T42 HDD password confusion

[Edward Mendelson]

Hello,

Can anyone explain something to me that probably is obvious to everyone else?

On my T42 I want to be able to set the HDD password in the same way I set it on my 600X machines, in other words - on my 600X machines, I have a supervisor password (let's say it's "Elmo") and a poweron password (let's say it's "Oscar"), and the HDD is password protected also. When I turn on the 600X, it doesn't matter if I enter the supervisor password or the poweron password - the HDD is unlocked without typing a second password.

On my T42, I have the Supervisor password set to Elmo and the Power-On password to Oscar (not really but you get the idea). I set the HDD password to Oscar. Now, if I enter the supervisor password when I start the machine, I also have to enter the user/HDD password to unlock the HDD. What confuses me is that the item-specific help in the BIOS says under "HDD password" that "Hard Disk password [etc etc] In addition to the user password, an optional Master Password can be used to give access to the adminstrator." OK, I give up - HOW do I set that additional optional Master Password for the HDD???

Thanks for any help with this one!

Edward Mendelson

[MobileGuru]

Edward.

First you have to set the user HDD password. Once that is done you can return into the bios and set the master HDD from the same location. In order to enter the master password and override the user, at the HDD password prompt, press F1 and you will see a little supervisor type guy appear near the icon, now enter the master password.

For the longest time it was undocumented .. I dunno if that has changed yet.

[Edward Mendelson]

Thanks for that - but unfortunately (presumably a case of user idiocy) I'm still confused. I've already set the user password for HDD1, and now I want to set the master password for it. I get to the BIOS Setup Utility screen headed Password. The second to last item is Hard Disk1 Password. Next to it appears [User].

What I can't figure is exactly what keys I have to press (or what incantations I have to recite) to get that field to let me enter the master password. If I press Enter, a change password box pops up, but all that does is change the User password.

About pressing F1 at the HDD password prompt - could you also tell more details of this? I *think* your message meant that I can press F1 at the little locked HDD symbol during startup (not while editing the BIOS settings), and then enter the Master p/w instead of the user p/w. I tried that, but since I haven't yet figured out how to enter a Master password, it didn't do anything.

Sorry to come back to you for more help this way, but probably there are other people who can't figure this out either!

Edward Mendelson

[Riddil]

Assuming you have no passwords set:

-Enter BIOS, go to security
-Set whatever Supervisor password you want
-Set whatever power on pw you want
-Select "User+Master" password the system will prompt you to:
-enter & confirm the user pw
-enter & confirm the master pw

Reboot

Input the supervisor password when prompted

The system will now ask for your HDD password. Since you have two (user and master) you will be prompted to input the pw even though one of them may be the same as the supervisor password.

If you want to input the user HDD password, just input that pass, and hit enter to access the BIOS.

If you want to input the master HDD password, then you need to press "F1" to switch over to 'master' HDD input. (you'll see the icon change next to the pw prompt).

[Edward Mendelson]

Thanks for that! For some reason I was NOT getting the "User + Master" option at the HDD password entry. So I cleared all the passwords, restored the BIOS defaults, and started over - and sure enough, there was the option to set "User + Master" - just as you said. I can't imagine why it wasn't there earlier, but it wasn't.

Thanks again for helping me sort this one out...

Edward Mendelson