On Oct 20, 2014, at 12:25 PM, Bruno Wolff III <bruno@xxxxxxxx> wrote: > On Mon, Oct 20, 2014 at 09:51:43 -0600, > Bill Kuns <am497@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: >> I inherited a computer running Windows 8. When I power up the machine, >> it asks for a >> password. I don't have that password. What can I do to use the >> machine? > > A BIOS/EFI password or a Windows password? If there is a BIOS password you can usually pull the battery out for a few minutes and it will change back to having no password. But you will also lose your current BIOS settings which could potentially be a problem. I am not sure if machines using EFI typically need the battery to keep the password stored. You might need to do something else in that case. I suspect it's semi-immune to this, if the password is in NVRAM. It's called NVRAM for a reason. It might take hours (that's still pretty volatile) or it might take months for it to reset without a battery. At least on Apple hardware, firmware passwords forgotten require a kind of hardware reset that Apple's AppStore application will only do if that hardware's serial number is associated with an AppStore account that the user can login to. If you can't do that, e.g. it's a 2nd hand computer, you're SOL. You can bring it to an Apple Store and they can do the hardware reset presumably after they check whether it's a stolen laptop. Chris Murphy -- users mailing list users@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx To unsubscribe or change subscription options: https://admin.fedoraproject.org/mailman/listinfo/users Fedora Code of Conduct: http://fedoraproject.org/code-of-conduct Guidelines: http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Mailing_list_guidelines Have a question? Ask away: http://ask.fedoraproject.org
