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Linsalata28

Linsalata28

Senior Member
Dec 24, 2012
155
47
Since everyone is so cool here I'm asking for a little help with another PC that was given to me its a Inspiron one. Thats about all I know about it. My problem is that my brother forgot the login password and he lost the recovery disc. I have no idea how to unlock this thing. I'm really hoping someone here has some clue how I can do this cause I decided to use this as my android computer. I want to dual boot w7 and ubuntu 12.04LTS. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
 
Easy to reset it with out the recovery CD.
Press either F11,F10, F9 , or maybe F12 at your Boot Up Screen One of these should take you into the system recovery mode where it will give you the option to either recover from the Recovery CD or the System Recovery partition this will effectively wipe the password from the hard drive and reset it back to factory specs.
Then you should be free to set up your dual boot.
BUT I would make me a set of recovery cds/dvds of the factory image before doing the dual boot either through the windows recovery manager or dell's oem recovery cd/dvd maker.

I have no idea if once it's dual booted you'll be able to access the recovery partition or not, So that's where the Recovery Disc will come in handy.

You can also go to dell's support site and type in the Service Tag# or manually look and match up the model of the laptop and get your needed manual and or drivers you'll need there.

I have a dell inspiron M511 so I am kind of used to them as I've also had other dell's as well.

Is it password protect on just booting up the OS?
OR is it password protected on the bios boot up or worse yet the hard drive?
The second one is hard to get around but it can be done most times.
BUT the third one if it's a protected hard drive without the password the hard drive is useless and will have to be replaced.

I hope this helps?
And if I can help any further let me know and I'll be glad to help you if I can.... :cool:
 
WasteLandSavage said:
Easy to reset it with out the recovery CD.
Press either F11,F10, F9 , or maybe F12 at your Boot Up Screen One of these should take you into the system recovery mode where it will give you the option to either recover from the Recovery CD or the System Recovery partition this will effectively wipe the password from the hard drive and reset it back to factory specs.
Then you should be free to set up your dual boot.
BUT I would make me a set of recovery cds/dvds of the factory image before doing the dual boot either through the windows recovery manager or dell's oem recovery cd/dvd maker.

I have no idea if once it's dual booted you'll be able to access the recovery partition or not, So that's where the Recovery Disc will come in handy.

You can also go to dell's support site and type in the Service Tag# or manually look and match up the model of the laptop and get your needed manual and or drivers you'll need there.

I have a dell inspiron M511 so I am kind of used to them as I've also had other dell's as well.

Is it password protect on just booting up the OS?
OR is it password protected on the bios boot up or worse yet the hard drive?
The second one is hard to get around but it can be done most times.
BUT the third one if it's a protected hard drive without the password the hard drive is useless and will have to be replaced.

I hope this helps?
And if I can help any further let me know and I'll be glad to help you if I can.... :cool:
Click to expand...

The PC is already setup with a dual boot. The password is the use login even it starts in windows.

Thanks everyone for the replies.
 
I can't seem to get any of this to work. I can still boot into ubuntu. Is there anyway to recover from there? Remember I know little about computers.
Thanks again for the help guys.
 
vampirefo. said:
You can't get ophcrack to work?
Click to expand...

No. I'm not sure how to use it. I put it on a usb flash drive but have no idea what to do with it. I have the options to hit f2 or f12 when it first boots and then f8 when I get to the window where I can choose either windows7 or ubuntu. Also I'm not sure, do I extract the zip on the flash dive? Either way I put the zip on it and also the extracted file and the files in the extracted file on the root of the flash drive. Thanks for the quick reply. I think this will make for a cool computer for moding. And it was free. I just wish the touch screen worked even though I would never use it LOL.
 
Linsalata28 said:
How would I just install ubuntu over windows 7 ? I have a live CD but when I run it, it says to install it alongside of Windows 7.
Click to expand...

I have never used Ubuntu, so it's installer I am not familiar with, The installer should give a choice to use entire hard drive or partitions, in my be advanced section of installer, when ask where to place root point to windows partition.
 
vampirefo. said:
Here is how to install Ubuntu

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/GraphicalInstall

scroll down to Installation type
Click to expand...

Thanks.
I know how to install it. What I'm asking is how to use gparted to partition my hardrive. This PC has a 500gb hd with 2 partitions one with ubuntu 11.10 with only 20gb and the rest for the w7. I would like to create a 200gb partition to install ubuntu 12.04LTS on. I already have the ubuntu disk. Also in case Ididn't mention I'm able to boot into the ubuntu 11.10 on this computer.

Edit: The reason is cause I'm getting a windows 8 that I'm also going to put on it. I would also like to wipe out this old ubunru. It was dual booted from the windows so I'm not sure how that works. Like I said I'm new to this stuff.

Thanks again for your help.
 
Last edited:
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