Help - Password Error

[Guest]

(sorry for the repost - lost first message) I took home my old work computer
for my daughter. I wanted to eliminate the password prompt at start up, went
into the control panel and made changes in "passwords". I changed to
administrator and left the passwords blank (thinking I would just hit enter
when/if password was prompted) and check 'home computer".

Well when I restated it prompted for password and now I'm lock out. No
matter what I do I cannot get back into windows. HELP PLEASE

 

[John John]

http://home.eunet.no/~pnordahl/ntpasswd/

John

 

[Guest]

Okay I feel like an idiot. What am I supposed to do?

 

[John John]

Download the utility and try to reset the password for the administrator
account. How many administrator accounts do you have on the machine?

John

 

[John John]

PS. Did you try booting with the Last Known Good or Safe Mode boot
option? Press F8 when the computer boots and you will get the different
boot options.

John

 

[Guest]

Oh yes I tried the last known good boot and it went to the administrator and
couldn't log in. I have no idea how many administrator accounts are on the
computer, but it looked like maybe 2 or 3.

I tried something like this last night and it wouldn't boot, got the "non
system disk" thing!! What do I do then?

 

[Guest]

I can't write the unzipped file to my cd any suggestions?

 

[SG]

Hi Jen,

This is win2000 system right?
I'm not sure on Win2000, but in XP home you have to have at least one user
with Admin rights setup in order to boot in normal mode or else you will get
the same thing you are getting. In XP home if you delete that user the
log-in will default to Admin and no matter what password you put in, even if
it's blank you cannot bypass this.

To fix this problem you must log-in in Safe Mode and create a new user with
Admin rights, set password or leave it blank and you can then log-in normal
mode. As I say this may not be the case with Win2000, but thought it worth
mentioning. Might be worth a try booting in Safe Mode then see if you can
correct the problem.

All the best,
SG

 

[John John]

All the information needed to create the disk is on Nordahl's web site,
if you can't burn the cd make a floppy diskette. You may not need to
use the password reset utility at all, if you know the names and
passwords to the administrator accounts try this:

To bypass Automatic Logon when Windows 2000 is starting press and hold
the SHIFT key, this will present you with the logon dialog box where you
can select to logon in a regular fashion where you have to enter a user
name and password. You need to log on with an administrator account to
undo the AutoLogon changes. If you do not know the account names and
passwords the Nordahl reset utility will be helpful.

As another alternative you can mount the machine's hard disk in another
Windows 2000/XP machine and edit the registry and remove the autologon
entries.

John

 

[Guest]

Even when I log in in safe mode I get the prompt for admin password and
cannot bypass it, so there is no way I can reset the admin password.

 

[SG]

Well it looks like you need to do as John John suggested. Mount the
machine's hard disk in another Windows 2000/XP machine and edit the Registry
and remove the autologon entries.

All the Best,
SG

 

[Frank Booth Snr]

Even when I log in in safe mode I get the prompt for admin password and
cannot bypass it, so there is no way I can reset the admin password.

The time you spent messing about with this, you could have done a
re-install. Get out your Win2k system disk and place it in the drive,
then reboot the machine, tapping F2 (or Delete button depending on PC)
during the first few seconds of booting and go into BIOS, then make sure
the CD drive is the first to boot from. Exit BIOS and then reinstall
Win2k from disk. Do not re-format when given the option and make sure
you note the new password when prompted to make one.

 

[Guest]

In case you're interested. I DID IT!!! Don't know how, it took 3 tries, but
I'm good. Lost some settings and such, and now I don't need a password at
all (?). Happy non the less!!!