What is HDD Master Password

[wirelessprom]

I'm running Windows Xp as my operating system. When I turn on it has black screen, asks for a DriveLock Password, a second I forget, then a HDD Master Password. I've never had password for these and nothing works and pc locks my hard drive. So, can any body tell me that what is HDD Master Password? How can i get rid of the above issue? Does any body have any idea about it? Kindly provide me the correct information on the above issue. Would be grateful if any body provides me the correct information on the HDD Master Password. Thanks in advance.

[Hardwareman]

When you unlocked the drive then locked it again manually, you voided the master password. This password is usually stored both in a chip on the HD controller (the printed circuit board on the hard disk) and on the hard disk itself in a special hidden sector. Now you can try manually typing in the key hoping to find your mistake.

[Maxforu]

Setting this password will make the hard disk completely unusable to anyone that doesn’t know it. Modern hard disks (notably IDE ATA IV and above) support setting of hard disk password lock so user cannot access the drive until correct password is entered. And not only on your computer, but on any computer. You could try a low level format of the drive to erase all sectors. This is a common implementation in most modern notebook. These hard disk lock passwords are not the same as BIOS passwords.

[Killen]

Hard disk lock passwords can not be removed by reformatting or zero-filled the disk, fdisk or any other software procedure (with some exception). The other option to save the drive is Hddunlock. You will lose the data though. As the hard disk lock is part of the more advanced ATA security features, it has some anti-hacked features. The hard disk manufacturers are unable to unlock a password protected hard disk, as there aren’t any “secret” master passwords build into the firmware. For instance, some software could be written to "guess" the password in an attempt to unlock it. Even swapping the controller of the password-protected hard disk with exactly the same controller from an unprotected HD will not remove the protection on most disks, as the password (together with most of the firmware) is also stored on the hard disk itself. However, a power reset must be performed after five guesses so it makes the "hacking" difficult.