WIN 7 administrator password

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I sent this question to Woody.  He said he didn’t know the answer but someone else might.

I’m stuck and am hoping you can point me in a direction to get my little WIN 7 notebook going again.
I have been trying stuff since April when I downloaded the big update from Microsoft.
I have read everything I can find on Ask Woody. I have also downloaded and tried to use other things posted on the Internet.
I’m only trying to get one thing repaired…administrator password.
When I bought the little machine, it offered an option to create an administrator password. I chose not to do it. So, anytime I was installing or removing software and was asked for an administrator password, I hit “continue” and whatever was supposed to happen did.
The Microsoft update must have installed a password, but since I didn’t install it, I have no idea what it is.

I have tried to take out the password they installed, but I have to have the password to get into command prompt. When I go to bios, the option to change the administrator password is locked.

I looked at chrome books. Most don’t seem to have USB ports and won’t run PowerPoint if I had one to plug in a jump drive with slide shows on it. I have about 25 years of PPT programs. Most of them are seldom used but are like an archive from which I can borrow slides and insert into current programs. Many are pretty large files.

If you can point me to help, I surely would appreciate it.

Edit to remove HTML. Please use the “Text” tab in the entry box when you copy/paste.

William Sharp

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JohnS1606

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Bill, Which update do you think has created this problem?

I do have a password for the PC, to log in as “User”, and the same as “Administrator”: this is not the real Admin password, that is a secret. It happens to be like that because, at least this is my theory, this password in Win 7 Home and Pro is a leftover from the main business version of which all other versions of Windows 7 are downmarket knock offs. Be that as it may, the real Admin password in the business version was only for the company’s System Administrator, and the employees were not supposed to know it, to make sure they were unable to tamper with the operating system.

In my own experience, I have never been asked to use a password when clicking on “Run as Administrator” and, from your posting, I gather neither have you, until now. So am really interested to hear what might be causing your problem to avoid it, if possible.

Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).

MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV

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My problem began shortly after I downloaded the monthly roll up in April (2018).  The machine is a Toshiba NB505 with WIN 7 Pro. I am the only one that uses it.  It is not part of a network.  I use it to run PowerPoint presentations.  I would like to sync it to my Google Drive account, but it wants an administrator password to permit the sync download.

I’m 74.  I have limited computer skills.  I can follow instructions pretty well.

William Sharp

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Elly, OscarCP

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Most of the question pertains to the Windows Administrator-credentialed user logon, and I think that this is that for which you are requesting help.

But just to clarify: “When I go to bios, the option to change the administrator password is locked.” This is a different Administrator.

When I go to my BIOS Security tab there are two password fields that can be set.
An Administrator password permits one to lock out the possibility of changing these BIOS passwords. This is not related to an OS password.
A Power-On password permits one to require a password before the computer can be booted into an OS.

The use of the unqualified word ‘Administrator’ is ambiguous. In a max-passwords scenario one would have at least three distinct passwords: BIOS Administrator, BIOS Power-On, OS (e.g., Windows) ‘Administrator’. In addition, each defined ‘standard’ user could have his own distinct password. (And, applications also may have password capabilities.)

“When I go to bios, the option to change the administrator password is locked.”
If this statement is as it appears to be, then the BIOS Administrator password has been set, and is a different challenge than the one you have concerning software installation.

Are you the only one who uses the computer, or who does updating?

You may be able to log on to the built-in Administrator by booting into Safe mode.
A couple of Google search [ windows 7 safe mode administrator ] hits are:
https://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/102552-built-administrator-enable-winre.html
https://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/682-command-prompt-startup.html
Note that some information applies only for 32-bit systems.
Warning: Registry editing can be disastrous; get more-expert help if you are not comfortable.

Concerning the BIOS Administrator password – what is the make/model of the computer?

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JohnS1606, ch100

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Bill, if you want to change the “Administrator” account’s password, you will need to be logged in on an account with administrator rights. Once you have done that, open File Explorer and right click on Computer, then choose Manage. Now click on Users and Groups, then Users. You will see the Administrator account listed there. Right-click on it, and then change the password. You can ignore the warnings that you will see.

Group "L" (Linux Mint)
with Windows 10 running in a remote session on my file server

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doriel, ch100

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Jim, I get as far as manage and then am asked for a password…which I don’t have.  I can’t get to the next step (users).

William Sharp

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That’s because you are logging in with less than administrator rights. Is there an account on your computer that you can log on with that has administrator rights? For example, that account that it keeps prompting you for the password of.

Group "L" (Linux Mint)
with Windows 10 running in a remote session on my file server

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BobbyB

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It sounds like your account is a Standard user account, not an Administrator.
(You may have a separate Administrator account on the machine.)

Try this:

• Press Window key + R to bring up the Run window
  Type lusrmgr.msc and hit enter (This should bring up Local Users and Groups)
• On the left, click on the Users folder. In the middle, double click on your account which is probably your first name.
• Under the Member Of tab, are you a member of Administrators or Users?

If you are an Administrator, you can change the Administrator account password by going back to the Users > middle panel, right-clicking on Administrator, and choosing Set Password.

If your account is a User account, you cannot reset passwords. You also are then getting the UAC prompt because you are a User account but you’re trying to change things that require Admin privileges. You can either 1) change your user account to be an Administrator account (which has to be done with another Administrator account), or 2) you can try to use a rescue disc such as Hiren’s Boot CD to reset the password.

Download link: https://www.hirensbootcd.org/download/ (scroll down, the ISO link is next to Filename)
How-to: https://www.hirensbootcd.org/faq-items/resetting-windows-password/

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ch100, Elly, BobbyB

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I got very close (I think).  After putting in the lsgrmgr.msc I was able to click through to the page that has users and groups. In the middle column I see all user accounts including administrator.  To it’s right there is “Built-in account for administering the computer/domain.” Clicking on administrator, I go to a page that has options like “password never expires” and “account is disabled.”  I unchecked the “disabled” box and tried to click the apply box and am taken to a screen that says “access is denied.” Trying to make changes to user accounts brings up the same screen.

If I double click on “administrator” I can get to a “member of” tab that shows administrator is a member of administrators and users. I tried deleting “user” but get the “access denied” screen.

William Sharp

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See #206328 below.

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I don’t know whether this may help.

https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=how+to+bypass+request+for+administrator+password+on+Windows+7+Pro&&view=detail&mid=A414520FD95950236E7CA414520FD95950236E7C&&FORM=VDRVRV&ajf=100

Forgive me if you’ve already tried it without success, but it would appear to offer a workable solution.

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@zero2dash   @The-Surfing-Pensioner

Please be sure the solutions you are offering are legitimate. Woody doesn’t like to reference non-legit software on the blog

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Microfix

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I’m sorry, I have followed the tutorial through twice and can find no reference to non-legit software, or indeed any third-party software. There is an advert at a couple of points on the video, but I disregarded that much as I disregard Woody’s.  The advert is not relevant to the recovery method suggested.

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The video does show a widely known legitimate solution (many web pages present this solution), yet it applies only to resetting a User’s login password (regardless of whether or not the User has only User rights or Admin rights. This is not Bill’s issue. Bill’s issue is that he needs to reset the Win7 Admin password, whereas Bill already can log in on his Win7 computer using his account which which only has User rights. This is the twist which Bill is presently encountering with his Toshiba laptop. Bill only has User rights after logging into Windows. Bill does not have Admin rights, and Bill has no idea what the Admin password is for Admin access on his Win7 Toshiba laptop computer.

