Help clearing cmos/bios passwords in Asus laptop

Da Mail Man

Da Mail Man

Active Member
Greetings all,

I was asked to try and fix 2 Asus x551m notebook pc laptops that were purchased from best buy a few years ago at one of their tax free weekends. The one, I got back on it's feet and the other is FU! What I had determined is that Best Buy sold a possible returned computer to the current owner as new. This was determined by the internal inspection that showed scratches in the battery "trough" and a few missing internal screws.

When these were purchased, the buyer only tried the one and not the other. I tried for 3 days to kill the BIOS/cmos /Admin password(s) and to no avail. I opened the unit and removed the mother board and the battery for 10 min as well as the large battery. Then, held in the power button for 5 min and the log-in password as well as the Admin password(s) remain intact. Further, each time I boot the computer (with the new hd and with the old) there appears a square box asking for a password. Somehow, I managed to create a user profile that enables me to get past that screen with a pass I created.

I also determined that the hard drive was bad in that, when I inserted a few "password recovery/changer/deleter" CD's with the hard drive plugged in, the CD wouldn't boot. So, I have another GOOD empty hard drive installed and the C.D.;s function but, I still cannot eliminate the passwords. This prohibits me from making changes to the BIOS, boot order, etc, etc.

I see no jumpers on the board as is usually present in most computers. How can I clear the passwords in this POS? There is no OS installed. Any Ideas?...Thanks in advance!
 
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Most of the time you cannot clear a BIOS password from a laptop, even if you remove all sources of power.

I have only once actually seen someone clear a BIOS password. It was on an IBM ThinkPad, and they had to make a USB device that they placed on several contacts on the motherboard as they ran some type of software, and luckily they were able to clear it. But that was the only time I've seen it.
 
Thanks for the reply...Gonna try and get a pict or two up tomorrow...I have "acquired" various programs that are alleged to do this but, they too are a POS...I did read where someone had to log into windows and fiddle with that in order to change/delete passwords but, lagging an OS here prompts me to temporarily install one and try that "trick".
 
Some laptops have a built in jumper for this, but it's usually not labelled and varies from model to model. Most Toshiba's have them, 2 little solder points near the RAM slots that you can short and clear it. I've done this a few times at work. Other times you can crack it but we can't help with that. More often than not though if you have a BIOS password it's not coming off without you knowing it. My laptop is similar and I doubt it has a jumper.
 
HackSpoon said:
Have you looked at backdoor passwords?
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No, however, I had read that someone changed/eliminated/cleared the passwords by installing an OS and then screwing around with the date with success which brings me to my next related issue! I was going to attempt this (install os) but, I keep getting a "BIOS NOT ACPI COMPLIANT" error message. I tried to load win 7 as well as win xp and still get message. I am unsure of i can overwrite the current bios by flash.


Darren said:
Some laptops have a built in jumper for this, but it's usually not labelled and varies from model to model. Most Toshiba's have them, 2 little solder points near the RAM slots that you can short and clear it. I've done this a few times at work. Other times you can crack it but we can't help with that. More often than not though if you have a BIOS password it's not coming off without you knowing it. My laptop is similar and I doubt it has a jumper.
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I took a few pict of board while i had it out but, didn't see any visible jumpers...Will re-look for any other as you have indicated.
 
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You can attach them as long as they are within size limits. Or you can host them on a file sharing site and link them.
 
I ran possibly 12 password "altering" programs and still, none work. I also read but, with some replies contradictory, that is bios/cmos is PW protected, flashing another bios would not be possible.
 
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