password problems

[SuperDave]

First of all, let me say that I'm not trying to break into anyone's computer. I'm presently enrolled in Malware Removal University and I don't want to get booted out for trying to bypass a password. Here's the deal. My friend purchased a Dell computer from this guy. She said she was able to get into the computer twice while trying to set up her dial-up network. The third time she ran into a password protection. She consulted me and I told her to get the password from the guy who  sold it to her. She talked to him and he gave her a password. I tried that one but it was incorrect. She talked to him again and he gave her two more. He also gave her two recovery disks as well as a Windows Vista upgrade disc. I figured if I ran the recovery disks it would take the computer back to square one. There's nothing on the computer that my friend wants to save anyway. She just wants to get it working. Every time I put in the recovery disk it takes me back to the password program. Is this normal? Why was she able to access the computer twice before she started having problems?

[BC_Programmer]

She put the password on it. Obviously by accident.

I take it this is a BIOS password? If so simply remove the CMOS battery for a while- safe bet being about 20-30 minutes. then place it back and restart. any BIOS password should be gone.

if it is a OS prompt then it obviously isn't booting from the CD< so check the cables,power, boot order and so frth for the drive.

[SuperDave]

She may have accidently put a password on it. That's probably why the passwords he's giving her are not working. I checked the BIOS and it's not a BIOS password. I also checked and it's booting from the CD recovery disk. I even tried my XP CD and it started booting from the CD but came back to the password prompt. I'll try removing the battery but I doubt it will do any good. Perhaps I could remove the HD, slave it to another computer and reformat it.

[ale52]

Tried booting into Safe Mode?  If no one put a password on the Adminstrator profile then all you need to to is choose it and hit Enter.

Alan <>< 

[BC_Programmer]

HD might have a password perhaps- it can boot using a CD, but most OSes on the CD inspect the hardware, including the HD, at which point the PC is showing the prompt?

Although it isn't easy to just Suddenly put a HD password on it...


If you have trouble accessing the drive from a different PC, this could be it. unfortunately HD passwords aren't easily removed.

[SuperDave]

Booting in Safe Mode just leads me to the password prompt and it shows the previous owner's name so I don't think it was anything accidental. It looks like I'll have to find someone who can test a SATA drive.

[SuperDave]

I removed the battery and disconnected the power cord for almost 20 hrs. Now, when I boot, I get a diskette drive 0 seek failure. My boot sequence is CDRom drive and hard drive. There is no floppy drive. I changed the battery but I still get that  error. I know the CD drive is working because when I insert a disk, it gives me a "booting from CD" message and then along comes the password prompt.

[BC_Programmer]

If there is no floppy drive, is it set as such in the BIOS setup screens?

[SuperDave]

Well, I'm making progress. I was able to get Vista re-installed and no more problems with a password. Now the only problem is I get that "diskette drive 0 seek failure" when I boot. I press F1 and Vista loads normally. The boot sequence is CD Rom and then the hard drive. There is no floppy drive but when I open Windows Explorer, there's the A drive listed along with the C, D and E drives. Help please. Oh yes. I can't connect to the net using the dial-up modem. Is it possible this modem has gone bad? Everything looks ok in device manager and it says it's running normally. 

[JJ 3000]

Did you disable the floppy in BIOS?

If you right click on the A drive and select Properties, what do you see?

[SuperDave]

Yes, I disabled the floppy drive in BIOS. Here's my boot sequence:
1.Onboard CD-ROM drive
2.Bootable Hard drive
Non-intergrated NIC  ( not present)
USB-FDD (not present)
USB-ZIP  ( not present)
USB-CDROM  (not present)
Onboard floppy drive ( not present)

HDD boot sequence:
1. Sata-0
2. Bootable Add-In cards

I disabled the A drive in windows and if finally disappeared from " My Computer" but I'm still getting the "diskette drive 0 seek failure". It's not stopping me from starting the computer but I don't want to give this computer back without fixing it. 

UPDATE: I finally got rid of that annoying error on startup. Just for anyone having the same problems with their Dell computers. I went into the BIOS and I had to alter the disk drives as well as the boot sequence. That did the trick for me.