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The Surfing Pensioner

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before the problem, I had four user accounts…me, my wife, my daughter and guest.  When I try to sign on to my account, I immediately get a request for a password.  I have a password that I assigned for all user accounts in bios.  In the past, all I did was click on the icon for my account and it opened.  Now, I can click on the icon of my daughter.  I am not asked for a password and immediately get to the desktop for her account.  Because that account apparently is not one that has administrator rights, I can’t add or delete programs.

When I go to control panel in her account and click on users, it only shows her account.  I will do whatever is needed to activate the administrator account.  The machine came preloaded with WIN 7 Pro.  I don’t have a recovery disc. Woody got me started with Windows (3.1) about a million years ago.  Since then I’ve ventured through WIN 95, 98, XP Vista, 7 and 10.  I don’t like formatting the hard drive but I’ve done it a few times (especially when I was running 95).  I’m just hoping to find a “go around.”

William Sharp

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The password you see in the BIOS has NOTHING to do with the passwords required to log on to Windows. They are two different things. BIOS passwords belong ONLY t othe BIOS, Windows passwords belong only to Windows.

If one of the other Users is an Administer account, you can change passwirds with it. Log in with any account, go to Control Panel\User Accounts.\Manage Another Account. That will list the accounts on the computer. If any one is an Administer, use that one to change your password.

Log in with the account that is Admin. In the “run” box type “lusrmgr.msc” (without quotes). In the box that pops up, click on Users, then click on your ID. When it opens, on the “Member of” tab add Administrators. On the General tab (check boxes) be sure the account is not disabled or locked out, be sure to uncheck the box “User can’t change password, checl password never expires. Close the box. Right click on your ID and choose “Set password” (to something you know).

Reboot the computer and log in.

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ch100, OscarCP, geekdom

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Actually, for Bill’s Toshiba NB505 laptop computer, his laptop’s UEFI BIOS does have a feature to set the Windows login password in BIOS. Up until today and after doing some online research, I was completely unaware that such a feature existed.

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We have something similar on some small form factor HP units as well.

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cmptrgy

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Yeah, I saw this as well, while doing online research, with regards to HP computers.

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Setting a Windows user password within BIOS?

The Toshiba NB500 Series User Guide is downloadable from
https://support.toshiba.com/support/modelHome?freeText=2861099&osId=31 .
Pages 127-130 cover Setting Passwords.
The wording is confusing: a careful reading shows that the ‘User’ password refers to the ‘Power-On’ password, and also to authorization to do hardware setup.

According to https://support.toshiba.com/support/viewContentDetail?contentId=4009426 , Windows 7 uses BIOS; UEFI applies to Windows 8.

Posts #206196 and #206328 emphasize the distinction between BIOS passwords and Operating System passwords. What is a possible source of confusion too is that these BIOS passwords can be set from within Windows (User Guide, p. 128).

The computer is single user: single (not domain, no network) computer.
The computer is not single-user: multiple Windows users. In post #206311 he lists: me, wife, daughter, guest.

He also says “I have a password that I assigned for all user accounts in bios.” I find this quite baffling: this sounds like the Power On password.

Somehow the ‘me’ account (apparently originally an Administrator account) has been given a Windows password. How to recover from this is the real problem. The advice given by GoneToPlaid (#206354) is a good summary of options.

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Take your computer and go to your local down-home computer shop. (You don’t want a big-box or boiler-plate shop; you want a computer technician.) Explain your problem. Have the computer shop set things to rights and explain to you what was done. Sometimes computer procedures just don’t fit through flat-print online computer explanations very well.

On permanent hiatus {with backup and coffee}
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ch100

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I’m about ready to do that.

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geekdom

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PKCano wrote:

@zero2dash @the-surfing-pensioner

Please be sure the solutions you are offering are legitimate. Woody doesn’t like to reference non-legit software on the blog

Understood – I’ve used Hiren’s BootCD in the past many times; it is legitimate, legal and free.
Also, from their About page:
https://www.hirensbootcd.org/about/
“Hiren’s BootCD PE does not contain any malicious software and it does not contain any pirated software. It includes only free, safe and legal software.”

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Microfix, johnf, Rick Corbett, SueW, BobbyB

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I seem to recall when updating from win7 to win10, win10 really really wanted me to have a microsoft account. Since I had an old hotmail account (now outlook.com) I used that info to set up the account on the machine and set it to log in automatically. If you have a microsoft account of some sort you might try the credentials used for it.

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Microfix

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Bill wrote:

My problem began shortly after I downloaded the monthly roll up in April (2018). The machine is a Toshiba NB505 with WIN 7 Pro. I am the only one that uses it. It is not part of a network. I use it to run PowerPoint presentations. I would like to sync it to my Google Drive account, but it wants an administrator password to permit the sync download. I’m 74. I have limited computer skills. I can follow instructions pretty well.

Hi Bill,

Are you able to boot Win7 in Safe Mode? I ask because Safe Mode is more reliable when performing a System Restore or when uninstalling a bad update. If you can boot into Safe Mode, great! If not, proceed anyway. The first thing to try is to uninstall the April update. I hope that simply uninstalling the April update will fix everything for you.

If, after uninstalling the April update and rebooting, you still find that you are encountering the same issues, then the next thing to possibly try will be a System Restore point which was saved either just before or perhaps several days before you installed the April update.

Alternatively, you might try restoring to a December 2017 restore point, in order to wipe out all of the buggy 2018 updates. Don’t do so, until after you have copied and saved all important stuff (files, projects, et cetera) to external media, so that you don’t lose this stuff after restoring to December 2017. If your issues are resolved after restoring to December 2017, don’t do anything in terms of reinstalling any post Dec 2017 updates! We will figure that one out later.

You DO NOT WANT TO TOUCH OR RESET ANY BIOS SETTINGS AT ALL, except for simply checking, after performing the first or both of the above, whether or not the Windows Password screen is still locked. Hopefully it will become unlocked.

If you get to this point, where your issues are resolved, please don’t do anything else until we can figure out what the next steps should be. The upshot is that we will want to disable your Toshiba laptop’s UEFI Windows Password feature and instead use Windows’ built-in password feature, since Microsoft obviously forgot about this scenario with regards to the April updates.

If worse comes to worse, and you have to reinstall Win7, and you didn’t create installation media, at least your Toshiba NB505 offers a way to restore your Toshiba NB505 to a factory default installation.

Best regards,

–GTP

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anonymous wrote:

I seem to recall when updating from win7 to win10, win10 really really wanted me to have a microsoft account. Since I had an old hotmail account (now outlook.com) I used that info to set up the account on the machine and set it to log in automatically. If you have a microsoft account of some sort you might try the credentials used for it.

Hello Bill,

Anon just mentioned something which is potentially useful. Do you have a MS Live account which was, perhaps, created if you installed MS Office 365 on your laptop computer? If so, your Live account password might be the new Admin password on your Toshiba laptop computer. Just a guess, yet worth trying.

