X41 Power up password not removed with normal methods

[Starting-windows]

As I understand it power on passwords are allowed to be discussed?

A friend was cleaning out their house and throwing out stuff, one of which was an ancient X41. It was used by family and it was ages ago, so they don't know the password. It didn't come with a charger, so I got one myself. The POP icon appears. I have tried the steps outlined by Lenovo, also tried to clear CMOS by removing and reconnecting the CMOS battery, but all that does is generate an error checking the date and time and the POP follows. I attempted to go into BIOS setup but all attempts end in a long delay at the IBM logo screen, the date and time error message and the POP shortly follows. Is there something wrong with the thinkpad?

[RealBlackStuff]

By removing the CMOS battery you have changed the password from POP to SVP.
Replacing the motherboard is usually the solution.

[Starting-windows]

By removing the CMOS battery you have changed the password from POP to SVP.
Replacing the motherboard is usually the solution.

What if there was no supervisor password?

[danikayser84]

Both the passwords (power-on and BIOS) might have been set on your X41, hence removing it not clearing the BIOS password (normally, if it's only the BIOS password, it will let you just see the system settings in the BIOS but won't let you change them as long as the battery has a charge; a power-on password prevents it from starting up unless entered)

Unfortunately the BIOS icons on many older models do not distinguish between the two (just POP/SVP and HDD, which shows a hard drive symbol instead of a monitor symbol), is the symbol a monitor or a hard disk? Could be a HDD password, but that can be solved by replacing the hard drive

[Starting-windows]

Both the passwords (power-on and BIOS) might have been set on your X41, hence removing it not clearing the BIOS password (normally, if it's only the BIOS password, it will let you just see the system settings in the BIOS but won't let you change them as long as the battery has a charge; a power-on password prevents it from starting up unless entered)

Unfortunately the BIOS icons on many older models do not distinguish between the two (just POP/SVP and HDD, which shows a hard drive symbol instead of a monitor symbol), is the symbol a monitor or a hard disk? Could be a HDD password, but that can be solved by replacing the hard drive

Monitor. Also, when 3 wrong passwords are entered, it prevents any further entry until restarted. This didn't come with a hard disk or battery.

[rkawakami]

To be clear, your newly obtained system may have had both the power-on password (POP) and Supervisor password (SVP) set at the same time. If the previous owner did it right, both passwords would have been set to different ones. The lock icon is the same for both (a picture of a computer monitor). The usual way of knowing which is which is how the system responds when simply powered up. If you get only the lock icon, and no error message saying lost date/time, then you are dealing with the POP. If you see the error message about lost date/time (implying a dead or removed CMOS battery) and then you are presented with the lock icon, then that's the SVP.