Locking your PC through the BIOS?

Instead of going through the time to encrypt my drives (which by chance has little of value on them), is there a way on newer computers to simply lock it down through the BIOS?

The reason that I ask, is that my older Dell notebook has this option, a password must be entered to even boot it, not even a boot disc will unlock it.

I went through the BIOS on mine, when I had to enable HAV to run Windows Virtual PC. When I was there, I seen the options to create passwords, supervisor passwords, but no option to lock it down totally. Mabye one of these does lock it down, it's just not showing.

Does anyone know how to do this on a HP Pavilion (see my specs)?

Thanks for any responses.

Cat

Unless I am mistaken, any password set in the BIOS can be removed by pulling the battery.

Yes that is correct

If anyone wants your data and the drive is not encrypted, they can simply plug it into another machine. All the password in BIOS does is prevent that machine from booting, it does nothing to the drive.

You can encrypt specific files rather than the entire drive; although if the key is maintained on the drive then you are really only protecting the files from someone stealing them over the internet, again if they have physical control of your harddrive they can likely access them.

Notebooks are different than PCs. Although PCs can grow legs, notebooks already have good ones. NTFS has supported data encryption since day 1. Notebook makers typically take advantage of that because people walk off with other people's notebooks all the time.

http://www.ntfs.com/ntfs-encrypted.htm

I realize about the encryption deal, as I was using BitLocker when I had Ultimate on here. One of my backup drives (the Seagate FreeAgent) is encrypted. What I want is a simple way to disable starting my computer, like say, if we had company or whatever. I can't watch the grill & my desktop at the same time.

As far as the battery goes, that would take a lot of time to find, especially for someone that doesn't know about it. I don't even know where the BIOS battery is on here. On my notebook, it's behind a small door on the bottom. There's no such small door on here, except a cover that accesses the RAM.

For me, it's just to prevent unauthorized access to my desktop. I suppose if I wanted to, I could just kill the power by a toggle switch, more or less a fancy power strip inside of my computer desk. It must serves some purpose, as it guarantees my equipment up to $25,000, in case of power surges. It slides into place on a narrow shelf, and has 6 switches for various equipment, plus a main one for all. It's about 12 inches wide, a little deeper, and is about one and a half inches tall.

Also, the door to that part of my desk locks, so really I could do either. I just figured the password option would be simpler, in case I forgot to switch the power off, and lock the door.

Cat

Then assign a password to your account, set it to require a password when waking from sleep, then when you walk away, just put your computer to sleep.

You could reconsider your dinner guest list.

Amen to that! I think with Cat it's his relatives... stepson I think.

Ya know how that old saying goes: You can pick your friends, but you can't pick your relatives!

Digerati, I know how to use the screen saver option, that's what I do when I run a virus scan, I usually do this when I have errands to run. Otherwise, except for when company arrives, I don't use it. But the power switch can be held down long enough for it to shut down, to reboot.

yodap, I don't have a choice as to the dinner list, but I wished that I did. Sometimes, that's the way things are.

Nibs, you hit the nail straight on the head. I can't turn my back on anything around here with second guessing what's going on. Everything of value to me has to be kept under lock & key when I'm gone, or there's the risk of theft. A few months ago, just days after being released from the hospital for neck surgery, I had to run an errand, and forgot to put my bag of meds in the safe before leaving.

After I returned home, it was time for my meds, as riding wears me out. Some (about 20 or so) of my Demerol were gone, from a new prescription. Just so happens, that relative had a back injury from lifting weights, and had came over while I was gone. This is also the same relative that I signed for a new Jeep in '99, and the finance company was always sending letters to me on the matter.

Then a couple of weeks ago, which is why this thread is even being started, I came home after a doctor's visit, and my wife told me that something was wrong with my computer. I asked her who was using it, as she doesn't even care to use it, she said that he needed to place an order for something. So I came in here, and it had been booted into recovery mode. Fortunately, he didn't proceed with the recovery, got scared, and left, telling my wife that something was wrong with my computer, even going as far to say that I needed to "fix" it.

When you're dual booting Windows with most any variant of Linux, the last option on the boot list is Vista. But that's the recovery partition, I don't know why it even says Vista on it. Anyway, I removed Linux from that drive, and placed it on it's own.

However, that's not the point. If I open my mouth to complain about anything, the "troublemaking" flag gets thrown at me, whether I'm in the right, makes no difference in the matter. He simply refuses to allow my wife to see her granddaughter, she gets upset over it, and when it's all said and done, everything falls on me for even saying anything from the start.

So, locking down the computer from even booting would be the best option for me. That may not be the case for some, but we're all different, and there is no "all-in-one" answer here. For the time being, I'm flipping the master power switch for all of my desktop devices, and locking the door that has access to it, whenever we have company, or I go somewhere.

I'm still wondering if locking the BIOS would be the easiest (and best) option for me. It's quicker to enter a password, rather than dig out a hidden key to unlock a desk door every time I come home. As to my family situation, I cannot change that. I just need to prevent certain things from happening. I don't believe that I need to be concerned about the removal of the BIOS battery, as he doesn't even know how to install a printer properly, let alone hunting for a battery that he probably doesn't know of it's existence.

Cat