Re: Forgot password - dead in the water

stonesman911 wrote:

My son is running Windows XP on his laptop. He is the only user account on
the machine. Until recently, he claims never to have been required to
enter a logon password. He does not recall setting a password, and now he
cannot proceed pass the XP logon screen. We've tried the CTRL-ALT-DEL
option to access administrator-level functions - no success. He does not
have a Password Recovery disk. Can someone explain how to resolve this
conflict and eliminate/reset the need for a password? Thanks!

Have you already tried just using a blank password (pressing Enter)? If not,
please do so and then see this link:

http://www.mvps.org/marksxp/WindowsXP/aspdot.php

Otherwise:

In XP Home, boot the computer into Safe Mode. Do this by repeatedly tapping
the F8 key as the computer is starting up. This will get you to the right
menu. Navigate using your Up arrow key; the mouse will not work here. Once
in Safe Mode, you will see the normally hidden Administrator account. The
default password is a blank.

In XP Pro, you do not need to go into Safe Mode. At the Welcome Screen, do
Ctrl-Alt-Del twice to get the classic Windows logon box. Type in
"Administrator" and whatever password you assigned when you set up Windows.

If you reset the built-in Administrator account's password in Home or have
Pro and don't remember the password, use NTpasswd to change the built-in
Administrator account's password to a blank.

http://home.eunet.no/~pnordahl/ntpasswd/

Then go to the User Accounts applet in Control Panel and set passwords that
you will remember and make other desired changes.

Malke
--
Elephant Boy Computers
www.elephantboycomputers.com
"Don't Panic!"
MS-MVP Windows - Shell/User
.

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