and 5 are illustrative of the process which includes the interrupt handler that is hooked prior to the rom scan and wherein the password protection lies this interrupt handler has several functions if the interrupt handler is activated at step 88 after start of post initialization of minimal base functions enablement of c2 and determination that the password has not been entered at steps 80 82 84 and 86 respectively a user has entered an indeterminate keystroke at step 90 during the rom scan the reason for this keystroke is assumed to be the key sequence to load the utility from an adapter rom since the keystroke has been issued the interrupt handler will first retrieve the key sequence from the keyboard controller and store this information once the keystroke information has been stored the interrupt handler will prompt for the proper password at step 92 to allow for configuration routines to be run for the system once the prompt is issued the interrupt handler will determine if the proper password has been entered at step 94 if it has not the system will halt and indicate to the user the reason for the halt at steps 98 and 96 respectively if however the proper password is entered the stored keystroke key sequence will be lead back in the queue for handling by the adapter rom and the interrupt routine finishes through steps 100 102 and 104 respectively allowing the adapter rom to continue running with the proper keystroke information in addition the interrupt handler also marks that the password has been correctly entered so that the user is not.