Recovery of forgotten password for an adminstrative account in XP

[ekwang]

Hello,

My girlfriend, to my chagrin, has not turned off her Sony Vaio laptop in
quite a long time since she is unsure as to whether or not she remembers, or
even created, the administrative account that she has in XP Home Edition (I
believe it is XP HE SP2). That being said, here is what I do know (or believe
to know):

1) She is using an administrative account, not the Administator account
2) She may have created a password for her account when she first used her
Vaio
3) I don't believe she ever enabled the file level encryption scheme on her
My Documents folder (or if it would have been availalbe to her in XP HE)

I know there is the tool within the User Accounts control panel applet to
that allows you to prevent a forgotten password. Can this be used after the
fact, as in this situation where she is unsure if she created one and/or did
but forgot it?

Thanks and Happy Holidays!

 

[M]

Hello,

My girlfriend, to my chagrin, has not turned off her Sony Vaio laptop in
quite a long time since she is unsure as to whether or not she remembers,
or
even created, the administrative account that she has in XP Home Edition
(I
believe it is XP HE SP2). That being said, here is what I do know (or
believe
to know):

1) She is using an administrative account, not the Administator account
2) She may have created a password for her account when she first used her
Vaio
3) I don't believe she ever enabled the file level encryption scheme on
her
My Documents folder (or if it would have been availalbe to her in XP HE)

I know there is the tool within the User Accounts control panel applet to
that allows you to prevent a forgotten password. Can this be used after
the
fact, as in this situation where she is unsure if she created one and/or
did
but forgot it?

Thanks and Happy Holidays!

Try http://www.petri.co.il/forgot_administrator_password.htm#1

I have used http://home.eunet.no/~pnordahl/ntpasswd/ mentioned on this page
on a Vista machine, it unlocked all accounts and reset the passwords I had
forgotten to blank.

 

[Nepatsfan]

Hello,

My girlfriend, to my chagrin, has not turned off her Sony Vaio laptop in
quite a long time since she is unsure as to whether or not she remembers, or
even created, the administrative account that she has in XP Home Edition (I
believe it is XP HE SP2). That being said, here is what I do know (or believe
to know):

1) She is using an administrative account, not the Administator account
2) She may have created a password for her account when she first used her
Vaio
3) I don't believe she ever enabled the file level encryption scheme on her
My Documents folder (or if it would have been availalbe to her in XP HE)

I know there is the tool within the User Accounts control panel applet to
that allows you to prevent a forgotten password. Can this be used after the
fact, as in this situation where she is unsure if she created one and/or did
but forgot it?

Thanks and Happy Holidays!

Let's get the easy stuff out of the way first. If XP Home Edition is the version
that's installed on her computer then she can't be using the built-in
Administrator account. That account can only be accessed in Safe Mode in XP HE.
She also couldn't have used EFS to encrypt her files since that is not available
in XP HE.

As for her forgotten password, you're correct in that there is a tool in the
User Accounts applet to help with a forgotten password. The problem is that you
would need to know the current password in order to create a password recovery
disk.

How to create and use a password reset disk for a computer that is not a domain
member in Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=305478

Since XP doesn't require that a password be assigned to a new user account, odds
are her password is blank. If her account is the only one active user account
and you restart the laptop, odds are it will automatically log on her account
without asking for a password.

If you run into a problem, the simplest solution is to restart the computer in
Safe Mode, logon with the Administrator account and reset her password. Since,
as earlier noted, encryption is not available in XP HE, the warning about
changing her password can be ignored.

Good luck

Nepatsfan

 

[ekwang]

Let's get the easy stuff out of the way first. If XP Home Edition is the version
that's installed on her computer then she can't be using the built-in
Administrator account. That account can only be accessed in Safe Mode in XP HE.
She also couldn't have used EFS to encrypt her files since that is not available
in XP HE.

As for her forgotten password, you're correct in that there is a tool in the
User Accounts applet to help with a forgotten password. The problem is that you
would need to know the current password in order to create a password recovery
disk.

How to create and use a password reset disk for a computer that is not a domain
member in Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=305478

Since XP doesn't require that a password be assigned to a new user account, odds
are her password is blank. If her account is the only one active user account
and you restart the laptop, odds are it will automatically log on her account
without asking for a password.

If you run into a problem, the simplest solution is to restart the computer in
Safe Mode, logon with the Administrator account and reset her password. Since,
as earlier noted, encryption is not available in XP HE, the warning about
changing her password can be ignored.

Good luck

Nepatsfan


Is there a way to create the Password Recovery Disk to a CD-R if there is not floppy disk drive? It has been quite some time since I've sat in front of her Vaio. Thanks!

Eric

 

[Nepatsfan]

Eric

If there's no floppy drive available then your next option would be a USB flash
drive. I don't believe you can use a CD to create a password recovery disk.

Nepatsfan

 

[ekwang]

If there's no floppy drive available then your next option would be a USB flash
drive. I don't believe you can use a CD to create a password recovery disk.

Nepatsfan


I'll give the USB flash drive a try, thanks again!

Eric

 

[Nepatsfan]

Eric

You're welcome.

Nepatsfan