Reseting XP Admin Password

Okay, I bought a computer from a pawn shop and it came preloaded with Windows XP. The guest account is enabled along with another users account. The computer did not come with the restore software and I don't have any copies of anything lying around to do a fresh install not to mention there is licensed software on the computer I would like to keep (photoshop and Auto-Cad Lite).

I did a little googling and seen that I can reset the password or even brute force the hash using programs such as LC5 but access to the SAM ( and yes I did try to copy the repair directory SAM ) has been prohibited by the former owner.

Then I seen the linux approach.

I am currently downloading the Knoppix ISO but I need some directions as to what I am doing. How can I reset the password for the admin account. Delete the SAM?

How about if you just wanted to reset only the admin? Is there a line in which I can delete?

You could just reformat and reinstall XP.

Cant you go into safe mode and make a new admin account or give the guest accounts admin rights ?

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You could just reformat and reinstall XP.

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As he said

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don't have any copies of anything lying around to do a fresh install

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He doesn't want to reformat and reinstall XP there is software on it he wants to keep.
Installing LC5 will do you no good cause if I remember correctly you need to have admin rights to install that program... Unless you just wana brute it.

Not exactly sure how you would though.. Most programs like pwdump and LC5 require admin rights to get any information.

john the ripper might work though or even possibly chntpwd(but I think the later only works on NT/2000)

Give this program a try
http://home.eunet.no/~pnordahl/ntpasswd/

The admin account I am trying to access is the one you mentioned. Whoever also owned this computer before made the admin account accessible from the regular login screen which is a simple reg tweak I belive.


One thing maybe the AO community can help me figure out is that there is a hint for the password which is "ursa in english"

The only thing I can find is Ursa in latin is she-bear and I have tried many variations of this to no prevail. Anyone else have an idea?

Before you get to involved in different ways to get in.......did you try the simplist?

Boot into safe mode (usually by pressing F8 while boot screen is up). The administrator account will then show up along with any other admin accounts that are enabled on the box. Try the default windows password for the main administrator account to see if it works. (simple enter key....no input).

If the previous owner did not change the password then that will give you access to all features of windows and you can delete all the other accounts and create any new ones you wish.

I red(sp?) the first post wrong or I only noticed that he said he didn't have the restore disk. Try the word ursa=urged in italian. You really should use google.
If you meed to translate something go to google above the search box you will see a option that says more>>. Then you go to the bottom and it says translate.

Actually I'm gonna rant for a second because when I went to google and typed resetting xp admin password I got 36,000 results so I don't think you even searched google.
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&i...=Google+Search
Then on searching the AO forums I found this:
http://www.antionline.com/showthread...admin+password
and this:
http://www.antionline.com/showthread...admin+password

Use the search feature and google...

Unfortunately I don't have another computer at my disposal at this time to use. So went to burn the iso I got from your link DeadAddict and found that I don't have anything to burn an iso with. Can't install of course and found the rawrite tries to create a temp file somehwere which is not allowed.

Not looking good.

Also when I tried "urged" as the password I noticed that it is "usra" not "ursa". Sorry.


/edit

If you would have read the post a little muert0 you would have noticed that I said I did try searching google and I think if you read those results you will find that almost all of them require to use LC5, pwdump2, or someother like program which requires access to the SAM which I said I did not have.

/edit2 I looked at irongeeks porfile earlier and went to his actual site in which all the info was posted and once again, requires installation of a program or the way in which I was talking about, booting a live OS. I asked how to do so in linux because I only kno the basic commands and wasn't even sure if I should be doing this considering its a NTFS and don't think modification of NTFS from linux is quite stable yet.

I've had a similar problem, and always did this:

http://ebcd.pcministry.com/


It's a package (COMPLETELY FREE)that you can download to your machine and run to create an emergency ISO file. (An ISO is a cd image that you can burn to a cd). Burn that ISO to a blank cd, and boot up the computer with that cd. Of course this means you need access to a cd-writer and at least one blank cd.

From there, follow the instructions both on the screen and website to change the password of the Administrator account. It's actually quite simple, despite how complicated I've made it sound, and has yet to ever fail me on an XP box. Bootable, quick, and effective. If you need further explainations check their website or ask here. I'll do my best to answer.