Windows 8 laptop stolen and recovered but is now locked

My Dell laptop (Inspiron 15 5537) was stolen from my house. I gave the serial number to the cops and it showed up in a pawn shop. After I got it back from the Pawn shop the thief had password protected the computer.

1. I have a local windows account with no password that still exists on the laptop. The computer turns on to the new account the thief created however and does not allow me to do anything until I can enter the password he put on the computer.

2. I downloaded Hirens Boot CD 15.2 and made a bootable USB flash drive and booted into Mini Windows XP. However, Mini Windows XP cannot locate my local disk due to AHCI. I tried to change the SATA controller mode to something other than ACHI in the system setup but there were no other options I could select. So I have given up on Hirens.

3. I downloaded OPHCRACK and made another bootable USB flash drive. I successfully booted into OPHCRACK and on the list of accounts it lists my original local windows account that had no password. But it does not list the User account the thief created at all.

To me this suggests that the thief must have not made a local account but a windows live Id to password protect the computer. I have been reading on Google and as many pages as I can find but pretty much all of the help pages tell me to click on the reset your Microsoft live Id password or the "my account was hacked" link. This would be great if the Windows Live account belonged to me. But because it doesn't then I cannot answer any secret questions or reset the password for it.

I have seen help pages talking about how to switch from a live account to a local account. These help pages only work if you already have access to the computer which I don't.

How can you bypass the windows live Id protection when you do not have access to reset the password or to recover the windows live account?

Do I really have to reinstall windows to take care of this?

Thanks

-Dave

Hello Dave, and welcome to Eight Forums.

I think the best thing to do is to boot from your Windows 8.1 installation media and clean install Windows 8.1. You can setup a new Microsoft account to use to be safe. There's no telling what else may be on the laptop now.

If it is just the Windows login password has been changed, there are Linux tools out there to kill the password. If it is the bios lock, not much you can do, but send it off to Dell.

broe23 said:

If it is just the Windows login password has been changed, there are Linux tools out there to kill the password. If it is the bios lock, not much you can do, but send it off to Dell.

Click to expand...

If he can get into a local account, the BIOS must be OK. I would also vote for a reinstall. Here is a little tool to recover your data:

Emergency Kit - save your files from a dead OS - Windows 7 Help Forums

Boot to a windows pe usb stick, recover the data you want off of the computer and reinstall or change the password of this account. If it is a BIOS lock, then look up the manufacture of the laptop and look for a BIOS unlock. There is a way normally...you'll just have to hunt for it.