Rhonda,
(long)
There are a few things in your story that 'don't jive' for me.
See inline and you'll see why I say that..
dbzrocks said:
I was administrator on my computer.
First off, the account named 'Administrator' (that IS what we are talking
about here, isn't it?) will normally not show up on the genuine XP Welcome
screen.
If you have more accounts defined, then those other (self-defined) accounts
are showing, never the original account named 'Administrator', unless you
have tweaked the system, in which case it is possible to have it shown.
However, from the level of knowledge you have offered here so far (and I do
not mean any disrespect with this), I guess you haven't don this.
I added another administrative account
How did you add this second account?
Did you use the 'Local Users and Groups' function in Manage Computer or did
you use the Control Panel, Users, Category function? I suspect the latter,
simply because that is a very common approach for many users.
and made my first one limited,
Now this statement unnerves my first conclusion, because of your use of the
term 'limited'.
The possibility to 'just flick a switch' to change the account type to
'limited' is readily offered in Control Panel Users, but not in Local Users
and Groups. In the latter you would have to 'juggle' with Group memberships
to achieve something like that and again that is not a normal user's cup of
tea. On top of that this could only be done still being logged on with an
account that HAS membership in the group 'Administrators', otherwise you
will get error messages of type 'Access Denied' or 'Error occurred trying to
execute the requested function(or some wording with that bearing).
but now none of my or my son's accounts
appear, and there is no administrative account on my computer.
Simply from changing the account type of one and adding another, this is NOT
normal behaviour, I agree.
If I look at
the list of users, it shows my administrative account and many others, but
they are not accessible.
With what function are you able to 'look' at your list of accounts?
I suspect Local Users and Groups, because the Control Panel, Users interface
does not show you the account named 'Administrator' and you state you can
see your administrative account listed among others.
Furthermore they ARE accessible, only not for changing most of the settings,
if not all, so I guess with 'not accessible' you meant to say you cannot
change anything for those accounts.
I cannot use my computer as there is no
administrator. How do I get my original administrative account back. The
help I was already given did not work. Thank you Rhonda
There are various tools on the net that can be used to get a hold of the
password of the account named 'Administrator', but that is only a secondary
problem for you, because apparently your 'administrator' account(s) no
longer have 'administrator' privileges.
There are tools that can be used to gain access, but so far I've only been
able to find 'payable' ones, like Emergency Repair Commander from
Winternals.com. Such a tool will allow you get into your system (even with a
normal user status) and change things that you could not change through Safe
Mode (like writing in the registry!), but I'm not sure if it will allow you
changes to 'elevate' a given account to 'administrator' status.
Unfortunately I have no setup to 'mimic' your situation, but possibly
someone else has the ultimate bright idea. (Doug??)
george
