local machine administrator pw

[Troy]

My home machine "miraculously" changed it's administrator
pw. My kids don't know how it happened but for now, I am
unable to update software, etc. Also, other authorized
users do not have permissions to do this either. How can
I recover or otherwise change the administrator pw so that
I can again properly take care of this box??

Thank you,
Troy

 

[Dave]

This is easy.

If it's FAT32, boot on a floppy and delete the SAM file.

If it's NTFS create a linux boot floppy that will allow you to change the
password.
See the following for more information on that;
http://www.securityhorizon.com/archives/ntdisk.html

Dave