hey guys!
my friend has a Portege A200 that has somehow managed to get a BIOS password on it, and nobody knows what that password is. this means it's a $2000 paperweight. I'm trying to get a service manual or some such so I feel more confident about opening it up and removing the CMOS battery, but because it's a model that's not available to the general public (it's sold only to schools) I can't get a manual from the toshiba website, and the googles do nothing. does anyone happen to know where I can find one?
thanks!
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Anonymous2006-04-18 3:27
You can't fix it that way. Most laptops don't store the BIOS passwords in volatile memory with a battery backing it up - BIOS passwords are there to discourage theft, and thieves could easily remove the passwords if it were that easy. You need a password unlocker dongle, which in the case of some Toshiba laptops can be made by taking an old parallel port cable and shorting certain combinations of pins together, or in other cases you'll need to buy one (USB dongles are available too), or pay someone else to unlock it for you.
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Anonymous2006-04-18 3:59
If I'm not wrong, all toshiba's are registered.
If you're the actual owner of the toshiba's notebook, you can go down to their service centre and they'll reset it for you.
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Anonymous2006-04-18 4:27
>>3
it's been resold from the school to a student, and she wants to avoid the fee of taking it to the service center. especially considering there isn't one in our city.
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Anonymous2006-04-18 4:36
Does it want a password before it will even boot, or just if you want to get into the BIOS to change boot order or something? If it's the latter there are programs that can reset your BIOS. Having said that they tend not to work on laptops since laptops use nonstandard hardware.
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Anonymous2006-04-18 4:45
>>5
it's asking for a password before it will boot. the person who bought it (and asked me to look at it) isn't particularly computer literate, so I highly doubt she's trying to get in to the BIOS to do something. I'm pretty sure she doesn't even know what a BIOS is...
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Anonymous2006-04-18 5:50
Have you tried the obvious password choices yet?
admin, password, toshiba, god...
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Anonymous2006-04-18 5:53
sadly, I haven't gotten my hands on it yet. I'm pretty sure she's tried the obvious passwords, but she may not have thought of them all. I'm just trying to make sure I have as much information as possible before I try anything to fix it, just to be on the safe side. hence asking if anyone has service manuals for it.