Forgot administrator's password

Hi Reggie,

Please read the entire article before proceeding:

All administrator accounts are created equal, with equal
powers, except that the main adiminstrator account cannot
be deleted and it does not appear on the login (or users)
menu by default.

You do need an alternate administrator account to solve this
problem. You must login to a user account with administrative
privileges in order to access system resources, take ownership
of files and folders, and to change other people's passwords.
(including the built-in administrator account)

Otherwise, what would be the point of any security at all,
if you could bypass it at will.

If you can login to another account with administrator pri'vs,
then follow me. Otherwise you may have to pursue more difficult
options, as explained later.

1) Open up the control panel
2) Open up Administrative tools
3) Open up local security settings
4) Expand Local policies in the LHS folder tree

Check:
Accounts: Administrator Account Status = Enabled
Accounts: Rename Administrator Account = Administrator

this is to make sure that the admin account is enabled,
and has not been renamed. You can double click on these
settings to change them. Is you are for some reason unable
to enable the admin account, you must reboot to safe mode,
where the admin account is always enabled.

Now that you are sure that you have a functioning administrator
account, you must reset the password, since you cannot
retrieve it:


From the control panel, once again open up

Administrative Tools ---->
Computer Management --->
Local users and Groups ---->
Users ----->
Administrator ---->
Right click on administrator ---->
SET PASSWORD

....

This should do it.

N.B.
The administrator account will be re-created, you will loose
1) All settings and preferences
2) Access to any NTFS encrypted files the administrator
has encrypted.
3) Stored network and internet passwords (the administrator's)
4) Personal security certificates.

This procedure is different from simply changing the password,
because you don't know the original, so Windows treats it as a
hostile takeover, That's why you loose access to encrypted files.

If you have trouble starting the computer management Applet,
Run it manually:

START --> RUN --> compmgmt.msc

or

...\WINDOWS\system32\mmc.exe compmgmt.msc

==========================================

Trick:

If you do not have access to an existing account
with administrative privileges, you may be able to hack in
with and old setup disk from Windows 2000, with
no service packs, or at most XP1

The reason is that Windows 2000 did not anticipate nor
respect Windows XP security.

1) Reboot from the 2000 disk, and follow the on screen
prompts to repair the system using the

SYSTEM RECOVERY CONSOLE.

2) Do not proceed to install Win 2000, make sure you
get out before it asks you to format a disk, if you get
there you missed the prompt and you have gone too far,
Reboot and try again.

3) Once you are in the recovery console = DOS like environment
type HELP, and it will give you a list of commands.

You should be able to create a new user account
(with admin or change the admin password privs)

4) The last alternative is to purchase an XP password recovery
utility, which you run from a boot CD.

Good luck

Martin.