Owner account changed to "Account Unknown"

[Guest]

Help! My owner account (where most of my files are) has been magically
changed to "account unknown" under the System Properties/Advanced/User
Profiles. I "see" the "Account Unknown" listed, but I am unable to access
it. I tried signing in as the administrator, but no luck. I checked Windows
help online, but no luck. I called Sony Vaio support, (support?), no luck.

I am running XP Home Edition SP2 will all updates.

I have found out that the files aren't gone, according to online readings,
but getting to them is another matter. I'm a minister and all of my
sermons/funerals/baptisms/etc. are connected with the "Owner" profile. Yes,
I know, back up... I have the hard copies, but that's not real helpful.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[bumtracks]

Did you try an earlier restore point date ?

 

[Rick \Nutcase\ Rogers]

Hi,

Are you able to logon as administrator in Safe mode?

How to start in Safe mode:
http://www.rickrogers.org/fixes.htm#Safe mode

If so, you can create a new user account and copy your old profile data into
it.

How to Copy User Data to a New User Profile
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=811151

Note that one step not listed in the article is that after creating the
destination profile you must log into it once first to create the necessary
file structure before you do the copy procedure.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Associate Expert - WindowsXP Expert Zone

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org

 

[Guest]

Whatever happened also took away all my XP restore points. So, that's not an
option.

 

[Guest]

Tried creating the new user account as you said. The "copy to" in the system
properties/user profiles section is greyed out, so I am unable to click on it
to copy it.

I should also note that I have lost my restore points as well, so that is
not an option.

 

[Rick \Nutcase\ Rogers]

Hi,

Don't use the "copy to" function in system properties, instead open Windows
Explorer and copy/.paste between the user profile folders.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Associate Expert - WindowsXP Expert Zone

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org