If I take a hard drive with Windows XP Pro, which is password protected.......?

Question

If I take a hard drive with Windows XP Pro, which is password protected, then move it to another system, will it override the password and start normally?

Answer 1

if it is a WINDOWS xp login password, then no. but it probably wouldn't even start normally because the hardware will be different from the hardware that copy of windows was installed on originally.

if it's a BIOS password, then yes it will, except that "it probably wouldn't even start normally because the hardware will be different from the hardware that copy of windows was installed on originally."

if it is a HARD DRIVE password, then it will still be password protected, and unless you set that hard drive up as a 'slave' drive to a hard drive that already contains windows then you'll have problems because "it probably wouldn't even start normally because the hardware will be different from the hardware that copy of windows was installed on originally."

basically what i'm trying to say is, taking a hard drive with windows xp installed out of one machine and placing it into another machine and expecting windows to work on the new machine will not really work since when windows is activated it takes information about the hardware in your pc to generate the activation key - when you place that windows hard drive in a new computer the hardware key won't match.

Answer 2

Windows Password Recovery Software : http://tinyurl.com/askjDCX3Q

Answer 3

Technically, no because the password protection should be saved onto the HDD, and therefore will be transfered to the new system.