Service Forum

[eggman2112]

Hi everyone,

We have some new HP laptops that I would like to fix up.

The laptops are still under warranty (6 months old) but they have the bios password of a customers domain which we cannot obtain.

Heres what happens:

We send a new laptop to a customer to try and they return the laptop with a password and domain name in the bios setup screen.

We call the customer and ask what the password is and they say they didnt set a bios password. This has happen more than 10 times.

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I haven't tested the "adding systems creates a bios password" yet but I am assuming the windows hp protect tools software is automatically setting a bios password without the customers knowledge.

(If you haven't seen protecttools, it will let you see the bios and change the settings from the operating system.)

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I have called HP and this is a "user initiated situation that is not covered under warranty". They said that I have to take the system to an authorized service provider and pay to have the system board changed.

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I have seen this bios on most of the new HP business notebooks and I will find a solution even if I have to reflash the chips externally.

I have seen a chip with a blue dot that appears to be atmel 0825A 26DF321 SU.

I have attached some pics and let me know what you think.

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(Side Note: I have built the chip reader circuit and successfullly read passwords from IBM T40 and T42 so I am ready to try anything)

Regards,

eggman2112

[Disabled]

Hello,
you mention that you have some locked laptops, I would try to get two identical models with the same firmware version and try to read the AT26DF321 32-megabit 2.7-volt Only Serial Firmware DataFlash® Memory to compare their contents. To be able to do that you need to build a very simple programmer, the chip in that laptop is supported by this programmer, the information is in the next links:



Datasheet:
http://www.atmel.com/dyn/resources/prod_documents/doc3633.pdf


You may probably need to remove the firmware chip, don't know if this programmer supports In-Circuit programming/reading. I would ONLY remove the firmware chip if I had the proper tools (Hot Air Repair Station), you don't want to end-up with a chip with a broken leg, it has happened to me once, after that I bought a repair station.

DRGN997

[eggman2112]

Thanks for the information and links.

I have been working with some people that know quite a bit about bios chips.

One interesting discovery from the 2730p model is that the chip is not soldered to the system board but is in a removable socket. You could hot flash them by swapping the chips with the laptop running and setting a password. One laptop didn't like it and it died so its quite risky.

Some more comments about trying to read the bios chip I've received:

'It's quite different from regular BIOS in the sense that everything is compiled C code running in 32 bit protected mode and not hand-written assembler code running in 16 bit real mode.'

'Another main difficulty is that the flash file isn't the content of the FlashROM but some intermediary format which is probably encrypted.'

I will build a circuit and read the 2730p chip as I now have some software to try and the chip is easy to remove. We'll see how that goes but it doesn't look as promising as the IBM notebooks we already did.

[xordox]

Please tell me, I have a HP 2230s, with the same new bios security.
But I have only password for bios ( not power on and drive lock), Is it posiible to reset bios from Windows?
Thanks

[eggman2112]

Here is a link for the protect tools software manual and security manual:

http://bizsupport2.austin.hp.com/bc/docs/support/SupportManual/c01580453/c01580453.pdf

http://bizsupport2.austin.hp.com/bc/docs/support/SupportManual/c01508136/c01508136.pdf

This shows you how windows users can control the bios users. Of course you will also need the protect tools software suite if they have that for your system.

I think these are all the components of protect tools:

HP ProtectTools Security Manager Suite
Embedded Security for HP ProtectTools
Privacy Manager for HP ProtectTools
File Sanitizer for HP ProtectTools
Device Access Manager for HP ProtectTools
BIOS Configuration for HP ProtectTools

I think you need to be a bios administrator to change the other settings

Good luck with that.