Toshiba SSD - Encryption enabled - can't format or anything. Ideas?

Vanilla

Vanilla

Vanilla

Soldato
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18 Oct 2002
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Hi all,

I was given a 512GB Toshiba SSD by a friend who had decommissioned a load of servers at work. The SSD appears to have hardware encryption enabled.

- If I plug it into my PC before I even get a post I get a Toshiba screen asking for the password
- If I plug it into the PC after I boot I can see the volume in windows disk partitioning but I can't do anything with it. Can't assign, partition, nothing.
- I have tried a better program like EaseUS but if I format the drive it actually doesn't do anything - it doesn't show up in Windows as a drive. It seems this hardware encryption is locked in.

Anyone has this before with freebie drives from companies? Don't want the data, just want to wipe and use!
 
Rroff said:
There is a procedure - unless it is more than bog standard protection - you have to unplug it after the machine has booted and plug it in again after 3-5 seconds or something.

This might be useful https://forums.anandtech.com/threads/toshiba-ssd-secure-erase.2352280/
Click to expand...

Program doesn't even see it. It shows up in partition manager tools but you just can't do anything with it. No changes or formats work. Must be hardware encryption at the SSD layer.....it's just how to disable this!
 
From partition magic, says bad disk but they all say that (I have three). I think it's hardware encryption I just can't disable it :p

QQS0J5H.jpg
 
Parted Magic-open terminal,issue command :
hdparm -I /dev/sda

the a in sda being replaced with whatever letter points to your drive with the issue

that will return a list of conditions for the drive,you want to see locked in there as that means you can then issue a command to unlock it and you should be good to go.

Unlock command is:

hdparm --security-disable NULL /dev/sda

again replace the a in sda with your relevant drive letter,if it asks for a password ignore that and continue unless you want to add a password of course.

Better still trust me and I'll send you over a file showing all the options.
 
Sorry but how do I do all that! I'm using Partition Master which I think is what partition magic became? Can't even find a terminal

By the looks of things this may be a bricked drive without the password....... :/

edit: I see, getting parted magic now, althogh it's a trial doesn't seem to be a free version
 
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You could possibly still get a freeware version,it just wouldn't be the latest issue.

Be careful in there though as you could brick it yourself if you're not careful.

Search for parted magic old version or freeware.
 
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It could be a good idea to remove all your other HDD's when you run parted magic,then the sda command will stand.

Just unplug the sata cables to all your other drives.
 
Click on trust at bottom right of this page and enable it and I can send you the file.

Your own trust,not mine.
 
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Do you know if this is a bitlocker protected drive or actual hardware protection?

Also careful if you mess around with TPM data trying to wipe it as this can have implications for your other drives if they have bitlocker in effect especially if you don't have a backup of the recovery keys for them.
 
Rroff said:
Do you know if this is a bitlocker protected drive or actual hardware protection?

Also careful if you mess around with TPM data trying to wipe it as this can have implications for your other drives if they have bitlocker in effect especially if you don't have a backup of the recovery keys for them.
Click to expand...

I think actual HW protection. Came from a proper enterprise system........
 
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