1

20151209_111341.jpeg
20151209_111341.jpeg800×1422 188 KB

I took over a facility a couple of months ago and there was a Western Digital Nas being used for backups. I walked into the server room today and the NAS was indicating it had a bad drive. I went to open the case up to grab the bad drive, but it was locked. No problem, I will go to the stash of keys the old Sysadmin left me. Unfortunately, there is no sign of the key anywhere. I even texted the old Sysadmin, but it was not where he left it. I managed to break into the case to replace the bad drive, but I’m curious if there is a better solution for when case keys go missing?

@Cisco

40 Spice ups
2

Contact WD for a replacement?

12 Spice ups
3

who locks things in a locked server room?

plus many of those things are cheap 3 tumbler locks, really easy to pick. If you are really worried any locksmith should be able to open it in short order.

19 Spice ups
4

The old Sysadmin was pretty paranoid. Would do ludicrous things for added security. Like we had 7 different ISPs for 7 different networks to prevent them from talking to each other even though we have nice Cisco switches with VLANs and such.

16 Spice ups
5

Wow…7 different ISP’s? How did he manage to convince upper management to sign off on such a thing? Second question…where are you located that you have 7 different ISP options? In Canada, where I am, we have about 2 different ISP’s for business class connections, and they are both horrible. Its what happens when a country has an ISP monopoly.

13 Spice ups
6

Crrraaaaaaaazy. Over the rainbow, he is crrrrraaaaaaaaazy…

28 Spice ups
7

Yeah, that is all cleaned up now. What was funny is that everything is now on a 100mbps full duplex fiber and we barely use 10% of that. The worst part was the amount of WAP sprawled throughout the buildings for the different networks. I now have a pile of $50 home Netgears laying in storage.

8 Spice ups
8

wait wait wait…Captain Paranoia used consumer grade AP’s for his network? dafuq?!

49 Spice ups
9

Hi jacobhebert,

RohoLoco had a good response. Our Tech Support should have extra keys that can be sent out if you have lost or can’t find yours. You may have checked already, but there was also a small clip on the back of the some of the drives where the key can clip for storage.

13 Spice ups
10

You betcha. The sad part was that the “main” network had a Sonicwall and Sonicpoints that support VAPs for things like a guest network.

4 Spice ups
11

Yeah, I already tore the thing apart because we are out of warranty to get the lock taken care of. I removed the lock mechanism because it is not needed in the locked server room. Thanks for the input though.

5 Spice ups
12

Future reference -

You can take a Bic pen and remove the end cap. Jam it into the key slot and wiggle it around while rotating.

16 Spice ups
13

Collin is right about the Bic pen for certain makes and models of tumblers.

OP, it sounds like the old sysadmin woke up everyday and had a big bowl of crazy pops. Did he have a spare tin foil hat in the office? Consumer grade WAP’s cannot access your mind waves as well as enterprise grade WAP’s can. That’s common knowledge.

7 Spice ups
14

we had to call our maintenance department to get into a network cabinet one time. they just picked the lock with a lock pick lol

8 Spice ups
15

Just swap “crazy” with “incompetent” and I think you’ve nailed it…

10 Spice ups
16

crow bar… smash the $H!T out if IT. Or order the same model on amazon, get the key, open it up, return it to amazon. lol Most of those keys are the same. Been there, done that…

8 Spice ups
17

What I ended up doing to get the problem taken care of was to pop the cover of the case off. Then popped the faceplate off and without detaching any of the IO I was able to unscrew the locking mechanism from the inside of the faceplate. Then I was able to re-assemble the whole unit back together without the locking mechanism. The mechanism was really redundant since the server room where it is located is locked up.

6 Spice ups
18

I used to have to break into the older DEC’s all the time. Clients would lock the doors to “make it secure” and then lose the keys. Paperclip bent “just so” worked very well.

6 Spice ups
19

BTW, most of the keys are not unique. The MFR should be able to get you a replacement, be it Rack, Bezel or whatever.

20

I have an old tubular lock pick, but you can get by using a small allen wrench and a straightened paper clip in a pinch

6 Spice ups