Best regards,

–GTP

 

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This old machine has only had Office 7.  Like Win 7, it works for me.  Have not installed 365.

William Sharp

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Having asked for some clarification as to what might be causing Bill’s problem, I’m thankful to all of you posting here in reply to Bill, because you have made clear, as has Bill, that what might have caused the problem was in the Rollup. I am not worried about problems caused by Rollups, because I always update Group B-style. Besides, the problem seems to be that Bill was not asked previously to login with a password and now, suddenly has started to be asked to do so. In my case, all my machines are password protected, so I always login with a password: nothing new for me there. I really hope this is the end of my concerns on this issue. Others might also be well served from following this discussion, if they are likely to have this problem because they are Group A, install the monthly Rollup, and have their account set up the same as Bill’s.

Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).

MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV

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This can be accomplished with sticky keys. It’s a nice trick for those who are familiar with the cmd line. You will need a Win XP/7/10 disc. Lots of documentation on it if you google it. Once you have the sticky keys exploit in place, you can create an administrator account from the cmd line with the following commands:

net user /add [username] [password]

new localgroup administrators [username] /add

Group A | Windows 7 Pro 64-bit | Windows 10 Pro 1809 64-bit

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GoneToPlaid

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@Bill:

If you have CD/DVD drive on your laptop (or access to one on another computer), you might want to try the software explained and discussed at this website. The download link is at the end of the article.

https://www.lifewire.com/offline-nt-password-and-registry-editor-review-2626147

Link to web page to download the ISO file:

http://pogostick.net/~pnh/ntpasswd/bootdisk.html

There’s further information on this web page.

It is free, and I have used it many times in the past to REMOVE a user’s password. The current version I use does show and allow clearing a potentially ‘invisible’ Administrator account.

You will have to burn the contents of the ISO file inside the ZIP file to a CD, or, make a bootable USB thumb drive, my go-to utility for that is called Rufus, find it here: http://rufus.akeo.ie/

This utility CLEARS/REMOVES one or more user password so you can just log in by clicking on the user name on the log in screen.

After saving the modified SAM file, re-boot and remove the CD or USB and wait for Windows to boot back up, click on your name and you should get right in to your Desktop.

At that point you can go to the regular User Account Control Panel app and put in a new password for your account. The built-in ‘Administrator’ account is not visible in the standard User Accounts app, but is accessible from the Computer Management app. So you could put in a new password for the built-in Administrator account, or just leave it blank. You can Set any new password by right-clicking on the user name.

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Probably a rabbit trail.
Is it possible that the unknown password is just a simple blank (space bar)? Or 2 spaces?
I just tested both of these possibilities, I wouldn’t have thought that these would be acceptable.

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I wanted so much for the answer to my problem to be something a really old guy might do.

I tried.  It didn’t get me where I need to go.

William Sharp

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Thanks to all you trying to help me.  I have gotten close (I think) a couple of times, but I’m still blocked on changing or removing the administrator password.  I can’t download or delete any programs that require administrator approval.

Thanks to zero2dash I got to the accounts and added administrator to a couple of them.
(

You may have a separate Administrator account on the machine.

Press Window key + R to bring up the Run window
Type lusrmgr.msc and hit enter (This should bring up Local Users and Groups)

On the left, click on the Users folder. In the middle, double click on your account which is probably your first name.

Under the Member Of tab, are you a member of Administrators or Users?

If you are an Administrator, you can change the Administrator account password by going back to the Users > middle panel, right-clicking on Administrator, and choosing Set Password.</p>
If your account is a User account, you cannot reset passwords.

I have also tried just about every password I have ever used.  I just can’t kill of the administrator password thing.  Some suggestions talked of getting into command prompt.  Because of the absence of a password, I can’t do those.  I looked at user accounts in control panel.  I am only permitted to see the account I’m signed on to.  I’m open to just about anything.

William Sharp

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There should be no restrictions on downloading as this does not require special privileges. What errors are you getting?

Have you tried the password reset software mentioned by SkipH?
https://www.askwoody.com/forums/topic/win-7-administrator-password/#post-206479

cheers, Paul

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This is my first venture into asking for help on Ask Woody,  I have been blown away by the number of suggestion for what to do.  I still don’t have the problem solved but have gotten a look at all the very strange things people have learned about how to tackle problems with Microsoft.

My latest attempts to change the administrator password brought up a screen that told me that administrator is disabled.  I can uncheck the box, but when I click apply, I’m getting a screen that tells me change can’t be made.

Before the April 7 roll up, I sometimes saw a screen that told me I need administrator permission, but all I did was click continue and whatever I wanted to do…did.

For anyone following this, I still need help

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anonymous wrote:

My latest attempts to change the administrator password brought up a screen that told me that administrator is disabled. I can uncheck the box, but when I click apply, I’m getting a screen that tells me change can’t be made. Before the April 7 roll up, I sometimes saw a screen that told me I need administrator permission, but all I did was click continue and whatever I wanted to do…did. For anyone following this, I still need help

Hmm. Try this…

Go to Control Panel and double-click on Administrative Tools. Then double-click on Computer Management.

In Computer Management and in the left pane, click on Local Users and Groups to expand that group. Then click on Users.

Double-click on Administrator. The is the built-in Administrator account for Windows itself. In the Administrator Properties popup window, uncheck “User cannot change password” and “Account is disabled”. Make sure that “Password never expires remains checked. Hopefully the “Account is locked out” is not checked. If so, uncheck that.

Then click Apply and see what happens. Hopefully you were able to active the Win7’s Administrator account. If so, do the following:

Go back to Control Panel and double-click on User Accounts. The Administrator account should now be displayed along with your user account and the Guest account. Double-click on Administrator and see if you can either set a password, or change the password. As a user with non-admin rights, I am not sure if you will be able to do either. If you can set a password create a password which is at least 11 characters long and which consists of characters and digits, and at least one special character such as an asterisk. Write down the password first, before you set the password!

Assuming that you were able to enable the Administrator account and set a password, do the following…

Close everything, log off of Windows (don’t reboot), and log back in by clicking on the Administrator account icon and typing in the password. You should now be logged on as an Administrator.

Go back to Control Panel and double-click on User Accounts. Double-click on your user account so that you can make changes to your user account. Double-click on “Change the account type” and change your user account type to Administrator. Then change your account’s password, as described above, but don’t use the same password. Again, write down this password!

Assuming that you were able to change your user account to an administrator account and set a new password, do the following…

Close everything, log off of Windows (don’t reboot), and log back in by clicking on your account icon and typing in the new password for your user account. You should now be logged on as an Administrator. Go to Control Panel and then to User Accounts, and verify that your user account is now an administrator account.

IMPORTANT!!!!! Now we must disable the built-in Administrator account for Windows…

Go to Control Panel and double-click on Administrative Tools. Then double-click on Computer Management.

In Computer Management and in the left pane, click on Local Users and Groups to expand that group. Then click on Users.

Double-click on Administrator. Add a check mark for “Account is disabled” in order to disable the Administrator account. Click Apply and then click Okay.

Hopefully all of this will have resolved your issue.

Best regards,

–GTP

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JSTechGeek

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This is what I was getting at. If you boot from a system disc, the sticky keys route will allow you to create a new administrator from an elevated (admin) command prompt. You would be able to log in with this newly created admin and fix the old one. Like another poster said, it’s not easy to explain all the steps thoroughly.

