Question Upgrading to new computer - old computer hard drive in USB3.0 external enclosure

[Thys C]

Good morning,

I am responsible for all the computers in my department at my university. Our replacement policy for computers are 4 years for laptops and 5 years for desktops. When a staff member upgrades to a new PC / Laptop, we remove the storage device (hard drive or SSD) from the old machine, if the staff member does not have any need for the old machine. We also do this when a PC / Laptop fails.

I have now experienced 2 cases where we followed this procedure, but ran into bit locker message.

In the first case it was not an issue, as the hard drive did not have any data on it just the OPS system. However, in the 2nd case, the laptop was older than 4 years but was still being used. The power module failed. which makes it unusable and it will not be repaired. As the staff member needed access to the data on the storage drive, we followed our ussual procedure. This laptop was equipoed with a SSD and it was installed in the appropriate USB3.0 enclosure and then we had the bit locker message appear when we tried to access it.

We did not consciously activated bit locker on the old laptop, but it had in its BIOS, the TMP Embedded Security feature activated. Would this result in the bit locker message?

Thank you for reading. Hope for an answer good or bad.

 

[helpstar]

which exact bit locker message came up?
did the user enable it?
maybe the new computer is preventing the old os to be booted, disable secure boot temporarily

 

[Thys C]

which exact bit locker message came up?
did the user enable it?
maybe the new computer is preventing the old os to be booted, disable secure boot temporarily

Thank you for replying.
A window open with the heading Bit Locker. Please supply the 48 number code.
The laptop had win 11 so TMP had to be active for win 11 to work.
We are not trying to boot from the external device, just to gain access to the data on it.

 

[rgd1101]

no data backup and bitlocker key?

 

[helpstar]

Thank you for replying.
A window open with the heading Bit Locker. Please supply the 48 number code.
The laptop had win 11 so TMP had to be active for win 11 to work.
We are not trying to boot from the external device, just to gain access to the data on it.

The old OS is bootable and might be found by the BIOS of the new laptop

 

[Thys C]

no data backup and bitlocker key?

Yes, unfortunately no.
May I please ask if there is a work around?

 

[rgd1101]

you can get the key if windows was link to a MS account
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us...-windows-6b71ad27-0b89-ea08-f143-056f5ab347d6

 

[js2]

Good morning,

I am responsible for all the computers in my department at my university. Our replacement policy for computers are 4 years for laptops and 5 years for desktops. When a staff member upgrades to a new PC / Laptop, we remove the storage device (hard drive or SSD) from the old machine, if the staff member does not have any need for the old machine. We also do this when a PC / Laptop fails.

I have now experienced 2 cases where we followed this procedure, but ran into bit locker message.

In the first case it was not an issue, as the hard drive did not have any data on it just the OPS system. However, in the 2nd case, the laptop was older than 4 years but was still being used. The power module failed. which makes it unusable and it will not be repaired. As the staff member needed access to the data on the storage drive, we followed our ussual procedure. This laptop was equipoed with a SSD and it was installed in the appropriate USB3.0 enclosure and then we had the bit locker message appear when we tried to access it.

We did not consciously activated bit locker on the old laptop, but it had in its BIOS, the TMP Embedded Security feature activated. Would this result in the bit locker message?

Thank you for reading. Hope for an answer good or bad.

If you have the device on intune then admin can disable bitlocker. If not then stick drive in similar hardware to boot up and do a bitlocker recovery.