password not working

[RogueSeven]

Greets,

yet again finding myself going to TF for some help

So i was installing some drivers from the disk my mobo came with and it had the option "do you want to enable the auto logon" i was feelin lazy and did it...so i put in the username and pw info for the computer...when it rebooted it said the pw was wrong, here is the kicker, it wont let me login when i manually put in the PW....says it is wrong...

this is pretty annoying, there is some option for a password recovery using USB but i guess i never set that up...

so,any idea? any tips and/or tricks i can pull off to reset/remove the password

i tried just restarting it,hoping that the driver wouldnt do the auto login stuff but that was a nogo.

regards.

 

[KSoD]

Are you able to logon through Safe Mode?

 

[RogueSeven]

i am not

 

[KSoD]

Well then you are very limited to your option. First option is to use the Win7 DVD and get to the command prompt. When you see the Install Now screen use the Repair my PC option in the bottom left. From there you should see the command prompt option. For screen shots of what it all looks like see here. From there type in this command:

net user administrator /active:yes

This will enable the hidden admin account and hopefully allow you to login to either reset the password or remove the driver.

2nd option is to use one of the tools available here:

http://www.techist.com/forums/f9/windows-password-reset-disks-tools-etc-57458/

If neither of these options work, then you might be outta luck.

 

[RogueSeven]

hmm,i did the administrator activate command, it said it was successful

when i restarted it says the account was locked (the administrator account) is there a way to go straight to windows after activating the administrator account?

 

[KSoD]

No there is not. Seems in your haste you managed to cause some massive issues that cant be gotten around with anything built into Windows. Since there is no repair option and you cant even get into the Full Admin account there isnt to much of a choice. Cause using the Admin account was your only hope to remove that driver. It wont do any good trying to use a BartPE disk since it wont remove that driver from the install itself jsut from the system. Add into that the fact that there is no Repair option, you dont have any more options. Use a Linux LiveCD to backup your data and reinstall.

This is a harsh lesson to NEVER let anything but Windows control your Logon. If you make even a single mistake, there is no going back.

 

[RogueSeven]

Yeah, definitely not doing anything like that again, anyways yesterday, when i came home for work i looked around the windows repair options and this time there were a couple of system restore points from uninstalling an audio driver. i was able to restore back to this point and everything is all good now...


thank you very much for your help.

 

[joelm3103]

Not sure if this applies to your issue or may be obstructed but have you tried any troubleshooting live CDs? Check and see if this helps: Offline NT Password & Registry Editor

 

[KSoD]

That wouldnt help. As i said above in my posts, using a LiveCD (BartPE is a LiveCD) doesnt remove the driver from the system. All it will allow you to do is make some minor password changes or other things like that. You cant remove a driver from a LiveCD. Which is the root of the issue.