Group A | Windows 7 Pro 64-bit | Windows 10 Pro 1809 64-bit

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You haven’t told us if you have tried the external password reset?

cheers, Paul

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Be sure this is Pro not home win 7

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@GoneToPlaid you need admin rights to do all of that, and it appears that Bill is not a member of the Administrators group.  Were there any other local user accounts with admin rights on his computer, he would’ve seen them in the UAC prompts.  In sum, it appears that the only account on his computer with admin rights is the built-in Administrator account, and that account is disabled, so he’s stuck.

@Bill, since you don’t have a recovery disk, and presumably don’t have an installation dvd, you need to follow the procedure given in the video linked to in reply #206310.  It’s hard to argue that this procedure isn’t “legitimate” since it uses only software provided by Microsoft, just not in a way that Microsoft intended.  After rebooting and hitting the shift key 5 times to pop open the cmd window, type:

net user administrator /active:yes
net user administrator *

then type a password for the administrator (twice), exit the cmd window and reboot. When the reboot is finished, you now know the password for user Administrator, and in fact you’ll be able to login as user Administrator from the login screen (although I’m not recommending that). There’s really no pressing need to re-disable the Administrator account, but if you want to, you’ll need to first add your user account (Bill, I presume) to the Administrators group.  Post back when you get to that point and someone will tell you how to do that, and tell you how to undo the changes made by following the video.

It goes without saying that your important personal files should be backed up before doing any of the above.  16G SanDisk memory sticks are available for $5 or so at places like Best Buy.

 

 

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My machine runs on WIN 7 Pro SP1.  It has an Intel Atom processor.

I can boot to WIN 7.  I can’t add or delete any programs that require administrator approval.

I have 6 user accounts:  Administrator, Bub (my daughter), Guest, Mary (my wife), Home Group, and Toshita NB500.

I now sign on using Bub… because it’s the only one that doesn’t ask for administrator permission.  I always can sign on.

The administrator and Toshiba accounts are both part of the administrator group.  The others aren’t.

The administrator account has two blocks checked…”password never expires” and “account is denied.”  When I uncheck the “account is denied and then click “apply” I get the screen that says “access is denied.”

I can’t find a way to create or change the administrator password.

Again, thanks for staying with me on this.  By comparison, there are much bigger issues going on in the world, but this like the princess and the pea for me.

William Sharp

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I suppose you have tried unchecking “password never expires” and clicking “apply”? After all, we should all like the password to expire. It’s a silly suggestion, but I’ve clean run out of sensible ideas.

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Try this…

If your Bub account is truly an Administrator account, then you should be able to change all of the other accounts to Administrator accounts. Perhaps, start with trying this first, and then reporting back to us.

Hey man, we are all trying to help you, as this is what this wonderful world of AskWoody is all about.

Best regards,

–Michael

 

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Bill, reply #206913 tells you what you need to do to enable the Administrator account and set a password for it.  Good luck.

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Hopefully your are correct. Here is a similar Microsoft article re Toshiba computers:

https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_7-security/administrator-cant-logon-my-toshiba-laptop/0c7711b6-3f21-47a3-aed0-141e6d4ddb39

 

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Oooh, nice catch GTP!  I cloned a win7 pro vm with a single user and a disabled Administrator account.  I then enabled the Administrator account and logged in once as Administrator.  While logged in as Administrator, I removed the user from the Administrators group and disabled the Administrator account by running “net user administrator /active:no” in a cmd window. After a reboot, things were as they now are for Bill, i.e. Administrator locked out and no other user with admin rights.

I rebooted, this time tapping the f8 key to get into safe mode (the first safe mode option).  Behold, an Administrator icon was on the login screen!  In safe mode, I was able to log on as Administrator and undo the damage be adding the original user to the Administrators group.

Thank you GTP, this is very handy to know.

Bill, please reboot your computer while tapping the f8 key continuously until you see a black and white screen.  On that screen, select ‘Safe Mode’ and hit enter.  After the rest of the boot process completes, we hope you’ll see an Administrator icon on the login screen and be able to log on as Administrator by clicking it.  You’ll probably have to provide whatever password you were using in the past.  If you can get this far,  open a command window (cmd.exe).  In it type “net user administrator /active:yes” and then reboot the computer.  You should then see an Administrator icon on the login screen and be back where you were before.

 

 

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In the OP he stated that he does not know the Administrator account password, which is why he asked if he could reset it. Unfortunately this means that reenabling the Administrator account won’t get him any closer to resolution.

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True, but many confusing things have been said in this thread.  If I’m not mis-reading everything, Bill has been logging in as Administrator as a matter of course, up until that account was mysteriously locked out back in April.  If so, then either that account never had a password (the default) or it did and he knew what it was and will hopefully remember it.  It’s certainly easy enough to try.

And yes, running as Administrator is, to say the least, undesirable, but as PaulK points out there could be many of Bill’s files associated with that account by now.  Getting him back to where he was would be a victory.

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I just tried that. I booted into Safe Mode, yet I didn’t get an icon for my disabled Administrator account, only an icon for my own account. I think that the reason this worked for you is because there was no other account available, other than your disabled Administrator account.

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Yes, probably because your account is a member of group Administrators.  If there is any other account available with Administrators group membership, then the locked-out Administrator account is not shown on the welcome screen after booting into safe mode.  When no other accounts are available which are members of Administrators, then Administrator is shown on the welcome screen after a safe boot.  I certainly could be missing something, but I’ve tried this a number of times by now, and it works every time.  Independent verification would be nice, if you’re so inclined 🙂

I hope that Bill tries this and that it works for him, because really the only other viable alternative is to hack in as per reply 206913.

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Bill wrote:

I now sign on using Bub… because it’s the only one that doesn’t ask for administrator permission. I always can sign on.

Most likely your UAC prompt is for a software update of some sorts, that has updated under the Bub account. That seems likely since:

Bill wrote:

The administrator and Toshiba accounts are both part of the administrator group. The others aren’t.

This means Bub is not an admin privileges account.

Unfortunately from the Windows perspective, with what you have available, you are SOL – unless you can find a Toshiba account password. That may be standardized somehow, I would assume it is, since they’re probably a generic account that they use in the set up of their PC’s. However, whether you can actually find out what that password is, is anyone’s guess.

I would again suggest using the Hiren CD which will let you reset that password. The issue that you have is, Windows encrypts its passwords. (Most OS’ do.) There is no way for you to recover that password, without a password recovery disc. You cannot make a password recovery disc without knowing the password to create it in the first place; in other words, at this point, you cannot create this disc to actually reset that password. It’s too late. It would have had to have been created already before this point, and obviously it hasn’t been. The Hiren CD has a Windows password reset tool that will basically go where the password is stored, encrypted, and reset it for you. You may not feel comfortable using that disc, and I get that, but I’m afraid (or at least IMHO), that is your only option at this point without losing data. Obviously you can reformat the HDD and reinstall Windows, but that will wipe your data.

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Situation summary:
Multiple user accounts defined, presumably all with data; only one standard account accessible; Bill’s non-accessible Administrator account has years’ worth of files.

