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accessing content of internal hard drive as external hard drive on different system

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  • 21-05-2010 12:24am
    #1
    pwd
    Closed Accounts Posts: 5,284 ✭✭✭


    My laptop will not start.
    I have another one. I also have a case for putting internal laptop drives in to use as external drives.
    I put the internal drive from the broken computer into this and it works fine. However I need to access stuff in non-public folders on the drive.
    So I need to know how to do this witout messing up the configuration for when the computer is fixed.
    If I can boot the computer from the external drive that would be fine, since obviously I know the password etc.

    edit: installed os on working laptop is vista. Installed on external drive is widows 7.


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    #2
    pwd
    Closed Accounts Posts: 5,284 ✭✭✭pwd


    I tried booting from the usb drive via boot options, however it gives a message saying it cannot verify the digital signature of winload.exe.


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    #3
    pwd
    Closed Accounts Posts: 5,284 ✭✭✭pwd


    ok I'm responding to the "you don't have permssion" message in vista with get permission and hoping it doen't mess thing up later.
    I have a second account on the drive with very little content and it worked fine for that.
    Actually it's surprising how easy it is to access the content (touch wood) without needing password...all you would need is physical access to get at someone else's documents apparently, if they didn't use any additional security.

    edit: That worked. I don't know how to get at the sql server database though, which uses windows authentication.


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    #4
    uprising2
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,627 ✭✭✭uprising2


    pwd wrote: »
    Actually it's surprising how easy it is to access the content (touch wood) without needing password...all you would need is physical access to get at someone else's documents apparently, if they didn't use any additional security.

    Check out Backtrack 4 and that will surprise you, then delete "physical access", windows login passwords are as tough as wet toilet paper and easily erased, you need to lock your whole system, locked HDD are really hard to get into, settings can be set by F2 at start up under security and enable all passwords. Just don't forget it, a HDD unlock can cost €1,000 or even more.

    My 7yr old daughter can remove windows login password in about 1 minute,


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    #5
    pwd
    Closed Accounts Posts: 5,284 ✭✭✭pwd


    uprising2 wrote: »
    Check out Backtrack 4 and that will surprise you, then delete "physical access", windows login passwords are as tough as wet toilet paper and easily erased, you need to lock your whole system, locked HDD are really hard to get into, settings can be set by F2 at start up under security and enable all passwords. Just don't forget it, a HDD unlock can cost €1,000 or even more.

    My 7yr old daughter can remove windows login password in about 1 minute,
    Cool. Can she remove windows authentication on sql server databases too, by any chance :)


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    #6
    Fysh
    Moderators, Arts Moderators, Regional Abroad Moderators Posts: 11,024 Mod ✭✭✭✭Fysh


    In fairness there are a lot of tools that will get you a lot of information from any given computer if you've got full physical access to it. If you're looking to hide/protect data you could consider using Truecrypt as an alternative option.

    As for the SQL Server database - this will be much easier if you can boot into the OS on the original drive. I'm not aware of any simple way to do this where you can just stick the drive in a USB caddy - realistically it's a case of either diagnosing the original fault in your laptop or putting it into another similar system.

    What was the original problem with your laptop?


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    #7
    pwd
    Closed Accounts Posts: 5,284 ✭✭✭pwd


    Think it's the power board. It's in warranty so it should be fixed on Monday. Powered up once there [while on phone to tech support] but it didn't boot anyway because there was no disc in it...trying to boot from the usb disc triggered startup repair which failed. Put the disc back in...won't power up again.
    Hopefully the boot failure was related to the internal disc being used externally and not from a problem with the disc :(


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    #8
    Fysh
    Moderators, Arts Moderators, Regional Abroad Moderators Posts: 11,024 Mod ✭✭✭✭Fysh


    pwd wrote: »
    Think it's the power board. It's in warranty so it should be fixed on Monday. Powered up once there [while on phone to tech support] but it didn't boot anyway because there was no disc in it...trying to boot from the usb disc triggered startup repair which failed. Put the disc back in...won't power up again.
    Hopefully the boot failure was related to the internal disc being used externally and not from a problem with the disc :(

    Yeah, I'd expect that it would be - since the disc interface is different (as far as the OS is concerned) it'll freak out when booting in a USB enclosure unless you've specifically prepared your installation media to allow installation to & booting from a USB drive.

    Once the hardware issue on your board is sorted it should be fine.


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