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DADDY BOB'S COMPUTER Q & A
August 5,
2007
Q.
My daughter created a password on her
computer to keep her little brother out, and
now she has forgotten it and cannot use her
computer. HELP??
A.
This is a question I get many, many times.
Most often, when I try to describe the
process to remove the password, I end up
with the computer and do it for them.
As you
have found out, passwords usually only lock
out the very one they are supposed to admit.
If you are going to use a password for
anything, write it down, and don't lose it.
It's easy to think you will remember it, but
chances are, that unless you have used it
many times, you will forget it.
There are
two common places that a password can be
required. If the password must be entered as
soon as the computer is turned on, the
following procedure will NOT work. This kind
of password is stored in the BIOS setup, and
is extremely difficult, if not impossible,
to remove without opening the case and
making changes to the motherboard.
If the
password is required when the XP Welcome
Screen is displayed, then the following
should do the trick. Thankfully, this is the
more common case.
If
there is another user account setup on the
computer with administrator privileges, sign
on using it, and then proceed to step 4
below. If your daughter is the only user
account on the computer, start with step 1.
-
Restart the computer. When the welcome
screen appears, try entering any
password and click Enter. If the
password is incorrect, you will get this
message something like this:
Did you forget your password? You can click
the “?” button to see your password hint. Or
you can use your password reset disk. Please
type your password again. Be sure to use the
correct uppercase and lowercase letters.
You probably don’t have a restore floppy,
but you can try clicking on the “?” to see a
hint about your password. Of course, if when
you originally created the password you
didn’t enter a clue, none will be available
here.
-
Assuming you either didn’t create a clue
or the clue doesn’t help you, proceed as
follows: Press CTRL+ALT+DELETE
two times, and then in the Useer Name
box, type in “administrator”
(without the quotes). By default,
Windows XP creates an account called
administrator on the computer when it is
installed, but this account is normally
hidden and not displayed.
-
Now, if you are lucky, this default
administrator account has never been
accessed before, and therefore there
will be no password. So, just click OK
without entering anything in the
password space. If the start up process
begins, you were lucky.
-
When the computer has started up, and
the new Administrator account has
finished setting up, click Start,
then Run, and enter control
passwords2 and click OK.
-
Click the name of the account you want
to change, and then click the Reset
Password button. Note that you
cannot change the password for the
account you are currently signed on
with, and if you try, the Reset
Password button will be grayed out
and inactive.
-
If you want to change your password,
type a new password in the
New password box, and
then type the password again in the
Confirm new password
box, and then click
OK.
-
If you just want to remove the password,
leave the New Password and
Confirm Password boxes blank and
click OK.
-
Click Start, Turn Off Computer,
then the Restart button.
Now, when
the compute restarts, there should be no
password required. If the above procedure
does not fix the problem, all is not lost as
there are other things that can be done, but
these are too involved and computer specific
to try to describe here. |