Recovery, the last resort:
A – locate another Windows 7 system
B – get an external drive enclosure (uses USB connection)
— examine existing hard drive, it probably is SATA; get external enclosure to match
— someone else here can recommend source and model
C – remove hard drive, install into enclosure, connect to ‘another’ system
D – copy off all data desired from all accounts
— note: another external drive needed for data storage; or multiple DVDs?
— be sure to copy off files that contain internet passwords
— start a new topic to pursue this
E – reinstall drive to own computer
F – recover to original factory image – see the User Guide, pages 49-58
G – rebuild system – install applications, etc.
H – redefine current users’ profiles; and folder trees?
I – selectively restore data from ‘storage’ drive – and DVDs?

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Corrections and emendations —
A – locate another Windows 7_or_later system; the bittedness (32 or 64) doesn’t matter
I don’t know why I constrained that to just 7.

The existing C: disk is formatted in NTFS.
D – There is a choice of media for the target (copy-to) device.
If a hard disk, it also should be NTFS, although ex-FAT or FAT-32 will work. (FAT-32 is limited to files < 4GB.)
Reference: Do an internet Search for [ ntfs ], and sub-search subjects of interest.
After this whole exercise is complete, this recovery-disk may be used as an archive.

G – After the ‘original factory image’ (item F) is done and you get to the point of installing updates and patches, look for guidance in the Patches Forum here.

Presently the PPT folders and files are in “My Documents” – on the now-inaccessible account.
Suggestion: unless there is a need to limit access, consider in the future to put them in C:\Users\Public\[Documents or Pictures or Videos or define-your-own-Folder-name]. Anyone can access them (yes, or change them too).

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You guys are fantastic.  Such patience you’ve shown to a guy who is older than dirt. I have tried just about everything recommended.  Among other things, I went to Hiren’s and found it is only offered for 64-bit…my machine is 32-bit.  My little computer is WIN 7 Pro, SP1.  It seems that no matter what I try, I can’t get past administrator is disabled.  This is the only machine I have that is WIN 7.  The others are WIN 10.

I think I might as well buy an emergency boot disc.  I understand I will lose all my files but just about all of them are backed up on Google Drive.  It will just take a lot of time reinstalling files like Microsoft Office, Acrobat and other tools.  I have spent many days reinstalling programs…mostly in WIN 95…what a mess that was.

How much info do I need to buy the correct boot disc?

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Bear with me, I have an idea. I’ll edit this post but I may be able to assist you with getting one for free…I have an idea on how to create one and get it to you so I’m creating a VM right now. Hold that thought…

Ah dangit…can’t be done.
https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_7-security/can-you-make-a-password-reset-disk-on-one-computer/048f5f83-18c4-4747-b130-9d8cccad969b?auth=1

Sorry 🙁

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I’m a moderately patient guy.  I have been working on this since April.  I have watched a gob of YouTube videos.  They all make it look so easy to go into command prompt, make a couple of changes and voila all is well.  The key, of course, is having an administrator password to begin the process.

Woody (my nephew) has pulled away from real issues sometimes to respond to my whining and told me to give it up and get a chrome book. The only thing I use this little notebook for is playing PowerPoint programs when my wife is speaking.  I could take another laptop that has WIN 10 but this little guy is tiny and easy to transport.

So, your help is deeply appreciated.

William Sharp

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Hi Bill,

At this point, it is seriously looking like your only solution is to reinstall Windows, and to avoid using Tohiba’s BIOS Windows password stuff for Windows in the future, as it appears that there is no other available solution.

SEPARATELY, A NOTE TO ALL: My company bought four identical laptop computers, in terms of actual hardware. All had identical BIOS versions. One of these four identical computers had Win7 installed, and the other three had Win8.1 installed. Here is the thing. Windows 8.1, forever and irreversibly changed the BIOS settings, such that it is impossible to make any of the three computers which came with Win 8.1 installed to show the same configurable BIOS settings which are shown in the hardware identical computer which came with Win 7 installed. I tried reflashing the BIOS with the same version which was present on the three laptops which had Windows 8.1 installed, yet after doing so, I can’t get these BIOSes to show the same configurable settings which are shown in the same identical hardware laptop which has Win7 installed.

The upshot is that it appears that Microsoft writes to, post Win7 and within the BIOS, areas in the BIOS which do not get reflashed even when reflashing using an OEM BIOS file.

This is just a heads up. Do your own research to verify my above comments.

Best regards.

–GTP

 

1 user thanked author for this post.

Bill C.

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Well guys, I’m inching closer.  I have now learned that beginning in 2007 Toshiba quit making separate emergency boot discs.  Instead the program to reboot to original factory settings is in a partitioned part of the hard disc.  Theoretically, if I hold down the zero key while the machine is booting, I will be taken to a menu that guides me through formatting and installation.  I haven’t been able to get this to work yet because of my overlying problem…administrator is disabled.

I’m learning the old bromide that “close only counts in horseshoes and grenades” should be amended to include repairing WIN 7.

William Sharp

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Bill wrote:

Well guys, I’m inching closer. I have now learned that beginning in 2007 Toshiba quit making separate emergency boot discs. Instead the program to reboot to original factory settings is in a partitioned part of the hard disc. Theoretically, if I hold down the zero key while the machine is booting, I will be taken to a menu that guides me through formatting and installation. I haven’t been able to get this to work yet because of my overlying problem…administrator is disabled.

This would have been an OEM Vista recovery partition and no doubt wiped by whoever put Win 7 Ultimate on… so not much help even it did work.

In my opinion SkipH gave you the best tried-and-tested solution most likely to succeed many days ago (July 27) in post #206479.

Hope this helps…

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Hi Bill,

For the Administrator password, try four spaces. Yep, four spaces supposedly is the default for many Toshiba laptops.

Best regards,

–GTP

 

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I recommend SkipH’s reply. I’ve used the Offline Windows Password & Registry Editor, Bootdisk / CD for many years and it has always worked to remove any Windows passwords. Most times the default settings are fine so it’s just a case of reading the prompts and pressing ENTER.

Just 2 points to note… 1.) the laptop *must* be shut down properly (i.e. Start > Shutdown), not just powered down by holding the on/off button and; 2.) the laptop must be able to boot from CD or USB.

I believe the boot menu key for the Toshiba NB500 is F12, i.e. power on the laptop and press F12 when the Toshiba logo appears. (If you can’t get the boot menu to appear then you’ll need to amend the boot order in the BIOS.)

In terms of ‘ease of use’, I would suggest creating a CD rather than a bootable USB.

Hope this helps… (and yes, it’s legal.)

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Thanks to all of you who spent valuable time trying to get me reconnected to my administrator password.  I still have not solved the problem but have become frustrated trying.

Perhaps my attitude will improve later and I will try again. Until then, thank you for trying to help me.

Bill

William Sharp

1 user thanked author for this post.

Elly

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Can you create a system repair disc?

Start, All Programs, Maintenance, Create a system repair disc. Or if you have any disc W7 or up (8.1, 10) that you can boot from.

