Bitlocker Stops me starting Laptop

[leachim]

I am a techie who is trying to dig myself out of a hole

 

Client brought a dell foldable laptop to me with the corner of the screen lid coming away when opening and closing as the screen hinge was stiff....

 

But in my examination of it I unfortunately CRACKED the touchscreen.......

 

Looked online - only replacement screen available was £500.....

 

SO - I ordered an exact replacement laptop and took out the hard drive out of the old one and put it in the new one in the hope it would fire up normally

 

SADLY Bitlocker raised its ugly head

 

I guess there is no easy way around it..... She had 2 accounts on the laptop, so which MS account will she have to log into to HOPEFULLY get the key ?

OR is it the Bitlocker account of the previous user I bought it from that it is looking for ??????

 

Any advice appreciated, as she wants it back for UNI in 2 days 😱

 

Thanks

[robintech]

If the key is linked to her online microsoft account she should be able to check the two accounts on https://account.microsoft.com/devices/recoverykey and see a likely looking device then message you the Recovery Key.

 

If it isn't then I'd put it back in the old laptop and use an external display if needed, log in with her pin/password then backup the recovery key or disable bitlocker and move the drive, enable it

 

The broken laptop hard drive is looking for the TPM chip on the old laptop so won't be related to the new one

Edited September 18, 2023 by ittech2342323

[chazzy2501]

put back into old laptop, use external screen, make a backup, restore to new laptop.

[leachim]

Sorted

 

Put HD back in old laptop - started it up

 

Switched off Bitlocker

 

Put HD in new laptop

 

HAPPY DAYS

 

Cheers !!!