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HITACHI Password UNLOCK trouble (i have password)

February 10th, 2012, 13:43

Hello,

i'm trying first time to unlock HDD, i have many years IT experience

-disk type: HITACHI HTS541616J9SA00

-it is password protected taken from unworkable ASUS notebook

-i know the password from owner

i'm trying getting valuable data from it ->
i used MHDD and ATAPWD software under pure dos enviroment
i tried UNLOCK command with both master and user pass, used known pass but everytimes if wrote `fail` (mhdd) or `rejected` (atapwd)
i'm even tried to boot without locked HDD to avoid `bios freeze lock` and attached the drive after DOS boot is complete :!:

does someone have similar experience?
thanks in advance

Re: HITACHI Password UNLOCK trouble (i have password)

February 10th, 2012, 13:50

You wil need to take it to (& pay) a DR pro who has the right tools to do this ie PC3000, Atola or SD.

Loki

Re: HITACHI Password UNLOCK trouble (i have password)

February 10th, 2012, 15:06

loki wrote:You wil need to take it to (& pay) a DR pro who has the right tools to do this ie PC3000, Atola or SD.

Loki


thanks for the answer

I'm from slovak republic...
I'm affraid the owner doesn't want to pay for his photos from vacation so much money - i'm doing this like favour for a friend

It is problem even when WE KNOW THE PASSWORD?
Will it be accessible in other notebook which supports HDD password settings in bios?
I tried it on two desktops that don't have this in BIOS

btw. it is SATA drive connected directly to mainboard if it matters...

Re: HITACHI Password UNLOCK trouble (i have password)

February 10th, 2012, 15:09

I read the the correct actions in these cases is:

-first unlock with correct password, then disable password forever
(all can be done thru MHDD)

-if bios issues `freeze lock` it is needed to be avoided

what i'm doing wrong? i have password which owner used to access her notebook before it stopped to turn on...

Re: HITACHI Password UNLOCK trouble (i have password)

February 10th, 2012, 15:23

I just got an idea to try to set controller mode to most compatible mode (legacy or something like that)...
i'm going to try it ASAP

Re: HITACHI Password UNLOCK trouble (i have password)

February 10th, 2012, 16:37

try and find info on keyboard scan codes. Also search this forum ;o)

Re: HITACHI Password UNLOCK trouble (i have password)

February 10th, 2012, 17:25

The following thread discusses WD passwords, but the information on keyboard scan codes is still relevant in your case:
unlocking-ata-password-for-western-digital-t8374-240.html

The easiest solution may be to install the drive in another laptop, not necessarily the same model or brand. In that way your key presses will be transmitted as scan codes rather than ASCII characters.

Re: HITACHI Password UNLOCK trouble (i have password)

February 10th, 2012, 19:10

fzabkar wrote:The following thread discusses WD passwords, but the information on keyboard scan codes is still relevant in your case:
unlocking-ata-password-for-western-digital-t8374-240.html

The easiest solution may be to install the drive in another laptop, not necessarily the same model or brand. In that way your key presses will be transmitted as scan codes rather than ASCII characters.


thanks, that thread is quite a long, but i will read it ASAP...
so there is some mismatch in passwords?
this one is `0000` or 4x key with `0` or `)` on it.

btw. i tried HDAT2 and it writes:
security = enabled, locked and level =`high`
master password revision code=0001h (changed)

`freeze lock` is in red color and unaccessible

Re: HITACHI Password UNLOCK trouble (i have password)

February 10th, 2012, 21:41

She swears again that the password is `0000`.... :shock:
And i saw her actualy to access the notebook recently.

From what i tried it looks everything working like the pass is incorrect :(

Re: HITACHI Password UNLOCK trouble (i have password)

February 11th, 2012, 7:03

Hiya,

The easy way is to run Victoria for Windows.

Tick the PIO option, select the correct controller IO then Passport.

Check the details then in Security Manager type in user password as 0000 and try to unlock.

If that dosn't work then you might have to alter the way the password is inserted. The problem is the original laptop bios might store the password in a different form. You have used 4 character spaces to insert 0000 but what happens to the empty spaces for example?
So you might also require to know what is the maximum password length which can be used by that model laptop bios.
There are too many variables here even to describe.
Some passwords might have to be entered in hex or in decimal or in plain text. Also some with padding or without.

