W520 locked somehow

[deickos]

I am trying to buy a W520 and the seller indicates that it has some kind of lock (supervisor in bios?) and cannot boot from hard drive - anyway there is not one - but boots only from usb. Read some information about the eeprom chip and wanted to ask what are the odds in my case. The price is low enough to buy it for parts, excluding the mb, but i want to make use of the laptop.

[RealBlackStuff]

If there should be a BIOS password on that W520, it's easy enough to remove.
Watch this.

[deickos]

If there should be a BIOS password on that W520, it's easy enough to remove.
Watch this.

yea i seen it - is that all or is there a worse scenario?

[theterminator93]

Could also be an encrypted HDD that requires a password prior to booting. If it boots to USB it's probably not a BIOS or SVP.

[deickos]

Could also be an encrypted HDD that requires a password prior to booting. If it boots to USB it's probably not a BIOS or SVP.

yes it is possible -
what happens if the encrypted hdd is missing ? (the seller says there is no disk)
means you cannot use ANY disk with this mb?

[theterminator93]

If the HDD was password protected you could get around it by swapping it out.

[deickos]

If the HDD was password protected you could get around it by swapping it out.

Seller says there is no disk included, there is a photo of the bios.
He mentions bios is locked and this laptop only booted from usb -
what do you get from all that?

[RealBlackStuff]

There is a BIOS password.
All you need is that link I gave you before.
Once that is removed, go into BIOS, press F9 to set everything at Default, then press F10 to save it.
After that, you can use any HDD/SSD you want.

[deickos]

just got the laptop - it is exactly as in these videos "supervisor locked"
no value can be altered in bios
i managed to boot with linux from usb and everything works ok
i will provide updates

[deickos]

Since never used a bios locked computer before i have a question - can i put a drive and install an OS or are there any restrictions and possible problems?

[RealBlackStuff]

I strongly advise you to unlock that BIOS first.
Get the W520 manual from the HMM link at the top of this page.
BIOS chip location here.

But while still PW-locked, you can put a SSD in it.
Then boot from USB and install the OS from another USB-drive or CD/DVD.
When done try to boot from that SSD.
If that does not work, restart and press F12 to (hopefully) get the boot-menu and select the SSD (ATA HDD0 xxxxx) there.
If that does not work, see my advice above.

[deickos]

Then boot from USB and install the OS from another USB-drive or CD/DVD.
When done try to boot from that SSD.
If that does not work, restart and press F12 to (hopefully) get the boot-menu and select the SSD (ATA HDD0 xxxxx) there.

bios is set to nvidia optimus which is something i don't need and suspect power hungry as well
f12 works - that is how i booted to voyager linux

why boot from one usb and install from another?

[RealBlackStuff]

Because normally stuff like that is not stored on the same stick...

[deickos]

But while still PW-locked, you can put a SSD in it.

When done try to boot from that SSD.
If that does not work, restart and press F12 to (hopefully) get the boot-menu and select the SSD (ATA HDD0 xxxxx) there.
If that does not work, see my advice above.

why should an ssd with a new OS not work in a locked bios - is there something i should know ?
is this bios paired with a specific user's OS?

[deickos]

Update. I had a msata ssd with an older version of ubuntu in a T420 - took it put it in a sata3 adapter and installed it as primary disk in the w520 - it boots and works ok.