XP Home Passwords and Accounts

[KG4IDA]

I'm trying to help a friend out with her daughters laptop. It is an older Celeron (Compaq 2500) that has XP Home on it. The laptop was out of use for a while because it needed a new plug in for the AC adapter. I did that and it runs on AC now and charges its battery.

The problem is that her daughter cannot remember her password. I have used the Linux password editor to try and blank the password. However her login account doesn't show up when I do this. I changed the admin account but Administrator doesn't show up when XP boots. Only her login account is listed. I'm wondering if she disabled all the other accounts or something. Or if it is because her login account is two words, I.E. Blue Bird.

We only use XP Pro at work so I'm not that familiar with XP Home. Is there a way to get the Administrator account to show up so I can log into it. On the XP Pro machines, it doesn't list accounts and let you click on one. You have to type in the account name.

Thanks.

[theleafybug]

assuming she didnt put an administrator password on... easiest way if you havent tried is press F8 when the computer turns on and choose safe mode. The administrator account in XP only shows (by default) if there's no other accounts or if you're in safe mode. you can go to user accounts in safe mode and remove her password.

if you already tried that (she has an administrator password) and its really giving you trouble, Hiren's boot cd (just google Hiren) has several password resets/utilities.

[Orkinman]

I know this works on Pro, not sure about home, but if you hit CTRL+ALT+DEL three times at the "Welcome" logon screen it brings up the logon screen you're familiar with and allows you to type the user name.

As for the Linux boot cd, which one did you use? The one I use all the time and never fails for me is NTPassword Reset. It doesn't look very intuitive but if you read closely it's really easy. Also, they and I both recommend you blank the password instead of replacing it. Once your back into windows you can set a new password if you need one.

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

[KG4IDA]

Thanks to both of you!

I didn't realize that the Admin account was only visible in safe mode. Learn something new every day. I use the Ultimate Boot CD. I did blank the password. I'll try the Ctrl+alt+del and see if it works. I logged in as administrator and changed the user password. XP Home seems strange!