Group A | Windows 7 Pro 64-bit | Windows 10 Pro 1809 64-bit

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One last request from Bill Sharp

My situation has become more complicated.  The clock on the computer is not correct so when I try to go to the Internet, I get an error message saying I am not permitted because information on the net is sensitive and will not be provided to folks who don’t have the correct date and time.  But, because I don’t have a password, the clock program won’t allow me to change the time.

I have given up on the password fix.  Now I want to format the hard drive and just reinstall programs.  My knowledge of command prompts is very limited.  If you know of a way I can clear the machine and start over, I will appreciate learning what to do.

William Sharp

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This sends us in a new direction, and may deserve a new title. But here I will observe that while I did not do the homework to be familiar with the Toshiba NB505, what you describe is indicative of clock battery failure. While it is a minor symptom, I do not know if this is considered replaceable on this model of notebook. It may be adding to the accumulated difficulties of an aging unit, and foretell greater difficulties to come.

Is the often suggested LibreOffice a viable replacement to display your PowerPoint decks? It may not satisfy all your needs. But if it does this opens more possibilities for replacing the notebook hardware. And there are many voices here to help with that style of question.

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Same Anonymous as #post-209435. Remembered later, looked and found the AKB article by Canadian Tech last year: Changing Your PCs Battery

Where it is noted this is simple on a desktop box, and may not be possible on smaller units.

PaulK had a link to Toshiba above #post-206448 that may give more detail for this notebook.

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Hi Bill,

Alrighty! I just watched a YouTube tear-down video for your Toshiba NB505 laptop. Replacing the BIOS battery is pretty straightforward — much easier than on many modern laptops and notebooks. I agree that the battery is the root cause of your sudden issue, instead of being a result of installing any Windows Updates. Here is the YouTube video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=chXYRdQJPrA

The battery is seen, removed from its slot above where the hard drive would be installed (the guy had already removed the hard drive, at 2:09 in the video. In the video, the guy has laid the battery (black thing with a white sticker on it) on top of the RAM modules.

Note that earlier in the video, the guy removed and disconnected stuff which clearly is not necessary in order to access and replace the battery, since the the purpose of the guy’s video to show how to perform a full tear-down of a Toshiba NB505 laptop for cleaning and component replacement. The upshot is that only the laptop’s back cover for the RAM and hard drive is all that needs to be removed, in addition to the hard drive, in order to gain easy access to the battery. The relevant parts of the procedure should take a local mom and pop computer shop around 15 minutes to perform.

Since it is now obvious to me that your passwords in CMOS (BIOS) were lost, the local mom and pop computer shop must have password recovery software which will crack non-complex (as in not too long) passwords for a Windows computer. I have such software since I had to crack the password which was set by a bad employee, and so that I could then perform forensic analysis of the bad employee’s activities while using his office computer.

I figure that if your CMOS battery is dead, then your laptop’s hard drive most likely is close to death as well, due to age. Thus, the next step for the computer shop is immediately to sector-by-sector clone your laptop’s hard drive to a new hard drive. This is done by using a HD duplicator machine. The shop MUST use tape or other means to absolutely make sure that the original HD and the new HD do not vibrate during the cloning process. This is especially important for an old HD on the brink of failure due to worn out spindle bearings, as they may get only one shot at this. I mention this since, although HD duplicator machines perform their function very well, most HD duplicator machines are cheaply built such that they do not hold the HDs securely enough in order to prevent vibration which could kill a HD which is on the brink of failure.

The computer shop will then run their software to crack the Admin password which was stored in BIOS, yet which was lost when the CMOS battery died. Yet the computer shop will do so only on the cloned HD and NOT on the original HD which may be near the brink of failure. The Admin password should be easy to crack since, from what I have read online, the Admin passwords which Toshiba creates and stores in BIOS are fairly simple in terms of the number of characters.

I don’t know if you saw my previous posts. For Toshiba laptops, I have read that there are at least two possibilities for the Admin password which you should try:
Four spaces, and then hit Enter.

Nothing at all, and then hit Enter.

Best regards,
–Michael

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I really appreciate the time you’ve taken on this issue.  I have ordered a new cmos battery and a new main battery.

I feel certain you’re right about a battery problem being the cause of the sudden loss of the clock and therefore the ability to connect to the internet.

I’ve watched some repair videos on-line.  One showed what in layman’s terms looking like a creating a short circuit to wipe out bios passwords.  But, I figure if I can get the machine running again, I will look for help on that one.  My skills are too low.

It will be a few days until the cmos battery gets here.  When it does, I will let you know what happens.

William Sharp

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I tried using spaces to get the machine to accept it as a password.  It didn’t work on this computer.  Another guy who responded to my plea suggested something similar…one space, two spaces.

It sure would be great if that worked.

it did

William Sharp

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Bill wrote:

I really appreciate the time you’ve taken on this issue. I have ordered a new cmos battery and a new main battery. I feel certain you’re right about a battery problem being the cause of the sudden loss of the clock and therefore the ability to connect to the internet. I’ve watched some repair videos on-line. One showed what in layman’s terms looking like a creating a short circuit to wipe out bios passwords. But, I figure if I can get the machine running again, I will look for help on that one. My skills are too low. It will be a few days until the cmos battery gets here. When it does, I will let you know what happens.

Hi Bill,

You are most welcome. Don’t do the short circuit thing to wipe out any BIOS passwords. At this point, simply get the new CMOS battery installed. This won’t fix it, yet this is an important step.

Best regards,

–GTP

 

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I received and installed a new cmos battery and a new main battery.  I didn’t gain any ground.  I can’t update the clock without an administrator password.  Because the clock is not current, I can’t get to the internet…yadda, yadda.

Back in the dark ages, I remember typing “format c:” (many times) and started over with the emergency restoration disc.  Now that Toshiba has put the the restoration program in a partitioned section of the c: drive, I think I have to figure out how to get to it.

If I ever get the machine working, I should be able to reinstall the software I want.

William Sharp

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You mention new Battery (main, I take it its a laptop) and a new CMOS battery. To reset CMOS the power Source normally (this includes main battery, Mains power supply and the CMOS Battery normally like a large watch Battery i.e. completely dead) has to be away from the CMOS strip to discharge fully. No you wont wipe it or “Brick” it but it should remove all user settings from the ROM CMOS etc you wont break them they are “Hard Wired” in there. There’s mention of “Short Circuit” that I caught skimming through this UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES TRY as larger Voltage spikes and or Electrostatic charges will fry or “Brick” the Machine. 30Secs is the Golden rule anything over is immaterial but hey it doesent hurt to try, if its a really older machine it may well have a Jumper on the Mother Board or on rare occasions a small reset button, that will do the same Job if its an OS time problem definitely go with @Microfix ‘s scenario (below).

1 user thanked author for this post.

Microfix

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@Bill, Reading all of the above is somewhat confusing so I need to ask:

1. Do you need a password to change things in the BIOS?

2. Have you tried pressing F12 upon boot to access the BIOS and change the clock from there and then saving it?

Windows - commercial by definition and now function...

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It’s more than the passwords in bios.

I downloaded the April rollup update.  When I bought the machine (Toshiba Notebook 505), I chose not to use an administrator password.  It never had one…and may not now.  After installing the download, all user passwords were gone.

I have tried a bunch of things that should have taken me to a place where I can delete and/or install a password.  None of tips worked.

I want to save the little device.  It’s a handy size for travel to places where I make PowerPoint presentations.

