BitLocker and hard drives using the T13/T10 TRUSTED commands

[Gary G. Little]

This past week I tested one of our harddrives, a Momentus 5400 FDE, on Vista
5456. Vista could not find the drive, but since it was a "quckie" test I did
not have the time to do an indepth analysis. Is there any "known" issues
with newer drives that include full disc encryption capability in the drives
on-board firmware? Will BitLocker work with these drives, ignore these
drives, or simply make everything go bump in the night?

The drive I used was our Dancer USB drive, so there could have been several
areas where the failure occurred.

 

[Jamie Hunter [MS]]

The UI is targetted towards encryption of the OS partition, which is on a
physical non-removable hard disk.
-
Jamie Hunter [MS]

 

[Gary G. Little]

Yes but ...

Why did it not at least recognize the drive as a USB mass storage? Again, I
need to do more testing to define the problem, and the question, but from
your answer I assume that BitLocker is like a frog and a bee --- it simply
may not have ignored the bee, or in this case our FDE drive, in a USB port.

Ok, so enough of the USB stuff ... I currently have one of our FDE drives
installed in a Dell Latitude D610 with TPM enabled but not activated. Are
there any known issues with Vista and BitLocker and a disc with on-board
full disc encryption capability? What I am interested in, is any known
situations where BitLocker and the drive may end up head-butting each other.
Obviously my first test will be with BL disabled since I am currently
engaged in developing a service to support our disc, but I shortly will have
functional software I will want to test on Vista.

Perhaps the question should be more along the lines of BitLocker impacting,
or being impacted by, the new TRUSTED RECEIVE/SEND PIO/DMA commands in the
T13 specification?

--
The personal opinion of
Gary G. Little

The UI is targetted towards encryption of the OS partition, which is on a
physical non-removable hard disk.
-
Jamie Hunter [MS]

 

[Jamie Hunter [MS]]

Is this an issue of BitLocker recognizing the drive? Or of Vista recognizing
the drive? You'll need to provide more details of how you're determining the
drive is not recognized as USB mass storage (e.g. which UI / command line
you're looking at). We can go from there.

BitLocker Disk Encryption works at the logical volume level, so is
independent of the disk hardware or physical disk features. For example, it
currently neither impacts, nor is impacted by the Trusted receive/send
pio/dma commands.

-
Jamie Hunter [MS]

Yes but ...

Why did it not at least recognize the drive as a USB mass storage? Again,
I need to do more testing to define the problem, and the question, but
from your answer I assume that BitLocker is like a frog and a bee --- it
simply may not have ignored the bee, or in this case our FDE drive, in a
USB port.

Ok, so enough of the USB stuff ... I currently have one of our FDE drives
installed in a Dell Latitude D610 with TPM enabled but not activated. Are
there any known issues with Vista and BitLocker and a disc with on-board
full disc encryption capability? What I am interested in, is any known
situations where BitLocker and the drive may end up head-butting each
other. Obviously my first test will be with BL disabled since I am
currently engaged in developing a service to support our disc, but I
shortly will have functional software I will want to test on Vista.

Perhaps the question should be more along the lines of BitLocker
impacting, or being impacted by, the new TRUSTED RECEIVE/SEND PIO/DMA
commands in the T13 specification?

--
The personal opinion of
Gary G. Little

The UI is targetted towards encryption of the OS partition, which is on a
physical non-removable hard disk.
-
Jamie Hunter [MS]

This past week I tested one of our harddrives, a Momentus 5400 FDE, on
Vista 5456. Vista could not find the drive, but since it was a "quckie"
test I did not have the time to do an indepth analysis. Is there any
"known" issues with newer drives that include full disc encryption
capability in the drives on-board firmware? Will BitLocker work with
these drives, ignore these drives, or simply make everything go bump in
the night?

The drive I used was our Dancer USB drive, so there could have been
several areas where the failure occurred.

 

[Gary G. Little]

First problem sovled, the disc not being recognized, as operator headspace.
The disc requires USB 2.0 and unknowingly I was plugging it into a USB 1.1
hub I use for my cam and PDA. I moved the disc to a 2.0 port and voila ...
Vista finds the disc fine.

--
The personal opinion of
Gary G. Little

Yes but ...

Why did it not at least recognize the drive as a USB mass storage? Again,
I need to do more testing to define the problem, and the question, but
from your answer I assume that BitLocker is like a frog and a bee --- it
simply may not have ignored the bee, or in this case our FDE drive, in a
USB port.

Ok, so enough of the USB stuff ... I currently have one of our FDE drives
installed in a Dell Latitude D610 with TPM enabled but not activated. Are
there any known issues with Vista and BitLocker and a disc with on-board
full disc encryption capability? What I am interested in, is any known
situations where BitLocker and the drive may end up head-butting each
other. Obviously my first test will be with BL disabled since I am
currently engaged in developing a service to support our disc, but I
shortly will have functional software I will want to test on Vista.

Perhaps the question should be more along the lines of BitLocker
impacting, or being impacted by, the new TRUSTED RECEIVE/SEND PIO/DMA
commands in the T13 specification?

--
The personal opinion of
Gary G. Little

The UI is targetted towards encryption of the OS partition, which is on a
physical non-removable hard disk.
-
Jamie Hunter [MS]

This past week I tested one of our harddrives, a Momentus 5400 FDE, on
Vista 5456. Vista could not find the drive, but since it was a "quckie"
test I did not have the time to do an indepth analysis. Is there any
"known" issues with newer drives that include full disc encryption
capability in the drives on-board firmware? Will BitLocker work with
these drives, ignore these drives, or simply make everything go bump in
the night?

The drive I used was our Dancer USB drive, so there could have been
several areas where the failure occurred.

 

[Jamie Hunter [MS]]

Yeah, I have those days too
-
Jamie Hunter [MS]