please help: locked out of windows

LukeHazard · 07-07-2008, 03:29 PM

hello all, i will do my best to explain my problem:

i have a new Dell Inspiron 1720 running XP Professional SP3.

i downgraded from Vista to XP, and everything was running smoothly, i just wanted to change one thing; the welcome screen and then the password prompt to go away when i turn on the computer or return from standby.

i disabled the welcome screen in control panel only to notice a user/pass prompt in its place. so i then did a command prompt for "Control Userpasswords2" and unchecked "users must enter a name and password to use this computer". after rebooting the next day, i faced a user/pass field that would not let me log on to windows. no matter if i left it blank or put in any passwords that may have been stored, i just get a message saying: "cannot log on to windows, make sure the user and password you entered is correct" or something to that effect... there was only a choice of "Administrator" and my usual log on name "Luke" which is also an administrator user.

i tried booting in safe mode, but still had to face the user/pass prompt. (as a side note, i tried this on a friends computer when she had a similar problem, and safe mode allowed me to change her settings, but such is not the case with my computer for some reason)

where i am now is, i installed another instance of XP, named the main user "Hazard" and now i can see my Documents and programs from the old "Luke" user, but i still cannot change the settings for "Luke" in order to log on to "Lukes" desktop and be on my merry way.

what i would like to ultimately do is, somehow gain access to Lukes desktop, restore the settings to a working order, and delete the extra instance of XP named "Hazard".

i hope i was clear enough in my explanation. can anyone help? i will explain more if necessary. thank you so much in advance.

(in addition, i have not looked into 3rd party password recovery/Administrative password bypass software, but i know it exists. i would rather not do this, but if it seems safe and is recommended, i will look into it.)

(also, i understand that if i wanted to, i could copy the files from the old instance to the new instance, but recovering my programs and drivers would take days of work, and this is what i'm trying to avoid. as a second question, if i were to take this route, how do i delete the old instance of XP?)

Geekgirl · 07-07-2008, 06:42 PM

Hello and Welcome to TSF

Quote:

(in addition, i have not looked into 3rd party password recovery/Administrative password bypass software, but i know it exists. i would rather not do this, but if it seems safe and is recommended, i will look into it.)

TSF does not support this anyhow

Try System Restore to a date before you changed the settings if its possible if it is not you will need to copy data from your old user profile to the new profile.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/811151/

07-07-2008, 03:29 PM	#1 (permalink)
LukeHazard Registered User Join Date: Jul 2008 Posts: 1 OS: WINXP Professional SP3	please help: locked out of windows hello all, i will do my best to explain my problem: i have a new Dell Inspiron 1720 running XP Professional SP3. i downgraded from Vista to XP, and everything was running smoothly, i just wanted to change one thing; the welcome screen and then the password prompt to go away when i turn on the computer or return from standby. i disabled the welcome screen in control panel only to notice a user/pass prompt in its place. so i then did a command prompt for "Control Userpasswords2" and unchecked "users must enter a name and password to use this computer". after rebooting the next day, i faced a user/pass field that would not let me log on to windows. no matter if i left it blank or put in any passwords that may have been stored, i just get a message saying: "cannot log on to windows, make sure the user and password you entered is correct" or something to that effect... there was only a choice of "Administrator" and my usual log on name "Luke" which is also an administrator user. i tried booting in safe mode, but still had to face the user/pass prompt. (as a side note, i tried this on a friends computer when she had a similar problem, and safe mode allowed me to change her settings, but such is not the case with my computer for some reason) where i am now is, i installed another instance of XP, named the main user "Hazard" and now i can see my Documents and programs from the old "Luke" user, but i still cannot change the settings for "Luke" in order to log on to "Lukes" desktop and be on my merry way. what i would like to ultimately do is, somehow gain access to Lukes desktop, restore the settings to a working order, and delete the extra instance of XP named "Hazard". i hope i was clear enough in my explanation. can anyone help? i will explain more if necessary. thank you so much in advance. (in addition, i have not looked into 3rd party password recovery/Administrative password bypass software, but i know it exists. i would rather not do this, but if it seems safe and is recommended, i will look into it.) (also, i understand that if i wanted to, i could copy the files from the old instance to the new instance, but recovering my programs and drivers would take days of work, and this is what i'm trying to avoid. as a second question, if i were to take this route, how do i delete the old instance of XP?)