My computer skills are low but if I can figure out how to format the hard drive, I think I can reinstall the small number of programs I want on this computer.  It runs WIN 7,  has enough RAM and storage.

I’m still looking for a way to get this old guy running again.  My other computers are WIN 10 which I don’t like at all.

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1. I gather that you are now at the point that you want to just ‘recover to original factory image’, and abandon all hope of retrieving all user data (except that which is on ‘Bub’).
Correct?

2. You said that pressing zero during boot doesn’t work, because ‘administrator is disabled’. This statement is baffling, since Windows hasn’t yet been initiated, and couldn’t possibly be an inhibitor. BUT, if a BIOS Supervisor password has been set, that is a different matter.
(In 206158 you say: “I have tried to take out the [Windows Administrator] password they installed, but I have to have the password to get into command prompt. When I go to bios, the option to change the administrator password is locked.” Posts 206196, 206328, 206448 clarify that Windows passwords and BIOS passwords are distinct. I may be wrong – and despite several replies above that seem to accepts this – I do not believe that Toshiba stores any Operating System (Windows) password into the BIOS. What is confounding this whole matter is that a Toshiba utility, run from within Windows, supports the changing of BIOS passwords.)

3. Reference 210819: Technically, the (Toshiba) Restore partition is not within the C: drive. The (only) physical hard drive has multiple partitions: C: drive; the Restore partition; and perhaps one or more partitions. Only the C: drive is visible, the others are normally hidden, but whose allocations can be seen IF one has the (Windows) Administrator password. (Catch-22 anyone?)

4. 210857: “I chose not to use an administrator password. It never had one … and may not now. After installing the download, all user passwords were gone.”
– “and may not now” – What? isn’t that what this whole thread is about?
– “all user passwords were gone” – Umm, no. Bub has no password. ‘Me’ now has a[n unknown] password. It is not clear if ‘my wife’s logon now has a password.

5. I don’t see a succinct reply to Microfix‘s questions.
Please post the exact verbiage that is displayed when you do a Boot while holding the 0 (zero) key.

1 user thanked author for this post.

Microfix

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My current situation:

I am asked for a password as the machine powers on.

I have that so it goes to a screen showing names and icons of users.

If I click on my daughter’s icon, the program goes to her desktop screen without asking for a password.  The others all require a password…that I don’t know, can’t guess.

I have followed the trail using lusrmgr.msc.  The list of users are: administrators, Bub (daughter), Mary (wife), Bill Sharp, guest, homeusers.  Under the “member of” tab, administrators, Mary, and Bill are all members of administrators.  Bub is not a member of the administrators group.  I have tried to add her (as well as me and my wife).  I get a requests for a password.  Administrators is disabled.

Recently the clock went back to the first day the machine was used.  After that, I was denied access to the Internet because the clock was not correct (error message).  All attempts to add, delete or changes any programs get an error message “access is denied.” I bought and installed new cmos and main batteries.

I have tried all the things suggested.,.particularly 206249, 206307, 206295, 206328, 206354, 206479, 206851, 207041 and 210968.

When I try holding down the 0 key during start up, nothing happens…no messages.

I just want to kill or replace the password.

William Sharp

2 users thanked author for this post.

HiFlyer, Elly

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Have you tried my previous request yet?
1st things 1st, we need to get the system time correct before going any further as this may/ or may not cause complications later.

Windows - commercial by definition and now function...

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PaulK wrote:

Please post the exact verbiage that is displayed when you do a Boot while holding the 0 (zero) key.

Please?

Non-techy Win 10 Pro and Linux Mint experimenter

1 user thanked author for this post.

HiFlyer

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I offer this modest suggestion again:
https://www.askwoody.com/forums/topic/win-7-administrator-password/#post-206317

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@bill fairly hesitant to suggest these solutions as they are a bit drastic but here goes anyways on the account you can access you could always try “Take Ownership” via a Reg key, this may well scre mess up your file permissions for each account on your machine but at least you may be able to get Data out and save if the worst case scenario occurs.
https://www.howtogeek.com/howto/windows-vista/add-take-ownership-to-explorer-right-click-menu-in-vista/ (there’s lots of ready made Downloadable keys out there just check with AV before use)
Right click on the user folder and select “Take Ownership” should appear in the menu, it wont open up the folder for password access again but at least you should be able to get stuff out that you may need, You previously posted https://www.askwoody.com/forums/topic/win-7-administrator-password/#post-206311 in which you said you don’t want to “wipe” and fresh install so go to C:\windows\system32\sysprep inside you’ll find “Sysprep” run as admin, when it opens under “system cleanup action” select “Enter system Audit Mode” and reboot, you will be logged in with a defacto admin account delete all the user accounts then reboot. It will be like setting up a new computer again only it wont, anything that resides on the C:\ drive Office any Programmes installed all your updates drivers etc everything will still be there. BUT anything tied or residing in a user account will be gone, Docs Favourites Pictures hence you need the Golden rule Back up, Back up, back up. Your first account naturally, from setup will be as Admin then re-add your accounts as before. Note these suggestions are the absolute last step before reinstall if your not getting any where with access to the user accounts not to be taken lightly, fingers crossed here.

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” … inside you’ll find “Sysprep” run as admin …”
Bobby: How does he run as admin when he doesn’t have the administrator password? What am I missing?

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hey its worth a try I havent run in to a system like that before where you cant get in to the accounts, there’s always a way otherwise its a wipe and I guess it’ll either kick him out and no harm done or it’ll work but they are last resort scenario’s If you have time and patience and resources you can probably find a way, not really got much of that at work. So with crashed systems I normally retrieve the all important Test Data wipe and reinstall. Many times when folks return the Machines from the field there’s all sorts of “Tinkering” and unauthorised Downloading gone on. Its quicker than messing with a reluctant machine. Still musing here whether it was a 3rd party App that scrambled all the permissions. As I have no idea where you all are it maybe impractical to do House calls lol 😉 as so often solutions present themselves if you have “Hands On” Often in describing faults the most trivial or seemingly unimportant detail could be the issue at hand.

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Thanks guys for all your time and attempts to get my machine going.  I’m throwing in the towel…and will now try to restore it.

On-line, I found a little company in South Carolina that sells recovery discs.  If any of you have opinions on what I should order, I will appreciate your thoughts.

https://www.ebay.com/str/Appletree-Software-Sales/Windows-7-Password-Recovery-/_i.html?_storecat=5066896011

Thanks to all of you, again.

Bill

William Sharp

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You do NOT need to buy a password recovery disk.

There are good free ones listed in this thread.
https://www.askwoody.com/forums/topic/win-7-administrator-password/#post-206479
https://www.askwoody.com/forums/topic/win-7-administrator-password/#post-206307

cheers, Paul

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I’m back…again after 15 months of trying EVERYTHING.  The subject is the same.  I am blocked from downloading, moving or deleting any files without an administrator password.  I never had a password but the windows update I downloaded in April 2018 changed that.

I bought the machine on-line from its original owner.  I used it for about 5 years.  Was never asked for a password.

I want to find a way to wipe the hard drive.  Can’t figure out how to do that without a password.  Any ideas?

