have tried putting it in a enclosure as a slave drive, but it didn't work. I have put it in my new laptop, but it says Hard Disk Failure when I try to boot off it. When I go into the bios it still has a password set. The lame HP support tells me that the password is stored on the motherboard, but this cannot be since I am putting the drive in a new notebook. Is there a way to remove the password? It is a Hitachi Travelstar DK23EA out of a Presario 2100.

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by jonathan_gibbons

You're right! HD passwords are stored on the HD (hence the name lol). HP might be getting confused with system or BIOS passwords.

Some system manufacturers have what is called a 'Hash code' when it asks for the password. This is usually a string of digits that the manufacturer can put into a decoder and get an override password.

If you can't get an override, then you realllllly might be struggling to get data off without going to a data recovery company (which can be really expensive).

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