[ale] OT: Looking for some help with "locked" IBM Travelstar 30 Gig Laptop Hard Drive

[Michael H. Warfield]

On Sat, 2005-07-16 at 23:27 -0400, Greg Freemyer wrote:
> I don't know if it will help, but check out:
> 
> "ATA Password Tool," http://www.upsystems.com.ua/support/alexmina/atapwd.zip

	I got an error from that site.  I was able to retrieve it from here
(presuming it's the same):

	<http://www.rockbox.org/atapwd.zip>

	I haven't scanned it or checked for backdoors.  Use with due caution...

> I only know about it from reading a ATA drive white-paper discussing
> forensic issues:
> 
> http://www2.foi.se/rapp/foir1638.pdf
> 
> Chapter 5 of that white paper describes the ATA password feature.  I
> may be worth reading to understand what your trying to do.  Note that
> the goal of the white-paper is to read the protected data on the
> drive.  I think yours is just to make the drive usable again, so you
> may have a chance even if you can find the default master password.
> 
> Good Luck
> Greg
> 
> On 7/16/05, Van Loggins <vanloggins at gmail.com> wrote:
> > I got this off ebay for as a replacement drive for my Apple Powerbook G4
> > 500 MHz Titanium laptop that I am rebuilding.
> > 
> > To make a very long story short, This drive came out of an IBM Thinkpad
> > that seller was parting out for parts on ebay. The seller didn't know
> > that the drive had a password set on it while it was installed in the
> > IBM laptop. No one knows what the password was set to so the drive is
> > for all practical extents and purposes useless unless someone here can
> > help me out with a procedure to erase the service cylinder on the drive
> > which is where the password is stored according to all the info on the
> > subject that I have found using the google search engine. I have found
> > several services that offer a drive unlock service for this type of
> > situation but all of them cost more than I can buy another laptop drive for.
> > 
> > I thought using DD to erase the drive might do the trick but I was
> > wrong. Basically by having this lock in place on the drive it doesn't
> > allow you to make changes to the MFT table so you can't create a new
> > partition on the drive. Someone removed the partition on the drive
> > without clearing the password.
> > 
> > Any ideas anyone? I'm currently using a 20 gig drive in my Powerbook,
> > but it originally came with a 30 gig ibm travelstar drive so I would
> > kind of like to put it back to the original specifications.
> > 
> > Thanks in advance.
> > 
> > Van
> > 
> > --
> > Van Loggins        vanloggins at gmail.com
> >                    HOME # 706-864-6739
> >                    Cell # 678-316-0136
> > 
> >       _
> >      -o)
> >      /\\
> >     _\_v
> >  Linux User #316727
> > 
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> > 
> 
> 
-- 
 Michael H. Warfield    |  (770) 985-6132   |  mhw at WittsEnd.com  
  /\/\|=mhw=|\/\/       |  (678) 463-0932   |  http://www.wittsend.com/mhw/
  NIC whois:  MHW9      |  An optimist believes we live in the best of all
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