I am the original purchaser of this laptop and I can proove it. Is there any way I can get the Bios master password without having my laptop re-certified and extending the Warranty? If not I will not be upgrading to another dell laptop. Can anyone help with this in any way ? 

Yes, you can - but if the warranty is ended, you will need to pay for a service call.

:^/ With older hardware, one is able to reset the BIOS passwords (and all BIOS settings, for that matter,) by briefly removing the real-time clock battery.  It's advisable to write down every BIOS setting you can access before doing this so that you can restore them afterward.

However, I don't know whether this will work with newer hardware, what with flash ROM being able to keep settings without power.  Either way, if the laptop's out of warranty it's worth a shot.

Nothing will remove this password other than the dell master password , all people who didn't believe this , ended up ruining their mainboards by using tools to desolder the coin cell battery host unit but the password stayed there , anyway , i remember getting support via online chat in forgotten password cases , but all cases were still under warranty , i also think that the warranty status has nothing to do with this , so just be patient and try to use the online chat .

Thank you for your intrest guys, I think Magedam is correct that the only way to fix this is to get the password from Dell, however dell chat doesn't support Inspiron and when I enter my service tag in the online chat page and submit I am shown a page that gives me two options 1- Self help, online technical support and forums, option two Extend my warranty. Email support is only available with dell limited hardware Warranty and when I try to call tech support on the phone they first tell me that my warranty has expired, then I explain that I only want the bios password they say they will ring back but they do not ring back. I have called three times and been told three times someone will ring back but no call, this is extremely rude if they are not going to ring me back they should not tell me that they will, dell must have too many customers and is trying to reduce the number of future customers by giving no help whatsoever to anyone whose warranty has expired, I am not asking for much my laptop is not broken I just want a simple password.  Does dell have a customer relations dept ?

Nothing will remove this password other than the dell master password , all people who didn't believe this , ended up ruining their mainboards by using tools to desolder the coin cell battery host unit but the password stayed there....

:^/ Are we to glean from this that Dell real-time clock batteries are made to be irremovable?  What is one to do once said battery has expired?  Are we to buy new laptops then?  That's akin to buying a new automobile every time the ashtray is full.

No the coin cell/motherboard battery is removable. I think he means the host unit the battery fits into, but I don't know why someone would want to do that. I am fairly sure the bios password is kept in flash memory on the board.

Hey Drew!!

There are only two ways to fix this issue. The first is to contact Dell, and they will contact some other department to get the passoword Reset to default BIOS Password which is Dell. The last resort is to reseat the C-MOS Battery. Here are the instructions to reseat the CMOS Battery.

There is no third fix for this. Hope it works. Let me know if you have any more questions.

Sukhdeep

OK I'll try reseating the CMOS Battery tommorow and see how I go Thanks.

Hey Drew!! There are only two ways to fix this issue. The first is to contact Dell, and they will contact some other department to get the passoword Reset to default BIOS Password which is Dell. The last resort is to reseat the C-MOS Battery.

:^/ That's what I was thinking.  I'm unsure whether these days the BIOS password is stored in Flash ROM or volatile RAM kept active via the Real Time Clock /CMOS battery, as in my day, but we can always find out.

Did you try Google? I found many sites with "Master passwords" ( so they say ) Give it a try.

Arrrgggh I just got home and I see that my son has taken the laptop to his uncle's for the weekend, so I can't try reseating the CMOS battery till monday. Does anyone know if a Bios update might work if reseating the battery doesn't, I imagine flashing the bios would do about the same thing but I don't know for sure. Thank you all for your suggestions so far. Cheers

CMOS battery won't do jack anyways.  Its a Inspiron notebook, the bios password is hard set in NVRAM.  You would have to get ahold of SVCTAG.exe >v3.4 in order to flush the NVRAM if the master password doesn't work...

Arrrgggh I just got home and I see that my son has taken the laptop to his uncle's for the weekend, so I can't try reseating the CMOS battery till monday. Does anyone know if a Bios update might work if reseating the battery doesn't, I imagine flashing the bios would do about the same thing but I don't know for sure. Thank you all for your suggestions so far. Cheers

CMOS battery won't do jack anyways.  Its a Inspiron notebook, the bios password is hard set in NVRAM.  You would have to get ahold of SVCTAG.exe >v3.4 in order to flush the NVRAM if the master password doesn't work...