Laptop Hard Drived Locked

[TheIxC3xRxTeam]

Ok, see i have this laptop hard drive, i have had it for a while now only using it as an external drive for storage, but now i want to put it in my laptop and load an os on it.

when i put the hard drive in the hard drive loctaion and turn on the laptop, there's a message that says i have to enter the correct password to access this hard drive, but i never put in a password for it, ever.

I bought it new, about 5years ago from best buy, so i don't believe that it was on the before when i purchased it new.

any ideas?

It's probably a password for the laptop, not the HDD. Try resetting the CMOS to see if you can access it.

[TheIxC3xRxTeam]

nope not the laptop.

I can use other hard drives in it without a problem.

I've never heard of a HDD having a password. A BIOS password, for setup and booting, but not just to access the HDD.

[SeanC]

How were you using it as an external drive before? Perhaps that has something to do with it.

Sean

[TheIxC3xRxTeam]

here is what i get when i try booting and installing an os

[TheIxC3xRxTeam]

i bought an external usb 2.0 case


Message:
Hard Disk #xxxxxxxxxxx -595B
, the system Primary HDD, is protected by a password authentication system.
You cannot access data to use this hard drive without the correct password.Message:

Have you tried just pressing "Enter"?

Can you get into the BIOS before it does this? Maybe you need to turn that feature off or something. I don't think this is HDD problem.

[TheIxC3xRxTeam]

nope, it gives that message before i can access it

Hmm . . . at this point I would,

- Remove HDD from laptop and put it back in the USB enclosure and delete any partitions.
- Put it back in the laptop and cross fingers to see if it goes passed that password part.
- If it doesn't, put original back in and get into the BIOS and disable any and all security checks to make sure that's not stopping it.
- If after that, the HDD still can't be accessed, I'd check out Dell's FAQ's or call their Tech Support to see if this is a problem or design function.