Suddenly need Admin password in Recovery

[CP Broome]

I have been trying to fix a friend's computer (vitus,
most likely). I've had to use the recovery console a
number of times and each time I just hit enter when it
asked for the administrator password. Now all of a
sudden it says that the password is invalid. What on
earth happened? I have no idea how to know that
password. Help?? Thanks

 

[Taurarian]

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;308402
'The Password Is Not Valid' Error Message Appears When You Log On to
Recovery Console in Windows XP

 

[cp broome]

Thank you. This helped me, so now I could face other
problems, which, the main one is, when trying to
reinstall XP Home, it hangs up at the same spot each
time, when running it from the Recovery console. When I
got Windows to boot up, I ran the reinstall from WIndows,
and when it asked me for the CD Key, it said it wasn't
valid. So either way I try to reinstall Windows, I run
into problems. Trying not to do the full format-retore
to factory settings (this is an OEM, Compaq), but do you
think it's just best to do it all clean?

 

[Taurarian]

Are you typing in the correct CD Key. It is case sensitive, sometimes 8 can
look like B. Study the CD key and make sure that it is being typed exactly
right otherwise it will reject it.