Soooo.. uh... yeah. Apparently I set a BIOS password for setup. I don't remember doing so, but knowing me, I probably did. It's also possible that someone may have done this for me as a joke, but there's no telling how long ago and anyone recently around my computer won't own up to it.

But anyway. My computer has been having freezing issues, running slow, etc.... So, I figure I'll reload everything. Good idea. I then backup all my important stuff, get the cd's out and restart the computer to enter setup so that I can set it to boot from the cd. Hmmm... password?

Anyway, I don't remember what it is if I am the one that set it. I have tried all my normal passwords. I don't write passwords down as that defeats the purpose of the password in the first place.

I have been reading a lot about the software available that can get the password for you, but they have to be run from dos. I can't do that as I can't boot from anything other than the hdd. I also read that taking the cmos battery out usually doesn't help on laptops anymore, and that if it is an eeprom, it can be expensive to read or replace.

Any ideas? Any programs you guys know of run from inside windows? Or is there another way to start dos so that I can maybe run one of those other programs?

Thanks for any help. I have the bad feeling that I'm really screwed on this one, with no lube.

Ummm... yeah... computer info.

Sager NP5793 (Clevo M57RU), Phoenix BIOS (I don't know which version, I'll see if it has it on the splash screen), Windows Vista 64, 4 GB RAM, 8800 GTX, a hdd and lcd screen with some ports in the back and on the side. Oh, there might be a DVD RW in there too. I'm not sure what's pertinent to the question.

If your model has ready access to your CMOS battery, and if it's removable, you can pop it out for 5 minutes and that should reset the BIOS password. Check your manual for a diagram on the location of your battery, or flip your notebook over and look around in the RAM compartment (that's where I've located the battery in most notebooks).

No ready access, unless I'm blind. Only one part of the case comes off easily and the battery is not there.

I was reading somewhere that removing the cmos battery on most laptops will no longer work as the password is stored in an eeprom or something like that. I think it's non-volatile and removing power doesn't clear it out.

I don't know. This sucks. Guess I'll have to contact Sager and see what they would charge to do whatever it takes to reset that password. It's killing me that I can't remember. The BIOS is rarely accessed for me, so I know I'd use something that would be easy for me to rememer as it may be a long time before I needed it. Guess my memory is worse than I thought, lol.

Well that sucks. Hopefully Sager won't charge you an arm and a leg if they can help you.

Well... all is not lost. I didn't remove the cd drive from the boot process, just made it so the hdd boots first, making it "hard" for someone to boot from a cd. However, I was playing around and found out that if you hit esc while on the splash screen (where you would normally hit F2 for setup, it will perform a quick memory test and then take you to a screen where you can choose what you want to boot.

So, I still can't change any BIOS settings, but I can now try some utilities that have to run in DOS to clear the password. I can also go ahead with the reformat and reinstall of the OS.