Twokinds ARCHIVE Forums

Okay, I got this really old laptop from my friend. Problem is there's a password on the login, the only login. My friend doesn't know the password. I can't afford a new one, or a new operating system, so I couldn't wipe the hard drive clean even if I knew how. For reasons I don't have time to explain, I only have today and some of tomarrow to solve this problem. I'm a noob when it comes to computers of any kind, so I have no idea what to do. I've searched Google, Yahoo, Ask, About, and even Dogpile, none of which were any help at all. You guys are sort of a last resort (only because of the time thing, it's not like I don't think you guys know what youre doing!). Any help of any kind would be greatly appreciated. Please, for the love of George Lucas, help me!

So...you want to know how to circumvent the security feature on a locked laptop...from your "friend"...who somehow doesn't remember the password...

Yeeeeaaaaah...not touching that one with a ten-foot pole...
<<;

....

Find out who your friend got it from, if it's third+ hand and if it's from him/her, strangle them until you get the answer out of them.

:|

Or make them guess, that always works
:D

God damit, why won't anyone freaking help me?! I had to trade my sega for this piece of crap, AND mod his xbox! Why the hell is everyone's first reaction that it's stolen? There are in fact honest people in this world who obtain expensive items through BARTER. There's also the fact that if I WAS a theif and I DID steal a laptop, I would AT LEAST have the [censored] sense to steal something other than a COMPAQ ARMADA 1700! To assume otherwise is outright insulting! :evil:

Yeah, but unfortunately this is the internet and nothing is ever really verifiable. Anyway, if you're not planning on using the laptop for gaming, why not just format it and put linux on it? I can walk you through that.

I know a couple tricks, but they're OS dependent. Without knowing the OS on the system, I can't say if they'd work. I don't think MS ever fixed the bug where a Win2K recovery disk gets full permissions on an XP system, since that falls under their "if someone has physical access to your computer, it's not your computer any more." So if you're looking at an XP laptop, that's my suggestion -- Find a Win2K recovery disk (yeah, not an easy task, I know).

You don't have time to run JohnTheRipper at this point, and we don't know what you need the box for. If it's just to get some files off, a Linux bootable CD can do it, quick and easy. If you actually need some functionality on the system that's OS dependent or a specific program, then you're looking at something more complicated. It's a shame you don't have OS disks for it, that'd make the situation much easier. If you just need a laptop, follow DK's suggestion, and put Linux on it.

Well, all of my problems have been solved. My friend called and said he'd give me XP (he recently got Vista). I feel like a bit of a jackass now. I apologize to everyone for wasting your time, and especially to tuna for freaking out on him. That's about the end of it, so I request the thread be locked.

...or you could just forget its existence. Either's fine.