Thanks for creating this utility! It's really appreciated for when you don't want random people accessing your old files, from your previous computers. I've used it three times in total.
First was for making the SSD in my Thinkpad X300 like new. Unfortunately the secure erase failed after having run the whole night. I don't know what went wrong, but I got a new drive from Lenovo.
Second attempt was the Samsung SSD I bought for my X60s, and the secure erase was completed succesfully in very short time.
Third attempt on my T42 that I wanted to erase so that I could sell it. It started and ran without problems, and I had the power adapter plugged into the laptop. I had put the laptop away, and hadn't noticed the mains switch was off, so it ran out of battery. That left the drive in a locked state. When powered on, it asks for password, but doesn't accept "idrive". I decided to try another computer, an older Fujitsu-Siemens laptop. It also asked for password, but there "idrive" worked. I could start a boot CD and run HDD Erase. HDD Erase could not reset the drive with any password, so that left the drive in locked state. Neither could MHDD with "idrive" as password. The Phoenix BIOS didn't give the possibility of erasing the harddrive password.
What did remove the harddrive lock was attempting to start a new secure erase. It then sets the password "idrive", and when it asks if I want to proceed, I enter No. The harddrive lock is then removed, and the drive works again.
Hope this information is usefull to someone out there with a locked harddrive