Windows XP user accounts

[Frank O' Phile]

I hope you've tried entering nothing, just in case it's blank.

However I found this for you to try.

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_do_you_bypass_the_admin_password_on_Windows_XP_Pro_SP1

 

[KillerHERTZ]

Cheers, I will give it a try tonight

 

[MBK]

Hi Killerhertz,

The way to get round this is to get a copy of Hiren's Boot CD on a USB stick, as long as you motherboard lets you boot form a USB device you'll be ok.

once booted you have access to some really cool tools which includes a Windows password reset tool. Very easy to use and works everytime, i use it lot at work.

PM me your e-mail address and i will send you instructions on how to make this USB boot key.

Once you have cracked the administrator password boot your PC but hold down F8 to go to Safe mode then select the Administrator account and leave the password blank. then when your in as admin go to control panel and user accounts and upgrade your account to admin and you should be ok.

hope this helps.

 

[Sp!ke]

I think I did delete all accounts and everything, it still boots with the orignal account, but has no access to install/remove programes etc.

I dont want to have to wipe the whole HD...?

Thats rather odd since you couldnt have deleted user accounts using a profile that wasnt a local administrator.

Using this same logon, can you create a new user account and then make it an administrator or do you get an error?

 

[MBK]

How did you delete the accounts did you do it through User Accounts or did you just delete the profile folders from Documents and settings folder? both ways require your account to have Admin Rights.

 

[MBK]

To help with your initial problem:

Turn on automatic logon without editing the registry in Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition and in Microsoft Windows XP Professional on a computer that is not joined to a domain. To do this, follow these steps:

1. Click Start, and then click Run.
2. In the Open box, type control userpasswords2, and then click OK.
   
   Note When users try to display help information in the User Accounts window in Windows XP Home Edition, the help information is not displayed. Additionally, users receive the following error message:Cannot find the Drive:\Windows\System32\users.hlp Help file. Check to see that the file exists on your hard disk drive. If it does not exist, you must reinstall it.
   
   
3. Clear the "Users must enter a user name and password to use this computer" check box, and then click Apply.
4. In the Automatically Log On window, type the password in the Password box, and then retype the password in the Confirm Password box.
5. Click OK to close the Automatically Log On window, and then click OK to close the User Accounts window.

Then your pc will automatically login to the selected account when booting. If for any reason you need to access another account you need to hold the "shift" key whilst windows is booting or right after you log off from your windows. This will bring up the familiar login screen.

hope you get your PC sorted and get to try this out.

Best of luck.

 

[Antharro]

There's a lot of answers in this thread, but I'm not sure all of them are suitable.

- Remove BIOS battery; has nothing to do with the OP's question.

- Sp!ke is correct in that you should not be able to remove user accounts unless you are logged in as a user that has Admin rights, or unless you are logged in as the actual Administrator.

- If you deleted the user accounts by deleting the relevant folders in Documents and Settings, then the users should still show up on the welcome screen - Windows will simply create a new profile on boot.

- Adding to Kully 124Coupe's instructions;
-- step 2a: Click the name of the user you want to log in as. Their name will then be highlighted. You can see if they are an Administrator by looking in the next column over - "Group". Now proceed to step 3.

- Kully is also correct that Hiren's Boot CD is definitely worth a look at. I've never used it to recover passwords, but if it's as good at that as it is at everything else it's supposed to do then it should work fine.

- The Linux Boot floppy I mentioned isn't all that complicated and it would be relatively easy to talk you through it. It's all command-line stuff (press 1 for this option, etc) and can look somewhat intimidating if you've never seen anything like it before. It should be possible to create a bootable flash (USB) drive with it on, however.

Not having an available CDROM or floppy adds an additional complication that you could do without. Would be good if you could find the power supply for that CD drive.

Finally, as Spinal said, a clean install could really help out if your current installation is hosed because of this. Clean installs can also make your computer feel a lot faster, especially if it's had over a year's use!

 

[fuzzer]

Hiren is the dogs danglies for doing most things! big thumbs up from me

 

[Antharro]

I had a play with the Windows password recovery on Hiren's boot CD and I was pleasantly surprised. Unfortunately it didn't work with a particular installation, but that's because Acer do weird things with their laptops. The Linux boot disc I referred to earlier in the thread didn't recover it. But I found a way around that.

 

[sid6]

Hi all,

If you ever want to find the passwords for accounts on your windows computers try the Rainbow Tables crack.

check out this page for instructions.

http://www.wikihow.com/Crack-Windows-Passwords-With-Ophcrack-and-Rainbow-Tables

Ive used it at work and at home and its very good, just boot up with the CD and it does the rest.I think you can also boot from a USB stick too.Very long passwords might not be decrypted entirely but you should get enough of the password to get a reminder.

Thanks

Sid

 

[markmifsud]

have you tried booting in safe mode (press F8 during the first part of windows loading) then you can log in as the administrator.