bios password reset

[bwi]

Picked up the computer i bought and its got an admin passowrd installed, rang the guy up and he gave me a couple suggestions but neither worked and im waiting to hear back off him. Problem is the machine has got most of the sata ports and the IDE ports marked as off in the bios and i need to add some bits to the machine.

Any suggestions, would removing the cmos battery reset it etc?

bri

[speedlolita]

On older hardware a CMOS reset / battery removal will do it.

Might be the case for most stuff really, I know that the Thinkpad range have a bastard BIOS password security.

[abigsmurf]

Removing the battery for 30 mins should do it, if you're lucky there may be a jumper you can bridge to reset them. Some BIOS' are designed for the password to be persistent though.

Next time don't buy a PC from shady sources

[bwi]

ill have to look inside to see if there is a jumper, thing is there is this bloody huge heatsink in the way which i don't like the look of blocking everything. Will try the battery tomorrow and hes sent me another couple of words to try (should try different websites to see if i can get his accounts .

cheers for the help guys

[smouty]

What make is it?
I wouldn't hold out much hope if it is a corporate type of PC as they are almost impossible to reset without a password from the manufacturer.
You may be able to clear the password with a BIOS flash but this again depends on the hardware.

[bwi]

Its a dell XPS 710 H2C which is about 3 years old if thats any help.

bri

[bwi]

Job done , it was just pull the battery for a couple of mins and it worked, access to everything. Never did see the point of bios passwords that could be bust so easily