Updated software, now it's asking me for a password..

[jamesm]

Hi
I have a T42 and last week I downloaded the most recent software updates, I'm not sure exactly what they were, I think it was maybe a new rescue and recovery thing.. Anyway after I had installed it it was asking me for a password to be used to log on at which point I just cancelled out of it as I don't really need any kind of security like that. I thought that was the end of the matter but then today when I turned the computer on the windows logon screen came up asking me for a password and I have no idea what that might be.. Has anyone else experienced this problem?

I've gone into the BIOS settings and disabled any things in the security section that were set to enabled but that doesn't seem to make any difference - I'm imagining that it's maybe something that the program has changed within windows. I can't get into safe mode (to try and do a system restore) either as that presents me with the same screen, also giving me the opportunity to type in an administrator password - is this something I would have entered when I set up the laptop in the first place?

Does anybody have any ideas? Is running the rescue and recovery likely to fix this? I have the discs from the previous version of rescue.

If anyone can help in any way that would be terrific

Thanks

James

[chrisnyc]

I don't know anything about the rescue and recovery software or anything about the IBM-specific advanced security features. All I use is a "power on" password, which can be adjusted in the bios.

I do know that when you first set up your computer, it DOES ask for and you probably entered an "administrator" password for the Windows XP installation. I wrote everything down when I set up the machine. I didn't even realize this until I was reading around on the forum and found it out. And in fact when you go into safe mode, you must have this administrative password that you set up ; in safe mode there's actually an account called Administrator that doesn't otherwise show up. I went into safe mode and eliminated the password so my Administrative account doesn't have one. I'm not sure if you can set up the account initially without entering this password.

So maybe you can try to remember what password you might have used on original set up of the computer.

I'm not even sure that's what your problem is with the IBM software ; but it probably explains why you can't get into safe mode.

[jamesm]

Thanks Chris, that's kind of what I thought and I'm sure I would have written it down somewhere, but I'm not sure where.. I think I was overcome with excitement when I was setting the laptop up. I guess whatever it was I installed just activated that windows logon screen.

Any ideas what I would do if I can't find the password? There's not really any critical data on the computer, is there some way of reinstalling everything from scratch or will I still need the admin password for that? Is this something you think IBM support could help with?

[Kyocera]

It seems like I read something in this forum about updating the software installer and a password issue, maybe do a search here for that.

You can start from scratch by reinstalling your system to the original configuration with the restore to factory contents option, turn off the PC wait 10 seconds, start, when promted push the blue access IBM button to take you to the recovery environment.

You could try booting into safe mode and changing your user account, if it does not ask for one to log into safe mode. Also, I know most people disable system restore, but with my bungling I need it, if you can get into safe mode possibly do a system restore to a date prior to the problem.

[jamesm]

Thanks Kyocera, good to know that restoring to factory settings is an option. System restore was my first thought but unfortunately it's asking me for the administrator password to get into safe mode. I guess if I do wipe it totally at least I'll remember to make a note of that this time..

Does anyone know what the program I installed would have been? It was through the IBM software installer thing and would have been made available probably not before the beginning of last week. It seemed to be some kind of security thing, was asking whether to use the same password as my windows password to log on - at which point I cancelled out of it as I knew I wasn't really sure what that was. I'm kind of annoyed that it implemented a change like that without making it clear what it was doing or giving an option to back out..

[GomJabbar]

By any chance did you try leaving the password field blank and just press enter? If you never entered a password on setup, maybe it's just looking for a blank password.

[jamesm]

Yeah, I tried that, no joy unfortunately. I'm going to have a good look and see if I can find something I might have written it down on and then if I can't just go ahead and restore to factory settings..