Seagate Momentus 7200 RPM drive locked by something, any way to reset the disk to make it usable?
10 replies, posted
Every time you try to use boot this disk, it comes up with this:
[IMG]https://i.imgur.com/KlfhpyX.png[/IMG]
(got the screenshot by mounting the physical disk in VirtualBox)
It only shows as a 128 MB volume that you can't erase, format, or mount. It's a 250 GB drive.
Is it possible for me to remove this lock on the drive at all? It'd be nice to have since it's 7200 RPM and my girlfriend's laptop could use the boost.
You can't mess with the partitions in something like GParted or DiskPart?
[QUOTE=Protocol7;52764229]You can't mess with the partitions in something like GParted or DiskPart?[/QUOTE]
They return I/O device errors, but something tells me that's being done by the lock on the drive because it boots reliably to that lock screen every time.
It's called Hardware FDE and if you don't have the password the drive is trash.
[QUOTE=darksoul69;52764243]It's called Hardware FDE and if you don't have the password the drive is trash.[/QUOTE]
Yeah, I just did a little more research and came to the same conclusion.
[url]https://www.technibble.com/forums/threads/how-to-erase-a-self-encrypted-drive.43829/[/url]
Sorry dude.
Well that suxxxx
Thanks guys, at least I didn't waste a whole heap of time trying to get around it.
[editline]9th October 2017[/editline]
Update: Was fun to take apart. I might hook an aux jack up to the arm to make the hard drive sing.
I don't get how you can't just straight wipe a disk like that. I've come across healthy disks like this. I don't give a shit whats on it, just throw away the encryption and let my write to it.
I remember sorting one of these out for a customer a few years ago, depending on the drive some times you can get away with a few solder jumpers and it will then let you write to the drive but not read. (So you destroy all partitions on the drive and then it should show up as unallocated space)
[QUOTE=Brt5470;52764521]I don't get how you can't just straight wipe a disk like that. I've come across healthy disks like this. I don't give a shit whats on it, just throw away the encryption and let my write to it.[/QUOTE]
Because the disk controller doesn't even mount the actual drive content, and blocks any I/O requests at the hardware level.
Yeah, the password is stored in the SA on the drive.
If you have the right tools you can remove the password but they’re quite expensive.
you’re better off with a new drive tbh.
