Hi I hope you can help me since Im dont know what else to do.

Here's what happened. My Gateway laptop with Windows 7 died ( actually vga on main board) and my main hdd was BIOS password protected (not bios password but hdd itself ) I took it a part trying to bake it (common problem with vga chip-set) didnt help. I went with MHDD 4.6 ->diagnostics -> unlock (master unlock). It worked since I knew my password also I was able to remove it. Now any pc I use my hdd in ( directly connected or through sata/ide hdd adapter ) hdd is detected but not initialized - when I check in administrative tool I can see drive and its size but when I tried to initialize ( since it says not initialized ) I get this error --> The request could not be performed because of an I/O device error

I tired desktop and laptop and no luck - I have to get the data out of it

Please help

Any DIY diagnosis or recovery attempts have risks. Do you accept the responsibility that you might make things worse (i.e. more difficult / expensive for any later DR pro recovery, or perhaps even impossible), due to lack of experience / skills / incorrect procedures or even just bad luck, during your DIY attempts?

Other people may give different suggestions, but if you accept those risks, then based on your story so far, I suggest that you start by attaching the disk via SATA and supply the result of MHDD EID (press F2 key), so we can see exactly how the disk is reported (e.g. take a photo of the MHDD screen and attach that to your reply). Then further comments can be based on that result.

Obviously a working disk can be unlocked and then read successfully, so you have one or more extra problems which would not occur after just unlocking a working disk...

Maybe this created some other problems...

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As soon I as get back home I will do that
I run Hitachi health test on the drive and it is perfectly fine.

after baking I just booted without hdd connected just to see if I can get bios screen since vga died and nothing was displayed. When unlocking drive I used desktop.

OK


Please supply a full list of all tests / diagnosis / changes you have done so far, and the results for each one, so that readers don't waste their time writing suggestions for things you have already done.

In the specific case of this Hitachi health test - was that the quick one, or the one which reads every sector and so takes much longer?

that's was a quick one using Hitachi drive health test dos app.

I dont know if that changes anything but when I plug hdd (usb or internal ) windows successfully mounts the drive and says it ready to use but it does show up in "my computer"

Thanks for the info. I look forward to the full list of things you have done, with their results, in due course, along with the MHDD EID output.


I doubt that reads any data blocks, but is just reporting SMART pass/fail status. However I haven't searched for exact info - you chose the utility, so you'll need to interpret its result.


Strictly Windows doesn't "mount the drive" - if anything, it mounts one or more filesystems. However, if that is successful, then one or more drive letters (= filesystems) would be seen in "My Computer". I think instead, you probably mean something like the drive is seen in "Device Manager" but no new drive letters are seen in "My Computer". Is that correct? If so, it means that the partition table or filesystem metadata was either unreadable, or too corrupted to be recognisible. In your case, more likely the former.

When you say that you "baked" the laptop or its VGA chip, I'm assuming that you removed the disk drive first - is that correct?

FYI, I suspect that there won't be a DIY resolution to this, but if you accept the DIY risks that I mentioned earlier, then I'll look at the results from the questions I've asked, to see what they show.

I just did the diag again and it still says its locked
I tried my passwords but they dont work on master "1" or user "0"

I think that yesterday I made a mistake and typed once password and failed then typed it again with out taping unlock

what if my password doesnt work for some reason - is there a generic master password ?

That explains the behaviour you've been reporting, and this is exactly what I wanted to check in the MHDD output (although that isn't the specific command that I asked you to run. )


You claimed to have already unlocked the drive. I don't understand how you can have any doubts about doing it again.


For that type of drive? Probably - but the chances of it working in your case are little or none. With the modern BIOSes that I have seen, they all change the master password when you set a user password, so the default master password would likely be useless - after all, if it worked, then there wouldn't be much security!

- I thought I unlocked it yesterday when I typed unlock - 1 - and password came as fail but then I figured i made a mistake and instead of typing unlock again I entered password again then i didnt give me any error msg so i figured it worked.

- since my laptop died few weeks ago now I feel like im not sure what password I used but I went through all password I use and still none of them work in master or user mode.

im starting to lose my mind :/ and trying to come out with possible password that can work but I get fail all the time.
what else I can do to get that out ?? I have all my kids picts there since they were born and no backups
please help

Since we now have to ignore your claim that you had unlocked the drive, some "difficulties" can exist for you to unlock the drive. This thread discusses a similar situation - the disk's ATA password was known, but the original laptop was faulty:

hitachi-password-unlock-trouble-have-password-t22025.html

If the options in that thread are not successful for you, or if you don't have the time / equipment to try them, then use the services of a suitable DR company (and be prepared to provide some ID and/or proof of ownership of the drive).

P.S. Remember that, as I said before, DIY actions have risks - you accept the responsibility for those risks.

Would it be possible to unlock it with different laptop ?

Im so desperate that I will buy used laptop on ebay and try to plug my hdd to it to see if I can unlock it .

My dead lappy is gateway fx 171xl but nobody has it - they have models that are with lower spec but also from fx family and looking exactly the same.

is ata password married to only one motherboard ?

With a simple proof of ownership and the signing of a disclaimer a local pro might do it for less $$$! Wierd!

I did call and quotes they give me are more then used lappy off of an ebay - question is will it work ?

See the thread I linked earlier - IMHO the answer is "perhaps", just as it was in that thread.

As long as your second-hand laptop is from the same family (and hence hopefully the same BIOS encoding / padding for the ATA password as your original laptop), then IMHO you have a chance of the second-hand laptop allowing you to unlock your drive, using your known password. Unfortunately you also have a chance of that laptop (or other actions) actually damaging your locked drive, and making the situation worse - hence the earlier warnings about DIY.

If you decide to take those risks and go ahead, then be gentle with your drive physically, and take all possible ESD precautions. I would also do at least some basic tests on the second-hand laptop first, to ensure that it can access its own disk drive correctly, before putting your locked drive in there.

would it be better to replace motherboard on my lappy and try it then ?

Call me, I can help you out.

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