If the first option dosn't work I would be inclined to search for an exact same model working laptop and hope the user password can be entered successfully. Otherwise you might have to pay to get the drive unlocked for you.

Good luck!

Re: HITACHI Password UNLOCK trouble (i have password)

February 11th, 2012, 12:00

fzabkar wrote:The following thread discusses WD passwords, but the information on keyboard scan codes is still relevant in your case:
unlocking-ata-password-for-western-digital-t8374-240.html

The easiest solution may be to install the drive in another laptop, not necessarily the same model or brand. In that way your key presses will be transmitted as scan codes rather than ASCII characters.


Thanks man - after i found scancode table in that long thread the solution was near! :D

So the password was not 4x $30 like `0` but 4x $0B like scancode for this key!!!! (in ascii some strange char)
I felt that i'm missing just something small to unlock it...
THANKS FOR AN IDEA!!!

Re: HITACHI Password UNLOCK trouble (i have password)

February 11th, 2012, 12:12

dick wrote:Hiya,

The easy way is to run Victoria for Windows.

Tick the PIO option, select the correct controller IO then Passport.

Check the details then in Security Manager type in user password as 0000 and try to unlock.

If that dosn't work then you might have to alter the way the password is inserted. The problem is the original laptop bios might store the password in a different form. You have used 4 character spaces to insert 0000 but what happens to the empty spaces for example?
So you might also require to know what is the maximum password length which can be used by that model laptop bios.
There are too many variables here even to describe.
Some passwords might have to be entered in hex or in decimal or in plain text. Also some with padding or without.

If the first option dosn't work I would be inclined to search for an exact same model working laptop and hope the user password can be entered successfully. Otherwise you might have to pay to get the drive unlocked for you.

Good luck!


Thanks for help, i planned next to try it in my wife's laptop because of reasons you wrote - but it is not here this time.
But i finaly solved this puzzle yesterday :)

I have no problems to use pure DOS (i'm old school person doing in PC business since '92), i tried victoria too.
The unlocking was done with HDAT2, because it supports convenient entering the password in HEX form....

There were just some friend's pics from holiday etc. but she will be very happy about saving them (and never use HDD pass anymore in her life again :lol: )

Re: HITACHI Password UNLOCK trouble (i have password)

February 11th, 2012, 13:40

If she only used 0000 the rest of the password could be padded with the space bar. The password must be sent to the drive as a 32 bytes password

Re: HITACHI Password UNLOCK trouble (i have password)

February 11th, 2012, 14:48

The scan codes may be different for different languages. For example, the same key may occupy different positions on US and Chinese keyboards, so the scan codes would differ. In fact, even on the same keyboard, the scan code for the 0/) key would differ from the code for the 0/Ins key in the numeric keypad.

See http://www.users.on.net/~fzabkar/MSKeyLog.TXT

As for the "feeze lock", this is due to your BIOS. It does this to protect your drive from malware. When the drive is "frozen", it rejects any ATA password command until after it is power cycled.

Re: HITACHI Password UNLOCK trouble (i have password)

February 11th, 2012, 16:53

fzabkar wrote:The scan codes may be different for different languages. For example, the same key may occupy different positions on US and Chinese keyboards, so the scan codes would differ. In fact, even on the same keyboard, the scan code for the 0/) key would differ from the code for the 0/Ins key in the numeric keypad.

See http://www.users.on.net/~fzabkar/MSKeyLog.TXT

As for the "feeze lock", this is due to your BIOS. It does this to protect your drive from malware. When the drive is "frozen", it rejects any ATA password command until after it is power cycled.


yeah, i already wrote that it is unlocked from yesterday...

the password was not 4x $30 like `0` but 4x $0B like scancode for this key

one of my post is still missing here (it has to be aproved by admin :shock: )

btw. the story has second phase - everything was OK but suddenly the drive was disconnected and after reboot there is `unformated partition`

so i'm restoring the files from hdd without valid partition info like i did many times already... :(

Re: HITACHI Password UNLOCK trouble (i have password)

February 12th, 2012, 1:45

guru wrote:If she only used 0000 the rest of the password could be padded with the space bar. The password must be sent to the drive as a 32 bytes password


:mrgreen: ,
i suggest he finds a similiar lappie and try it there .if not take it to a dr pro and unlock the password
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