My friend bought this Dell laptop off of eBay. It worked fine, and had a hard disk password on it. However he changed it a while back, and the next morning he forgot it. He tried calling Dell for their help, however they claim that he needs to have himself registered with them, but in order to do so, he has to provide proof of past owner. Going back onto eBay (for which he doesn't know the password either) he attempted to do the "forgot password" detour (he knows his username) which should send him an email. He is SURE that the email address he entered before is correct and nothing is blocked, yet he still hasn't recieved an email from eBay about his account. This has been tried multiple times. The problem is that Dell CAN help him; there is a master password for recovering Hard Disk passwords (not the BIOS password), yet they refuse to give it to him. I have tried calling (as i have a laptop of my own from Dell) and asked her to give me the password. She sends me an email and says the password will be given to me after i give them my number and best time to reach me. I reply and still don't get the password! Stupid Dell tech support.

So now I ask anyone here: Does anyone know the master password for the Inspiron 5100 model from Dell? This has nothing to do with linux and there's no laptop forum that doesn't have anything to do with linux, yet so many people use this forum, so i thought i'd give it a shot (wouldn't hurt, or?).

Thanks a lot in advance.

Sorry, but getting help on this issue is going to be difficult. So many laptops are stolen, and the problems you are reporting are a common indication of a stolen machine. Not saying that's the case, but it's a fact of life. If you can't prove ownership, then you can't get the password. It's what protects owners from having their equipent stolen (no one will buy a stolen laptop without a password).

Short answer, if you can't prove to Dell that you are the owner, buy a new hard drive.