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mewtd

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Alternative to BitLocker

HI,

I have a user on Windows 7 Pro, so Bitlocker is not an option.

I want to encrypt his entire hard drive, is there a recommended alternative to BitLocker, or can BitLocker be purchased as a stand alone product?

Thanks for assistance and recommendations.
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McKnife
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You can change your win7 key to one of the ultimate edition. 20US$ for a used key - that comes with bitlocker.
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Alan
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Veracrypt is so "excellent", it totally fails to establish an encryption hierarchy. If you want users to stay users (and not enable them to become admins), don't use veracrypt.
I'd be interested in understanding what you mean.
With bitlocker, users get a PIN and can start the computer, that's all they can do. With veracrypt, they get a password and with it, can do whatever they like: decrypt, destroy, manipulate, copy administrative content, search for passwords...
Known to veracrypt, but is not addressed, because the author does not like TPM chips.
I'm still not really sure what you mean.

Is there somewhere you read this that you can point me to, that might be able to explain in more detail?

Thanks,

Alan.
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mewtd

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HI,

Thanks for input. Only one user on this system, and they have admin rights on the system anyway, so perhaps in this case we are ok?

If you think that is safe, I will at least install it and see how it goes for a period.

Many thanks.
In that case, you are ok with veracrypt, although integration of bitlocker is so much better and usage is more simple. Will be a pain if you ever chose to upgrade your OS.
On the upgrading of the OS, I have only done this once, and it was from Win8.1 to Win10 when the free upgrades were available (2015 / 2016?)

My approach was to remove the VeraCrypt (might have been TureCrypt then - I can't recall when it changed over) full-disk encryption first.  It worked fine, but I also had full images to restore, just in case it all went awry.

Interestingly, and with no proof whatsoever, I 'felt' that the machine ran more slowly without the encryption than with, which is completely the opposite of what I had expected.

I take McKnife's point about the difference between VeraCrypt and BitLocker, but not sure I would pay the $20 extra to get BitLocker myself.  Different if you were in a locked down corporate situation, and I will be adding this to my list for clients, although the Windows based ones pretty much only have Win10 Pro now.


Alan.
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