Password Problems Windows Xp

How Can I Get In My Computer When We Forgot The Password

 

If you know the password that was set when Windows was first installed, then you can boot into the normally hidden, default Admin account. At the Windows logon screen, hit Ctrl>Alt>Del twice and you'll get a Win2000 style login box, enter "Administrator" for the username and the original p/w (if any). Once in there you can change the foprgotten password for your normal accounts in Control Panel>User Accounts. Other than that, I'm afraid we can't help with cracking forgotten passwords.

 

Unfortunately it is against the rules of the forum...

...to discuss this. I made the mistake a couple of days ago of telling someone. Sorry for the bad news.

 

Close_Hauled - the sort of help SuperSparks offered, since it requires knowing the user knowing the administrator password (and so having admin rights on the box), is fine. Otherwise, you are exactly right and we just don't do that.

SuperSparks - I know your suggestion works fine on XP-pro but I seem to remember being told that it does not on XP-home. I have to confess to never having seen the home version of the OS but I think I was told your only option is to boot up in safe mode and then log in as the administrator. I may well be wrong and would love clarification if so.

 

Hi Newt,

I have an unfortunate tendency to forget that not everyone uses Pro However I do have Home Edition as a virtual machine (I'm the worlds biggest fan of Virtual PC 2004 ). I just fired it up and tried it, and I'm happy to report that logging into the default Admin account works exactly the same in Home as in Pro, there's no need to boot into Safe Mode.

 

That's very interesting! I have used both Home and Pro, and tried everything, including the Ctrl>Alt>Del twice trick to get into the Admin account in Home, within Windows, and have never been successful. Have never used a virtual OS, but would think that you run it from within the installed OS, which in your case would be pro? Are you saying that the virtual OS loads right from the boot menu?

EDIT....I guess I should note that I was able to get the classic logon box, just never was allowed to access the Admin account unless in safe mode.

 

I am extremely embarrassed I just realised that I went and booted up an XP Pro virtual machine yesterday. When I actually tried again with Home just now I got "Unable to log you in because of an account restriction ". You do indeed have to boot into Safe Mode. I'm not impressed with HE.

Sorry about that everyone. I shall now go and bash my head against the wall for a while, and see if it knocks any sense into me

 

No need for embarrassment, or apologies. It's one of those things Pro users know works, and wouldn't know doesn't work in Home unless they had the chance and need to try it. It's also one of those things that drove me crazy with Home, and which I do plan to continue trying to find a way to do. Somewhere in the registry, I assume, there's a setting that has the feature disabled in Home, and I hope to one day find it (don't figure MS will ever tell us about it ).

 

Virtual PC software allows you to create a complete computer system within your existing OS. You boot into your Host OS and then run your Virtual Machine software (there are different flavours out there) and then create a virtual machine (VM) that is complete in every way. Depending on system resources you can have multiple VMs running at the same time, can share files between them and can even network them.

The scariest thing is the first time you format a virtual C: drive to set up the new OS. It is frightening because you worry that it is the real C: drive. You can also enter the virtual BIOS and make changes there.

This is a great way to be able to play with different systems. You can even have a test version of your Host OS to play with. if you mess it up, no harm is done. I have a VM just for running older software. For example, spreadsheets created in Quattro Pro 9 do not always convert cleanly to Quattro Pro 8 (A client has this version) so I use my VM to work in Ver. 8 when necessary.

FYI, I use VMWare. I have Virtual PC but it does not support OSs like NetWare so I use VMWare most of the time.

DRD

 

Thanks for the info NetDoc.

That's what I was looking for, and assumed.