Vista SP1 RC Refresh & Bitlocker Question

Ex_Brit

Ex_Brit

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Staff member
I asked this question in the Technet Vista SP1 forum but I guess that they are inundated with people having installation problems.
I had hoped that perhaps Bitlocker without a TPM might have become a little easier to enable with SP1, but unfortunately, this is not the case.
I triple boot XP SP2, XP SP3 beta and Vista Ultimate SP1 RC Refresh so, as you know, Vista's Restore points, or should I say, System Protection points, are obliterated by it's older ancestor, XP.
That was why I was trying to get Bitlocker to work.
Unfortunately my motherboard (Intel D865GBF) doesn't support booting from a USB device although it does recognise USB Legacy devices such as keyboards, mice etc.
When I reboot I get this:
Bitlocker.jpg

There is one peculiarity that perhaps is unique to SP1...? When setting up for Bitlocker, having stored the key and password etc. and I get to this screen:
Bitlocker1.jpg

If I uncheck the item "Run Bitlocker System Check" the "Encrypt" button is revealed:
Bitlocker2.jpg

and when clicked encryption appears to start. I stored the key and password, even printed it just in case. Would this work?
(I stopped the process as I was too scared to continue...LOL)
Any Bitlocker experts out there?
 
Interesting....

Well, according to the prompt the only risk is that of having to manually enter the password - you have the password, so perhaps it's not much of a risk?
 
Thanks CG. I'll try it later to see what happens. I have a few errands to run today so don't want to start until I have a few hours spare to keep an eye on it.

Not getting email notifications again...;-(


Addendum:


It just occurred to me that this might be a risk in that Vista wont be able to read the USB key until after its booted. Do you think that's going to be a problem. I realise I can enter the password manually but....?


Addendum:


Talking to myself here it appears...LOL Anyway, it worked. I got to a black screen stating all kinds of dire warnings about this and that - basically it couldn't read the USB drive for the password. Press "Enter" for recovery.
That gave me another black screen where I could type in the 48 digit password and it booted OK. It seems that it can read the key off the USB drive but it can't boot off it...that's my M/B's fault.
Now whether or not I want to go through this rigmarole each time I boot up is another matter.

I have to think about this.

All this fuss just so that Vista can use its "Restore" function.
 
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48 digits, thank God I printed it out...LOL As Bitlocker will only let it be backed up to removeable media there's no way one can CCP it as the system hasn't booted yet.....I might just decrypt. Is it really worth the fuss just for a few restore points...er, correction "volume shadow copies"....LOL
 
This is the major reason why i stay away from BitLocker. 48 digit password is just too much. If you would have lost that you would lose that data. To me not worth it.
 
This gets stranger. According to Microsoft if you have a M/B without a TPM then you MUST use a USB flash drive to store the key and password.

Well, I backed mine up to my external USB hard drive as well, as a precaution, and have just discovered that it reads this too, so I don't need to insert the flash drive at all.

It allows you to backup your key/password as many times as you like as long as it is to removable media, and you can print it, obviously.

I still, however, have to manually enter the 48-digit password....LOL.:scared:

So far Vista is retaining its restore points.
 
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Footnote:
It may be a pain in the you-know-what to enter a 48-digit password every time I boot into Vista but I now have 10 restore points all alive and well. It only takes a few seconds to do anyway.
Plus noone can access this hard drive now.
 
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