HELP -- Made a huge mistake. Removed processor before decrypting drive using bitlocker and TPM

Question

Major, major oversight on my part. I wasn't thinking when I removed my processor and then placed the new one in. When prompted to delete/reset the fTPM, I went through with it and reinstalled windows on a new drive. I don't have the recovery key for my old drive. If I place my CPU back into my machine, can the TPM be reset again back to exactly where it was before, to allow me to decrypt my drive?

Answer 1

Hi Alex. I'm Greg, an Independent Advisor here to help until this is resolved.

You'll have to try and see, but I've seen nothing that indicates that broad of a hardware signature is used by Bitlocker.

See how to use Bitlocker here:

https://www.windowscentral.com/how-use-bitlocke...

See how to suspend or turn off Bitlocker:

http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/foru...

https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/37060-turn-...

How to find the Recovery key:

https://support.microsoft.com/en-ph/help/453047...

How to recover files from Bitlocker drive:

https://www.howtogeek.com/263561/how-to-recover...

I have seen enough problems that I would not use Bitlocker and if you do I'd have another backup of your files in OneDrive or Google Drive which are secure and encrypted and can save real time changes by lodging User folders in them.

As a last resort you can try to rescue your files from booted media which is reported to work in at least one case though it should not:

http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/wiki...

Then wipe the drive with Clean Command to clear Bitlocker:

https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/85819-erase...

and reformat it Disk management:

https://www.windowscentral.com/how-format-new-h...

I hope this helps. Feel free to ask back any questions and keep me posted. If you'll wait to rate whether my post resolved your problem, I will keep working with you until it's resolved.

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