[iranfromthezoo]

Hey guys, we just had an employee leave and for some reason when you turn on his computer it immediately states "Enter CURRENT Password:" It doesn't go into the BIOS or anything else. Is there anyway to get around this. I've searched MS' website along with some google searches. Maybe I need to Bing it.

BTW this is immediately at startup.

[shifuimam]

The BIOS has been configured to password-protect the machine's boot process - it's not going to go through POST until you put in the proper password.

There are some different ways you can fix this:

How to Reset / Remove / Bypass a BIOS or CMOS Password? - Tweaking with Vishal

Taking out the CMOS battery is probably going to be the easiest way to get around it. It'll reset the system clock (which will set properly once you get online and it connects to either NIST's or Microsoft's date and time server), as well as all the BIOS settings - including the startup password.

[ghporter]

I'm with shiuf. Pull the CMOS battery and let the machine sit for half an hour (some systems have a big honkin' capacitor to maintain CMOS while you change the battery). That will clear the CMOS settings completely, including any BIOS boot password.

Your former employee apparently thought he was being clever. One does not accidentally set a BIOS boot password, and one doesn't do it without some reason. What that reason may be is up in the air right now, but having a computer security background, I tend to be suspicious of such things. The ex-employee may have been doing something he shouldn't, something that could be anything from surfing pr0n on the job to downloading the kind of "pr0n" one gets put in prison for, to selling company secrets on the web. You may want to have someone examine the computer's hard drive. I'd pull the drive while the case is open, and hand it over to someone qualified to forensically examine it. DO NOT START THE COMPUTER WITH THAT HARD DRIVE INSTALLED unless you're ready to accept that doing so WILL destroy any evidence.

Yeah, I'm cynical, but I'm right more often than I'm wrong. And this has the potential to be a very serious thing.

[shifuimam]

This.

No employee should be setting a boot password on a company computer unless they have something to hide.

[iranfromthezoo]

GH this is actually our old fire chief who was asked to leave after the fire department wanted him gone. So he left and won't tell anyone the password. We need to get a program off the computer so will this destroy everything on the computer.

[ghporter]

As long as you know something about him, and don't have ANY concerns, then go for it. Clearing the CMOS memory will not in any way affect the programs (or anything else) stored on the hard drive. If he's just being a jerk, that puts things in a very different light.