Can you confirm that those laptops were actually seized by DHS under this policy?? Did the DHS issue your employees any "claim check" as proof that the system was being taken? One would assume that any confiscation would be duly noted on a report given to the seizee with at least the serial number ...

I'm not sure which version of R&R I have (and I'm not at the machine right now) but I have R&R and Acronis coexisting nicely.

Ed Gibbs

A new concern for me is that there have been reports that TSA officials at airports are requiring some passengers to turn on their laptops to inspect the data and in some instances, copying that data off the laptop. My client data is confidential and although there is no way I would surrender it, I...

Ok - time for a quiz. You have a sphere with a hole drilled clean through it, leaving a donut-like ring. The hole is 10 inches from top lip to bottom lip. (| |) You know neither the diameter of the hole nor the diameter of the original sphere. What is volume of the remaining donut-like ring? (You do...

The #1 reason to set the passwords is... so someone else can't. Every so often some poor [censored] will come on the board with a machine that "grew" a password while they were away from it. Funny joke to play on a co-worker, especially if it is set to a long random string of characters that the per...

Most states have some sort of charity care program, but they vary greatly by state. Here in NJ it is paid for by jacking up the rate that providers charge to cover the write-offs. Of course this increases what insurance companies pay, which increases the insurance rates. Or for those poor [censored]...

Gas prices today are actually quite reasonable... compared to what you will be paying next month. If you doubt that, think back a month or two to when a gallon of regular was in the $3.50 range (here in NJ) as opposed to the $3.87 I paid today. I used to spend about $25 a week on gas. Now I spend ab...

Sounds like a HDD failure to me. Do you have another machine you can stick that drive in as a secondary drive? If so you might get lucky and be able to copy off some of the data.

Ed Gibbs

If there is anything on it that she REALLY needs don't try to start it up again - just send it off to a recovery company and pray. If there was a real head crash then every time the platters spin your chances of getting anything off diminish. If it's just stuff she'd LIKE to have, go ahead and try i...

I've never done it, but some machines have an option to clear the security chip in BIOS. Try going into BIOS by pressing F1 at boot and see if you have it. Also not sure if clearing it will help with the issue you are having.

Might be time to call Lenovo.

Ed Gibbs

Cheers for the response chaps, will try my ultrbay in the T42 at some point, see if it works. If not assume a direct install of ther HD in the T42 will allow me to access the drive and remove the pw. A T30 Windows install may or may not boot well enough in a T42 to get to the point where you could ...

Try just pressing Enter at the password prompt.

Your best bet is probably a caddy in the T42. It should prompt you for the 2nd HDD password at startup, and once you supply it the drive should unlock and you'll be able to copy the info off.

You may also be able to remove the password from the T42 BIOS, but that is iffier.

Ed Gibbs

I'm sure you know this but they tend to be stricter WRT carry-ons on international flights. What makes it onto the Houston to Newark leg may not make it onto the flight to Bombay.

That said, a first or business class ticket can ease the rules a bit.

Ed Gibbs

For this kind of problem I would just do three things(in order): 1. backup data(by using recent version linux live cd and a external/internal drive) 2. wipe out that 20 hard drive 3. start a fresh windows system installation. I would add: 4. Conduct a damage assesment and remediation. Determine wha...

Hmmm... Strange.

Are you absolutely, 100% sure that the RDP is going through the VPN tunnel and not around it? That's the only thing that comes to mind.

Ed Gibbs

The remote computer probably has a private IP address on your network as opposed to a public IP. The library computer is probably set up to use a public DNS server which knows nothing about the private IPs on your network. If you can make changes to the library computer internet settings tell it to ...

THIS IS EXTREMELY INVASIVE. Surely I have some rights against Lenovo for using my taskbar as an advertising billboard for new batteries. Why do you think it's your task bar? Surely you read Paragraph 1.3.5(c).h.26(d) on page 167 of the EULA, down at the bottom in 2 point text where you agree that i...

That should work. Is the 2nd drive formatted NTFS? Do you have another OS on it or something that might have messed with the boot record?

Ed Gibbs

Are you trying to back up to it, or back it up?

R&R won't do the latter, the former should work.

Ed Gibbs

I'm not really sure what you are asking. Have you got a Power On, Supervisor, or Hard Disk password set that you want to get rid of?

If it's the Power On password the instructions to remove it are in the Hardware Maintenance Manual. If it's one of the others you're screwed.

Ed Gibbs

You need to switch the BIOS from Password mode to Passphrase mode.

Ed Gibbs

Thanks for reminding me why I swore I would never get a FPR.

If you know where you will be you should be able to talk Lenovo into shipping the repaired machine to the hotel rather than returning it to your home. IBM always used to do stuff like that, I hope Lenovo continued the tradition.

Ed Gibbs

I have had Access Connections updates cause all kinds of problems with networking. Can you uninstall Access Connections if you have it? You may not be able to - it sometimes won't uninstall. You can manually uinstall it if you are comfortable searching the registry for keys and deleting them. Make s...

I use Acronis to backup to a network drive only and R&R to backup to the local disk and the network. The backups do take up twice as much space on the network, but I've got over a TB now on my home network, so that's not a huge issue. You could certainly use Acronis by itself, but when it comes to b...

Best I can suggest is to clear the POP like you said by pulling the CMOS and main battery, and see what happens. I suppose it's possible that it switched itself from Passphrase to Password mode, so try entering the SP in all upper or all lower case and without any special characters. Beyond that I a...

I also use Acronis with R&R on my T42p, and find that they work well together. Acronis can do incremental backups as can R&R, and either of them will allow you to browse inside a backup and select only the files you want to restore. You may be wondering why we use both. I don't really trust R&R, hav...

Given the issues you are having this might not be the best time to purge your backups... If it was me, I would go out and get a 160 GB notebook drive, then pick up an ultrabay slim adapter for it. Then I'd buy a copy of True Image, and use it to move everything over to the new disk (including the se...

It doesn't come with a password - It is whatever you or the previous owner set it to. Try the password for any Administrator accounts on your machine, try blank (don't enter anything, just press enter), try all your usual suspects.

If none of that works you may have a problem.

Ed Gibbs

Also be sure to get PATA not SATA.