Trying to activate XP

My sister failed to activate her new windows xp home edition after the 30 days an now it wont let her do anything..She can now get to the desk top but when she tries to go any farther thant that, it says she is not authorized to do so, needs the administrators password to continue. Her husband mad: ) is the one who installed the new XP so we are not at all sure what he may have did... To her knowledge there is no administrators account set up on her computer.. Any ideas on what to do now????

 

Excerpt from:
http://www.informationweek.com/story/IWK20020117S0002

If Windows XP reaches the end of its one-month grace period without being activated, it simply locks you out, period. After login--even as Administrator--instead of seeing the normal desktop, you're shown a message:


"This copy of Windows must be activated with Microsoft before you can log on. Do you want to activate Windows now? (Yes/No) "

If you answer yes, you're taken through the activation process, after which--if your system successfully completes its activation--you can resume computing normally. But if you answer No or if your machine is unable to complete the activation process, you can't continue. You're stopped cold, completely locked out of the operating system. You can't do anything with XP, even if you have Administrator rights, until and unless you successfully complete the activation process. (Resetting the system clock to an earlier date via your PC's BIOS setup program won't let you regain access to a locked system. Once WPA is triggered, your system stays locked until it's activated.)

I believe there's even a phone number that you can call and get the activation number needed.

==Mute points but=====

If you need to login as Adminstrator, you will need the Admin password, but as described above, you will still be locked out until you activate.

Admin password: Can you not get this from the husband?

Could try a safemode bootup, this will boot in admin mode by default. (still need to know the password)

Could also hit key combo of cntrl/alt/del twice at the login or welcome screen. This should produce or show an Admin choice (still need to know password)

Opps...Blooper...
Edited this out, while not specific (in fact down right nonspecific), it was a violation of this boards policy not to circumvent any Security_Administrator Password requirement.


Or just format and reinstall xp. You will lose all personal data, applications or updates you've installed but I believe this will give you another trial 30 days to activate.

 

At some point, it will ask if you want to activate over the internet or by phone. If it won't activate on the net then check the "by phone" option. It will give you a number to call which will be answered by a machine. Just step through the process, typing the 42-number in as directed and eventually, after this long, tedious process, activation will be complete.

The number one reason it won't activate over the net (other than not having a way to get online, of course) is the time/date settings on the computer are wrong. Once the 30-day grace period has ended, there's no way to get into Windows to reset the clock so activating by phone is the only option.