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I have two HP ProBook 6560b laptops, with one running Windows 7 Enterprise with BitLocker enabled. I am trying to test the scenario where one BitLocker-protected machine dies completely (i.e. perhaps motherboard failure), so I am just moving the encrypted hard drive to the exact same model laptop. This is all fine, I can decrypt the hard drive with my recovery key.

However, as soon as the I've typed the recovery key in the machine blue screens. If I put the HDD back in the original machine it works fine. I am currently using TPM only as the authentication means to BitLocker.

Blue Screen details: KERNEL_DATA_INPAGE_ERROR 0x0000007a pci.sys

My understanding is that you are able to move around a BitLocker-protected drive, as long as you know the recovery key and put the drive in a relatively similar machine. I've tried repairing the Windows installation, booting into safe mode etc but no luck.

Thanks in advance.

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  • "My understanding is that you are able to move around a BitLocker-protected drive, as long as you know the recovery key and put the drive in a relatively similar machine." -- only true if it doesn't come from a system with a TPM
    – Ramhound
    Commented Jan 19, 2017 at 2:19
  • Do you know of any way whereby I can mount the device and decrypt it? This scenario I'm testing is TPM only
    – Aaron Fahey
    Commented Jan 19, 2017 at 2:26
  • Decrypt it on the PC with the TPM.
    – Ramhound
    Commented Jan 19, 2017 at 2:26
  • They both have TPM, say drive A is married to machine A. I want to put drive A in machine B, because machine A died. Is this possible?
    – Aaron Fahey
    Commented Jan 19, 2017 at 2:30
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    I just reviewed Windows Internals 6th edition, and it doesn't address this precise scenario - but it does say that the recovery key should work to decrypt the drive if you attach it as an additional drive to an existing machine.
    – dsolimano
    Commented Jan 19, 2017 at 16:51

1 Answer 1

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Following the advice of dsolimano in the comment section above, I ended up taking a different approach to this scenario.

I took drive A from machine A, and added it to machine B as an extra drive (through an external HDD enclosure). I was able to unlock the drive way using my recovery key and access my data normally.

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