password access problems with IBM Thinkpad 770

[birddog]

A co-worker of mine has a IBM thinkpad 770 laptop. Her young kid somehow entered a password into it. She brough it in to me to work on. (I have no experience with laptops). I figured I could reset the CMOS,or at worst reload windows in it. It will not let me enter the BIOS, nor boot to a floppy. I pulled the CMOS battery & it still prompts for the password. How can I get around this? (It shows a little lock right after the IBM flash screen). The IBM website is no help. THeir solution is to call a 'non-warrenty' service request (lots of $$$$). Anyone have any ideas on what to do? Is this password part of the OS? if so, getting to a A: prompt & reloading windows will do the trick. Problem is, I cannot get to the A: prompt, nor enter the BIOS to check to see if I can clear it there. Is there another battery (besides the CMOS) one or a jumper burried inside to clear this password prompt?

 

[RBlount]

Do you want the bad news or the real bad news?

The bad news is that system password is "burned" in to the system board. You can not bypass it.

The worse news is with out the password, the only "offical" way to remove the password is to replace the system board.

-Rob

P.S. I have heard there are unoffical ways to remove the password, but I have no idea how to do it.

 

[DanFungus]

does this help?
Just did a quick search on google, so I don't know if it works or not

edit: ouch...if that ( ^ ^ ) doesn't work..then this page says; 'Get eeprom 24c01 contents and run cmospwd on this rows'. That doesn't sound good..

 

[DrVos]

There is really no way of getting around the bios password in notebooks, they are very hard to get around for a reason. Her best bet is to try and contact IBM support. Many manufacturers do use "backdoor" passwords that may allow them to gain access to the rest of the computer. I don't know if it is something that she would be able to do over the phone or would require her sending her computer in to fix. If all else fails, she may have to do what RBlount said and get a new system board.

 

[Codewiz]

Originally posted by: RBlount
Do you want the bad news or the real bad news?

The bad news is that system password is "burned" in to the system board. You can not bypass it.

The worse news is with out the password, the only "offical" way to remove the password is to replace the system board.

-Rob

P.S. I have heard there are unoffical ways to remove the password, but I have no idea how to do it.

There is a company that will do it for like $70 IF you can show proof of purchase....I will try to find the link but I can't guarantee it. They just do it for IBM laptops.


EDIT: It is $95. Here is the link

Jim