Since
early 2002 this
site has been dedicated to ThinkPad™ (TP) owners who find themselves locked
out for whatever reason, they may not know the Power On Password (POP) or Supervisor
Password (SVP) or Hard Disk Password (HDP) or encounter a BAD CRC1 or CRC2 ERROR
on their TP.
TP owners will have subsequently discovered, to their absolute amazement,
that the manufacturer of their beloved TP offers no economically
viable solution. The manufacturer does not have a policy to help genuine legitimate owners
out of this predicament without paying, in some cases more than the TP is
worth, to replace for no sane or logical reason their perfect and fully functional
System Board!
Joe
in Australia offers the only Affordable Fully Assembled, Programmed and
Tested unlimited use USB based ThinkPad
Supervisor Password [SVP] Recovery or Clear Tools in the world.
It provides the elegant convenience of a dedicated, fully assembled and tested, Ready To
Use USB based ThinkPad SVP Recovery or Clear tool which unlocks an
unlimited number of TPs together with detailed illustrated step by step
instructions which everyone can understand and follow.
Joe's
KeyMaker X1 [KMX1] and X2 [KMX2] can
Recover or Clear Supervisor Password from all current IBM and Lenovo ThinkPad
models with the exception of the SL300 SL400 SL500 G550 T*40 X*40 X1 Carbon (Gen
2) it can do this even if TPM/TCPA/PC8394T/8356908 security has been enabled
SL300
SL400 SL500 G550 T*40 X*40 X1 Carbon (Gen 2) do NOT store Supervisor Password
[SVP] in an EEPROM, that is the reason the SVP cannot be recovered in those
models from an EEPROM by KMX1 or KMX2
Clearing a Supervisor Password (SVP)
from a TP is fairly straightforward.
Once you know how to avoid all the
TRAPS IBM/Lenovo have set for you the customer.
Trap number 1, the Hard Disk Password
(HDP)
If at any time you see this Password
prompt icon
That icon with the small number 1 (it
may be a small number 2 or 3 if you have more than one Hard Disk]
means the HDP is set. You will not be able to easily recover or clear
the HDP, KMX1 or KMX2 will NOT recover or clear HDP.
It will cost you more to clear the HDP
than a new reliable Hard disk with warranty is worth.
Clearing a HDP is only worth the
expense and effort if there is valuable data on the Hard disk that
MUST be recovered.
If HDP is set then
remove the Hard Disk [HD] before continuing so that you can determine
which other passwords (IF ANY) you need to recover or clear.
There may not be any other password set!
Ok, you removed the HD and you see yet another
Password Prompt icon.
Trap number 2, the guessing game - is it SVP
or POP -
The trap is that IBM/Lenovo in their wisdom chose to
have THE SAME PASSWORD PROMPT ICON for BOTH SVP and Power on
Password (POP)
The password prompt icon pictured
above
Does NOT define which PASSWORD it is asking you to enter.
It can be either POP or SVP
Note: On some Lenovo ThinkPad models
under some circumstances a Supervisor Password prompt icon looks like
this
I have only seen this distinctive SVP
icon on one ThinkPad, so it is RARE for now, almost all ThinkPads to
date use the same icon to prompt for POP and SVP.
Only ONE way to find out for sure
which one it is and maybe save a LOT of time.
-
-
Spend the time to read the first part of the HMM
which deals with Cautions some of which like for example Shock Sensors
are very important, you would not want to roughly handle your System
board to find out when you power it up to unlock it that in fact you
have ruined it.
Read the HMM section dealing with Passwords and
become familiar with how to remove Power on Password [POP]
WARNING:
If you have a ThinkPad that can
boot even though it has a Supervisor Password set
Removing Power On Password [POP]
will render it unbootable Until the Supervisor Password is removed AND
the correct Date and TIME are set in BIOS setup
Having first READ AND UNDERSTOOD THE WARNING ABOVE
YOU DECIDE if you will follow the instructions for POP Removal
NOTE - IMPORTANT - make sure you
do read this !!
The instructions in the IBM/Lenovo HMM regarding
POP removal are easily misunderstood.
The CMOS backup battery [small single cell lithium
battery, usually yellow colour] must be disconnected.
Main battery MUST be removed.
AC Adaptor MUST be unplugged from the ThinkPad.
In other words the ThinkPad must have
absolutely no electrical power, no CMOS battery - no main battery -
no AC adaptor connected.
Then with NO ELECTRICAL POWER at all to the
ThinkPad WAIT A FEW MINUTES just to be on the safe side.
Confirm that POP has in fact been removed;
After POP removal, connect the CMOS battery,
install the Main battery, connect the AC adaptor.
Switch the ThinkPad ON and you should see an ERROR
MESSAGE about Date and Time needing to be set.
That error message is your confirmation
of a successful POP removal.
That is NOT a real error, it simply means that
once you can go into BIOS setup you need to set the correct Date and
Time, so it is not something that is of real concern, nothing is
wrong, this is normal.
If you do not see an error message that means
that you DID NOT reset POP. Main reason is usually that you have
not removed ALL POWER from the ThinkPad, read the "NOTE -
IMPORTANT" paragraph above and try POP removal again.
After performing POP Removal
if there is no password prompt icon displayed, you
are done, your TP is unlocked, go to BIOS setup by pressing F1 when
switching ON [press ESC key to continue past the error message] and
set Date and Time then press F10 to save.
if you have performed POP Removal and
you continue to see this password prompt icon
It does NOT mean you didn't
perform POP Removal correctly
It means that with
POP removed, you have now absolutely confirmed that you do indeed have
a SVP set and you can now put the time and effort into removing or
clearing it.
I
didn't know there was a Supervisor Password (SVP) set - did the ThinkPad
(TP) set one all by itself ?
Lots
of TP users are not aware that their TP has a SVP set.
A
TP with a SVP set does NOT prompt for the SVP when switched on and is
allowed to boot normally.
This
is exactly how I got involved in SVP password recovery.
My
TP worked perfectly for many months until one day I needed to change a
setting in BIOS setup.
It
was only when I pressed F1 to enter BIOS setup that a SVP prompt
appeared.
If
the CMOS battery goes flat or is disconnected for even a very brief
period the Date and Time are reset, next time the TP is switched on it
absolutely insists that you go to BIOS setup in order to set the correct
Date and time, if there was a SVP set [even though you had no idea a SVP
was already set] then it prompts for the SVP.
No,
the TP will never set a SVP all by itself, human intervention is always
required to set a SVP.
Joe's KeyMaker KMX1
and KMX2 can Recover or Clear Supervisor Password from all current ThinkPad
models with the exception of the SL300 SL400 SL500 G550 T*40 X*40 X1 Carbon (Gen
2) it can do this even if
TPM/TCPA/PC8394T/8356908 security has been enabled
KMX1 and KMX2 are the latest state of the art
innovative ThinkPad SVP unlocking tools from Joe in Australia
Disclaimer
I make no warranty that any of my
information is correct, or safe, or does or does not breach any
warranty clause, or anything else, it is up to you to decide if
you will follow all or any of the instructions to recover the
Supervisor Password from a TP. It is up to you to decide, I am not
responsible for the results or for any consequential or incidental
damages whatsoever.
By Vijayan
raminfotech R&D
ww.raminfotech.net
raminfotechadyar@gmail.com
