Oh man what Have I done... (battery and KNOWN password)

[DJ UDX]

The model is Thinkpad 600 and this is regarding CMOS battery.

Even though I could have done this without removing the battery (basically my thinkpad battery went to someone else's laptop - my bosses - while I assembled mine from bosses old battery and purchased a basic 2025 battery at the store).

Now my laptop boots up without the 192 error code but 161 and 163 still appear.

Then the lock icon comes up and I do remember my password (In this case I believe it was supervisor password - not sure though). I type it in and the TP won't accept it. I have done it thousand times and I am positive it is the right password.

What the heck could have happened? After researching and trying to password "pad" shortcircuit my unit I just gave up (I even soldiered two wires together it still didn't work).

Nothing works - manual, F1 key, nothing.

What could have happened and if anyone has some advice I'd appreciate it?

*EDIT* Just wanted to point out that I am not that upset as I have two other laptops. If worse comes to worse I can always use a hard disk and memory from this laptop. I figure the battery could have died on its own anyways, and this would have happened either way.

But I am [censored] off a little and guess what... No more thinkpads. Personally, this design flaw is not very smart but rather it's VERY STUPID. Most CMOS-es are actually cleared with battery removal, not screwed up. At least put a warning sign - before you remove the battery please disable password from Bios and HD.

UDX

[DJ UDX]

Sorry my bad. It was prompting me for BIOS password which I did set up to be different.

I typed it in and voila put me in the date screen immediately.

I still chose to leave my comments above as this is EXTREMELY STUPID to do.

As of this moment right now I am removing all the passwords from BIOS.

[JHEM]

Of what benefit to anyone, other than a thief, is a PW system that can be easily overcome by simply removing the CMOS battery?

If you want to ensure the data contained on your laptop is secure, then the best thing is to set a Power On PW, a Supervisor (BIOS) PW and a HD PW.

It's not a flaw in the design that left you at a PW prompt, it was excellent security.

Regards,

James

[Greg Gebhardt]

Sorry my bad. It was prompting me for BIOS password which I did set up to be different.

I typed it in and voila put me in the date screen immediately.

I still chose to leave my comments above as this is EXTREMELY STUPID to do.

As of this moment right now I am removing all the passwords from BIOS.

For sure your bad!

As a person who had his ThinkPad stolen with more sensitive data than I care to think about, I find the IBM ThinkPad security excellent.

Seems you are ticked off over YOUR mistakes and not being able to defeat the IBM built in security.

Think about it.

[DJ UDX]

RE: on the other hand, yes I agree with you guys it's excellent way to secure your personal data.

Yea, it's just the time I spent on this thing has made me extremely upset.

The funny thing was that after hitting enter button it would show OK (ok let's say the design intended it to be like that, showing "incorrect password" would still do the job) and then it would just froze (I was like what the heck?). So then I tried removing the memory, the battery, you know how it goes - whole bunch of unecessary troubleshooting.

Oh and b.t.w. is the other battery issue just a CMOS problem? I updated it recently and it still tends to drop at some point (although much less than before).

I looked arround and found one page where this dude was really [censored] off, and he said that he will continue to hunt IBM to fix this issue. He stated that it is the chip on the battery that screws things up. The other guy suggested to put the battery in the freezer overnight but not sure if that would help.

Thanks ahead

UDX