Lost Password on Windows 2000

Our primary HR person has a Sony Windows 2000 laptop. Somehow the password stopped working on it, both the administrative one and hers. We are completely locked out of the computer. How the passwords all got changed I have no idea. What can I do to get a new password or way to get into the computer?

Is there a way I can do this while preserving the files on the computer? Any suggestions are appreciated!

http://home.eunet.no/~pnordahl/ntpasswd/
This will work if you have floppy drive .
I had this on a bootable CD but I just can't find the iso ..

The special boot floppy Ozzie pointed you towards is your best bet. If for some reason you can't use it or it doesn't work, you could do one of two things:

1) Reinstall Windows, but leave the file system intact.

It's been a while since I did this--it might overwrite the Documents and Settings folder. You can prevent this from happening by booting the laptop off a floppy that includes NTFS-DOS, then renaming the documents folder.

Once Windows is reinstalled you will be able to back up the files and either reinstall programs or perform a clean reinstall (recommended).

2) Mount the hard drive in another computer. In order to attach the laptop's hard drive to the IDE cable of a regular desktop PC you will need a special adapter. Once the hard drive is correctly attached to another computer you can retrieve files from it.

Hope the boot floppy Ozzie pointed out works for you.

Once you are finished recovering the system, do set up a backup system so your data will be preserved next time the box locks up. :)

Zac

 

Hi,

I am having the same trouble with an unknown administrator password on Windows 2000. I just started working at a CTC in Durham, NC and one of our employees has a computer that was donated and the administrator password is set but we don't know what it is. I want to be able to reset it. I have tried the boot disk but I didn't have any luck with it. Are there any tricks with the boot disk? Or is there any another way of getting the admin password reset without having to reinstall Windows 2000.

Thanks for your help!!!!!!

ben
you can call me and I will will you thru it

contracttrain_yahoo_com

Thanks for the advice!! I appreciate it, and I am off to see what I can do..

LostPassword.com is another option for forgotten passwords, although they charge for their utilities. (I pass this on because it is a useful site, but of course it does have implications of potential mis-use as well.)

Ivan