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Hello i just bought 18 desk tops from a city, they are complete units that came with the key boards speakers ect,they basically unpluged them and gave them to us they have a windows XP professional software in them, and all have the username and are asking for passwords,is there any way to clear this out so we can sell these systems
They are gateway and dell systems nice units p.s.I paid $5.50 for each system, thanks
computer repair guysshould have disks to take care of that
thank you never thought of them
start it in safe mode and create a new user account once its booted up, if not try signing in under the guest account
PM sent. Google, is your friend ;)
First thing you should do is completely wipe the drives so you don't give the buyer a virus or city information. Most companies that give or sell computers count on us wiping the drive and then do a new instal of Windows.Quote:
Originally Posted by 1956
Just my .02
We will, thanks for your input
If they came from a govement ageny of any kind first thing I would do iwipe the drive NOW.
I agree, you can download a disk for free that will allow you to bypass a windows or bios password. Just use google.Quote:
Originally Posted by NewbyScrapper
I buy thousands of computers from govt each year......If they wanted the HD wiped or removed they would have done it themselves.....So don't worry about that.........A fresh install of the Operating System of your choice (If the machine can handle it) will do the trick......Put computer with flat screen, keyboard, and mouse and list on Craigs List
check for a recovery partition on the hard drive, if it's got that you can simply re-install. Maybe even check in windows for creating a rescue disk, and do a clean install from it
Download dban and burn it to a CD. Then start the computer up after hooking up a monitor, keyboard and mouse. As soon as it boots up, put the CD in and restart. dban should load and you can wipe the hard drive clean.
Don't play around. Reinstalling an OS like Windows or Linux won't be enough. Wipe them clean before you do anything else. Then you can format the hard drives and install an operating system. But unless you are licensed by Microsoft, install a lightweight Linux system like Precise Puppy or **** Small Linux. Let the next guy worry about installing Windows and registering it, if that's what they want to do.
Edit: Didn't know a word would be censored. The censored word is like one step worse than saying "darn." It really is the name of the operating system.
doing a full recovery from either the recovery partition or disk will format and give you a totally clean install. Have any problems, blame windows, they promised you during the recovery that everything would be wiped/erased/destroyed/mutilated/nuked/obliterated
From what I read all it will do is delete any reference to the data, but the data will still be there. If someone knows what they are doing, they can recover the data. It's much safer to use a disk wipe utility that will reformat and overwrite everything in three passes with ones and zeroes. Then you can do a fresh install of an operating system.
a full recovery wipes it completely, as opposed to doing a "repair", which will, in fact, leave information ; ) chances are he doesn't have either option anyway, but it's certainly worth a look, in lieu of obtaining another full operating system disc for each machine
No a full recovery does not wipe it completely. It will write over portions of the disk that had information but not all of it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bear
To completely wipe a drive you must write over every sector 7 times per DOD specifications to destroy the data completely. While these standards are out of date, it's still the standard. That's why most companies Degas or destroy. Faster and cheaper.
Think of a drive like a puzzle. When it's faced up you can read the data.
Now delete the partition table and you cant read the data easily. This would be like flipping the puzzle over. You can still flip it back to read the data.
Now say you formatted the disk just once. This is like breaking up the puzzle into all it's original pieces. Much harder to put together and some pieces will be missing but you could recover money prohibiting.
Now say you installed a new OS directly ontop of the other. where the computer decided to put it on the disk would now be unrecoverable. It would be like your sister spilling paint on your puzzle. most of it's covered but you can still see some pieces.
Now comply with the DOD standard wipe of 7 pass's or 3 is more than enough with todays technology. It's like taking each puzzle piece, killing any one that's ever laid eyes on it, blacking them out with permitting marker then throwing them into the center of the sun. Point is once a sector has been written over several times it's useless to try and recover data.
Also just a note. Most formats dont delete any data. They only delete the partition table and FAL so the disk now sees that space as available to write data to again. The data still exists.
Think of your post like a puzzle.Quote:
Originally Posted by drozenski
When the drive is formatted and re-partitioned, and a new operating system is installed(written in the same place that the old one was) on the drive, any previous information is, for the most part, GONE. How many have you ever recovered, after even a re-partition? That information is easily lost, and hard to retrieve (try it sometimes ; )
Anyone who thinks they'll have a future problem with any drive, need simply recall Microsoft's warning at the onset of ANY format, which states, in capital letters, "ALL INFORMATION WILL BE LOST!"
Soooo, when they drag you in to court, in their 50 zillion dollar lawsuit, because someone managed to retrieve half of an old (expired by now) credit card number, and a blurred photo of their ex(in a not too complimentary position), you can simply say, "Microsoft promised me, go ask them why" ; )
This will explain it better than I can:
Disk Formatting vs. Disk Wiping | Enterprise Features
I normally just hook the drives up in an old pc and then just format them. I find if the information on them is useful in any way they would have removed it already. Unless you specifically sign an agreement that you will provide secure data destruction then I wouldn't worry to much.
For us old timers who remember what a card catalog in a library was, there is a good explanation for the difference between just deleting the file (or even just formatting the drive) and wiping the drive. When you delete a file or partition the drive, it is the same as removing the card from the card catalog. The book is still in the library, but it is not easily found. Someone who wants to find it can do it. Wiping actually gets rid of the book. We wipe every disk. If it can not be wiped, it is destroyed. Whether I have signed a document promising it or not, I just think it is the right thing to do.
There's a really easy way into windows XP login. Simply type "administrator" as user name and press enter (no password). I believe all systems of XP came factory set with an administrator account and this has always worked for me unless the individual changed the settings. However, I'm like ROK. I wipe them no matter what.