HELP! Lost XP Admin password :(

[spacey 0]

yea somehow, i mistyped my password twice (i guess cuz i wasn't paying much attn and i typed it fast in the dark) and now i can't login to my machine... without buying expensive software is there anyway i can get back in without having to format? like reinstall ontop or something?

[Four and Twenty 0]

there is a way through the recovery console

i can't remeber exactly how it is done

i think dosfreak knows

it involes deleting a certain file which then clears the password

[Davros 0]

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

[Four and Twenty 0]

that is a nifty lookin program

that should work great

the way i was talking about you have to delete the sam file

[el_vago32 0]

another alternative is a manual way to do it, but yo gotta have acces to the root of your HD (put your HD in other pc or wathever), then copy the cmd.exe to your %system% directory and rename it to logon.scr (firtsly yo have to rename the original file logon.scr to other name, so you can do it with the cmd.exe)...so at this point when your pc starts up it will open the command prompt. then type this:

 

"net user <account name> <new password>"

and that's it, a little harder than other ways but still good, so with this you can hack the system practicely

[tylau 0]

All is not last yet, if you havent have turned on the encryption feature of NTFS5, your data should still be accesible although it would require reinstalltion of XP

[theelviscerator 0]

Normally you set a time limit that expires in those cases..other than that log in with another account that has admin rights then go in and reset the password in MMC or re enable the account.

[kmzpub 0]

Hi,

 

Actually, Active@ Password Changer can easily reset your lost password. This utility saved me before, so it might really help you too. Try it, recommended.

http://www.password-changer.com/

[benway 0]

Ive seen this about 3 times in the last couple weeks.

Reading What everyone has said, seem this case is more difficult.

 

 

my thought is booting to safe mode, Use "administrator" instead of admin, i couldnt tell you off hand what is available at safemode log in. Anyway ive learned(xp pro)that Removing the password Through Safe mode (f8) is possable. In order to do so effectivly you need to only REMOVE the unknown password. Then set it with the actual account of the unknown password.

 

It works, i hope this is of some help.