Data recovery and disk repair questions and discussions related to old-fashioned SATA, SAS, SCSI, IDE, MFM hard drives - any type of storage device that has moving parts
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Re: Unlock Password protected drive using MHDD -Passwordis k

December 27th, 2016, 23:03

maximus wrote:Like I said, it was off-topic. I get a bit excited sometimes when I figure something out. You must understand that I am doing all this with no 3rd party tools or hardware, only my own software and a computer.

I understand little English, but understood.
have difficulties in the implementation, please contact

Re: Unlock Password protected drive using MHDD -Passwordis k

December 27th, 2016, 23:13

Spildit wrote:So if you want to make a script for HDDSuperTool to unlock a modern WD drive that prevents SA access when the PSW is set then you just have to dump module 02 from RAM, edit the correct field containing the user password and change it to your own password, save it to RAM and then use the unlock and dispwd commands to remove the password using the password you set on RAM.
This way you can unlock even drives that have S/A access locked like the OP one.

Yes, I could. But I also could have made a script to unlock the drives where the module could be read. And I have not done that. It took me awhile to add the part in the mod02 dump script where it shows the passwords, and then I did not mention that it could do that until recently. If I do anything, I would just add the ability to dump the mod02 from ram. I don't want my software to be best known for being able to unlock drives, as the intentions can be sometimes questionable.

The OP contacted me through PM and I am trying to help with using the scan codes to unlock the drive. The initial attempt using hdparm failed, and I have not heard back yet. If that attempt does not succeed, I will be more than happy to supply the OP with a private hddsupertool script to extract the password from RAM. Or the OP can use the other methods mentioned here.

Re: Unlock Password protected drive using MHDD -Passwordis k

December 29th, 2016, 8:50

Finally got my Hard Disk Unlocked! :D

Some Back ground Info: My Dell Inspiron Had a cold start problem. If I started while it is too cold, it would freeze after booting into windows (I dont know why). Only way out would be to force shutdown by holding power button.
My workaround was to set a hard disk password. That way I can let it wait for a minute or two, and then type the password. By this time, the lap would be nicely warmed up and I will not experience the freeze.

............Until Laptop broke down and locked HD with it.........

I tried HDPARM through Hirens Boot CD (Parted Magic), and tried to feed the password as HEX (scan codes) as Maximus had suggested. HD did not Unlock. May be Inspiron uses Different scan codes?

And then...Found an Identical Inspiron 1464 through a friend, went over to him, and removed the password through BIOS.

Thank you all for your help. I appreciate it.

Re: Unlock Password protected drive using MHDD -Passwordis k

December 30th, 2016, 14:09

And then...Found an Identical Inspiron 1464 through a friend, went over to him, and removed the password through. BIOS

Ok but I always thought the Dell bios would set the password using the unique service tag.
So have I been proven wrong with my assumption?

Re: Unlock Password protected drive using MHDD -Passwordis k

December 30th, 2016, 15:09

Ok but I always thought the Dell bios would set the password using the unique service tag.
So have I been proven wrong with my assumption?
My 1470 sets the user password according to key scan table that I posted, but the master password is set to a two byte value. The master password is likely what is set by the unique service tag, at least on the 1470 that I own.
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