Long Shot - Tech Support HDD Encrpytion removal

[Andrew L]

Hey this is a long shot but figured I would ask here cause I know some of you guys know a few things about a few things.

I got my hands recently on a Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon First Gen from work. I work in the IT department this laptop was purchased by another division that has a separate IT department. They have different standards than us and used the built in Lenovo Bios encryption where we use software like Symantec PGP. Anyway I asked them for the password and they gave it to me and it let me in so I could wipe the laptop completely and put a fresh install of Windows on it however every time this stupid thing boots up it asks for the HDD password and I have to enter it in before Windows boots.

I tried going into the BIOS and removing the HDD password but it tells me the password is wrong even tho it will let me in fine and boot windows after that. I don't understand I even asked the other IT department about this and they said they only use one password and never setup a different one.

My question is there anyway I can remove this completely? There's currently nothing on the drive except a clean install of Windows so there is no file retrieval or anything I just want this to boot like normal into Windows.

Also this stupid thing uses a proprietary NVME SSD so I can't take it out and put it in a USB adapter cause it doesn't fit.

In before "just throw it out it's old"

[Jon`C]

Have you tried "ThinkPad Drive Erase Utility for Resetting the Cryptographic Key and Erasing the Solid State Drive"?

[Andrew L]

Have you tried "ThinkPad Drive Erase Utility for Resetting the Cryptographic Key and Erasing the Solid State Drive"?

just tried it but it asks for the password and says it's invalid

[Phantom-Seraph]

Have you tried turning it off and on again?

[Mentat]

I tried going into the BIOS and removing the HDD password but it tells me the password is wrong even tho it will let me in fine and boot windows after that. I don't understand I even asked the other IT department about this and they said they only use one password and never setup a different one. My question is there anyway I can remove this completely? There's currently nothing on the drive except a clean install of Windows so there is no file retrieval or anything I just want this to boot like normal into Windows.

Are you certain that this is an HDD password prompt and not something else, like a Power on Password? If I'm understanding you, this was verified in the BIOS, but I just want to confirm, since Lenovo's have a multitude of potential passwords that can be set in the BIOS. For instance, my Lenovo has four passwords set in the BIOS (Administrator Password, Power on Password, and two HDD passwords). If incorrectly assuming it was an HDD password isn't your problem, is it possible that this isn't the HDD that was installed when the HDD password was set? If that's the case, you'd have to put the original HDD back in to remove the HDD password for that drive. I learned this the hard way when upgrading my NVMe a few years ago.

[Andrew L]

Are you certain that this is an HDD password prompt and not something else, like a Power on Password? If I'm understanding you, this was verified in the BIOS, but I just want to confirm, since Lenovo's have a multitude of potential passwords that can be set in the BIOS. For instance, my Lenovo has four passwords set in the BIOS (Administrator Password, Power on Password, and two HDD passwords). If incorrectly assuming it was an HDD password isn't your problem, is it possible that this isn't the HDD that was installed when the HDD password was set? If that's the case, you'd have to put the original HDD back in to remove the HDD password for that drive. I learned this the hard way when upgrading my NVMe a few years ago.

yea it's definitely the HDD password cause if I boot it without a HDD in it it boots up fine (except it says no HDD found) and I am able to get into the bios without needing a password. I ordered a new propritary NVME for it to see if that will fix it or not.