WinXP password

[tdth]

I forgot my WinXP administrator password, anyone know how to log on to Win?

My computer only has 1 account (administrator), and it is set password. Now I forgot it, and I have so many important documents in my HD. Help and thank

[pgrmdave]

Can you log on as a guest?

[Buffy]

You pretty much need to reinstall from the CD. You won't lose any data files, but you will probably lose at least some of your configuration....

 

Sorry,

Buffy

[C1ay]

I forgot my WinXP administrator password, anyone know how to log on to Win?

My computer only has 1 account (administrator), and it is set password. Now I forgot it, and I have so many important documents in my HD. Help and thank

 

While you are restarting your machine press the F8 key to get the "Boot Mode" menu. Choose "Safe Mode". Once you get to the Log in screen log in as administrator with no password. This should allow you to reset forgotten local admin/users passwords.

 

I have also used some of these tools before.

 

You should also create a Password Reset Disk once you have access.

 

HTH,

[tdth]

While you are restarting your machine press the F8 key to get the "Boot Mode" menu. Choose "Safe Mode". Once you get to the Log in screen log in as administrator with no password. This should allow you to reset forgotten local admin/users passwords.

 

I have also used some of these tools before.

 

You should also create a Password Reset Disk once you have access.

 

HTH,

Cannot, I have tried this method also, but it is useless.

To Buffy, are you sure that will not lose any data if I reinstall WinXP?

[TINNY]

to be safe, reinstall windows on a separate partition.

[nemo]

you might consider trying knoppix before you completely reload. this link demonstrates what i'm getting at...

 

http://animefreak.ath.cx:9000/index.php/2004/10/11/password-recovery-on-an-nt-machine-with-knoppix-std/

[pgrmdave]

I've dealt with a similar problem in two ways.

 

I installed windows xp as another operating system, so that I was dual-booting windows and windows. This allowed me to access all the data I needed, so that I could back it up in case it ever happened again, and then I uninstalled the problematic Windows.

 

The other time, I was able to back up my data by logging in as a guest, then I reinstalled Windows.

 

If you install a copy of windows over your old one, you will lose all information in My Documents and Windows folders. You may also need to reinstall some programs, I'm not sure why.

[tom]

http://home.eunet.no/~pnordahl/ntpasswd/ Here is the readme

 

And download from here

http://home.eunet.no/~pnordahl/ntpasswd/bd041205.zip

[GAHD]

can also pres ctrl+alt+del twice at the login screen, and try logging in a guest. This should work as long as you didn't reset permission or disable the guest account in 'Administrative tools'. once in guest you might be able to run 'msconfig' and activate noGUIboot which would autolog you in as administrator if you chose the noguiboot option after pressing F8 in the boot cycle.

[C1ay]

http://home.eunet.no/~pnordahl/ntpasswd/ Here is the readme

 

And download from here

http://home.eunet.no/~pnordahl/ntpasswd/bd041205.zip

 

I have used this successfully for several users myself on Win2K systems using FAT32. I have not tried it on WinXP. I do know that it could causes problems with NTFS systems using the old NTFS driver. For this reason I chose not to post it because of the precautions that must be considered.

[tom]

http://www.petri.co.il/forgot_administrator_password.htm

[alexander]

Just read the article tom is pointing to :( should work, its windows :( resetting passwords is easy, and even if the right way is to reinstall windows, cuz its windows, the less ethically right way to do that is to get yourself one of the programs mentioned above, create a bootable cd or floppy, and reset the password via it, there is also Knoppix that helps a lot in these situations, and there is an awesome util online that allows you to get a ntlm md5 hash that stores your pw, and translate it within seconds, due to an extensive library of hashes it will momentarily compare a hash (if your password meets the requirements) to its database of trillions (if not more) and get you the password , but that might be a bit hard core :(

[C1ay]

Then there is always LostPassword.com...