Admin account changed to a guest account!

ruetasilitu · 7th January 2008

Hi,
I'm running XP Home SP2.
I have always been using a user account with administrator rights.
Having heard that it is not safe, I thought I would change my account type to power user.
1. I ran "control userpasswords2" and, just in case, tried to change the account I was logged in with; which naturally did not work.
2. Then, in the same window, I defined a password for the main (default) Administrator account, which I had never used.
3. I rebooted in Safe Mode and logged in using the default Administrator account.
4. Went to Control Panel > User accounts, and the admin account I use everyday was not there. Only admin, and guest.
5. Then I rebooted in normal mode and logged in using my usual login... which is now a guest account! Meaning I don't have write access to the C:\ root, for instance... I can't even display the calendar as I don't have the rights to change the system date & time!
How can I sort this out? I've done my Google research but did not find any relevant solution. I'd be very grateful for any advice.
Thanks

**markp62** · 8th January 2008

No such thing as 'power user' with XP Home, only Administrator, Limited User, and Guest.
The Guest account would need to be turned on, it is off by default. It is not possible with my installation of XP Home to change a Administrator or Limited User into a Guest Account. The option isn't there.
So if you do have only the Guest and the Administrator, and nothing else, it appears you have deleted your old user account and turned on the Guest.
What you wanted was the regular Administrator account, an account with adminstrative rights, and a Limited User Account.
Try this, at the Welcome screen, where the users are listed when booting in Normal mode, press CTRL+ALT+DEL three times. You should get the old logon window. Enter in your old regular username and password if any.

ruetasilitu · 8th January 2008

Thanks for your answer.
Someone gave me the solution on another forum: Safe Mode, log in as default admin, run the command prompt and enter the following command:
net localgroup administrators /add accountname
Which did the trick.

For your information, my usual account was not deleted, the folder was still there and I could still log in as usual (I always use the classic logon), except that it was now a guest account. Not even 'restricted user', guest! This was the account type shown in User Accounts. I understand there is no option in XP Home to change an admin account to a guest account should anyone wish to do so, but still that is what happened after the sequence of events I described! Weird.

Also, I did not know that Power Users did not exist in XP Home. I wonder why that is, and why the option is still available in the account properties panel although it does not work... I guess that's MS for you.
Anyway, thanks again for trying to help out.