William Sharp

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[Berton]

I  use 2 methods in such a situation, one is a relatively expensive Technicians program on a bootable CD that allow deleting passwords and the other is either a Bootable Linux DVD that has GPARTED or a Bootable GPARTED CD, both created from a downloaded .iso file to create the disc.  GPARTED is great for deleting partitions on a drive, gives a clean media for installing an OS.  The main issue is to have the install media available first, either an earlier version of Windows [Win7, 8 or 8.1] or using the MCT/Media Creation Tool to either create a Bootable USB drive or download an .iso file to create the Bootable install DVD.  Be sure to get the same edition as in use, x86 or x64.  After having created the install media the computer should complain about not finding an OS so insert one or the other and try again.

Should have mentioned, your problem can’t be resolved from the installed Windows which is the reason for other measures, the OS booted to can’t kill itself.

Before you wonder "Am I doing things right," ask "Am I doing the right things?"

• This reply was modified 5 years, 10 months ago by Berton.

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Have you never felt like…………………………………………..?

 

3 users thanked author for this post.

Microfix, Lori, Myst

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Some thoughts that probably have also occurred to Bill: If it came to extreme solutions, after all one’s own efforts have failed, instead of taking an ax to it, as helpfully suggested by dear TSF wih her cartoon, I much rather (as was recommended already here much earlier on) find myself a good computer repair shop with expert technicians that can fix both hardware and software problems to take the ailing machine there, after finding the place through some previous research, including asking for recommendations from people who work in computers themselves, etc. And if that fails or is not practical (e.g., if one lives in a small town far from any large city), then I’ll seriously consider buying a new computer (or perhaps an old new computer: sometimes refurbished machines can be a good buy, I understand) and will start researching that possibility as well. But, in such a case, I’ll remove the hard disk, to keep its data from falling in the wrong hands, backing up its contents first, if that is still possible (there are other ways to get that done if the old PC can’t do it anymore, although some may cost money), and then recycle the old computer.

Bill: once, many years ago, my first PC, running Windows 98, would no longer boot up. Someone recommended to me a nice lady that worked on it and, after a couple of days gave it back to me once more in good working order. Thanks to her, I could keep on using it for another year. By then it was seriously running of space in the hard disk no matter what I did and also was no longer capable of coping with the new developments on the Internet, particularly the then novelty of streaming TV programs and movies. But other things were not working too well also: the machine had become too slow to keep up with the world, or the world to fast for it. Then I bought my next PC, running Windows XP.

Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).

MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV

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These may have been listed somewhere above, but what is the hardware configuration:
– What is the hard disk capacity? Or at least C: size? Can you list other partitions sizes?
– What I/O ports or drives are there: optical, USB, diskette, other?
– Does one also need a password in order to:
– – – get into the BIOS?
– – – change BIOS settings?
– – If no and no, does the BIOS support the capability to boot over a network?

With this information someone may be able to suggest a workaround – external boot, and format.

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In the past 15 months I have tried everything you guys have suggested.  I have even purchased software that is designed to wipe existing passwords.

The stopper is always the same.  I can’t add, change or delete any file without the magical “administrator password.”  I have loved my WIN 7 system for years.  I wanted badly to have one machine with a program I like.

Now, I am willing to step into the quick sand.  I have WIN 10 on other machines.  I dislike like it, but I can get things done.

25 years ago Woody sold me one of his old machines that had WIN 3.1 on it. Since then, I have gone through WIN 95 and several others.

I’m 75 and tired.  I’m ready to wipe my old buddie and install WIN 10.  I just can’t figure out how to do it when I can’t get past the “administrator password” roadblock.

My little old machine has USB ports but no disc drive.  I can access BIOS but can’t change the administrator password.  I can create a sign on password but am denied administrator changes.

William Sharp

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Bill, where do you live? (City, State, Country)

This is at most a 30-minute task (assuming you have a glacially-slow computer) with the right tools. SOMEBODY has to live close enough to drop by and help you out.

If you happen to be near me (SW Ohio), I’ll do it.

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I live on a tiny farm very near Kansas City Missouri.  I have the only Internet service available here…Hughes Satellite.  The machine I’m trying to get going again is a Toshiba Note Book 505.  I have a laptop and desktop that are both on WIN 10 that are not affected by this problem that came with a Windows update in April 2018.  Because I can’t add, move or delete files, I can’t remove the update.

William Sharp

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Back in the days the Utilman + cmd trick worked :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9xuQWGvcVFc

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I thought that still worked on Windows 7 (but not on Windows 10 which is more secure).

A similar suggestion was made a year ago but was ignored, at post #206310 above.

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Looks like it should work.  Wish this guy lived next door or nearby.  I’m 75 and have difficulty remembering that many steps.  Perhaps if I could find his actions as a printed list, I could work down through them.

Thanks for getting me to this.

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Bill wrote:

Looks like it should work.  Wish this guy lived next door or nearby.  I’m 75 and have difficulty remembering that many steps.  Perhaps if I could find his actions as a printed list, I could work down through them.

Thanks for getting me to this.

Try by downloading the YouTube video with Closed captions to a smartphone/Tablet/PC and play the video in slow-motion for easier follow up.

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Bill, have you tried the offline recovery CD in this link?
http://pogostick.net/~pnh/ntpasswd/bootdisk.html

It’s an 18MB download that you burn to a CD and then use to boot and reset the password.

cheers, Paul

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Bummer. In 1874499: “My little old machine has USB ports but no disc drive.”

BUT: The first line of the Pogostick link is:
“I’ve put together a CD or USB Drive image which contains things needed to reset the passwords on most systems.” [emphasis added]

So, Bill: In the BIOS, can you change it to boot from USB?
Also, have you tried the suggestion in 206479?

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This is an old thread. I recall that Bill has a Toshiba laptop? I vaguely recall that Toshiba has something in the laptop’s BIOS which somehow sets or controls the password for the disabled Windows administrator account? I have a strong feeling that only a Toshiba repair center can fix Bill’s issue, since this is a Toshiba thing. If Bill gets this issue fixed by Toshiba, then we should teach Bill how to create an additional and separate administrator account which has a really strong password (at least 14 characters and which uses special characters) which can not be cracked by malware due to entropy.

Bill’s mess actually is Toshiba’s mess. Toshiba should step to the plate and help Bill.

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The machine operated very well for years…until April 18, 2018 when I downloaded a microsoft rollup update.  If I can wipe the requirement for an administrator password from the system, I would go back to what I had before…no password.  This machine in very small and is used for projection of ppt files and movies on DVD  especially when I travel.  I don’t use it for anything anyone would consider important and I don’t store any important files on it.  I write many doc files, but I do it on other computers that have better software an more memory.

William Sharp

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Paul, I have been away for a few weeks, but I did try to use the Pogostick program.  I download it, unzipped it, got into BIOS and set the system to boot from my USB disc where the Pogostick program is.

I think because I can only sign on as a user, the changes didn’t “take.”  I’m still stuck with the machine asking for an administrator password.

Thanks for trying to help me.

William Sharp

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Hi Bill,

I came across this video this morning for clearing the passwords in a Toshiba NB505’s BIOS. Others should review the video so that they can chime in as to whether or not this might resolve your issue. See:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P516wdYnlYI

Best regards,

–GTP

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[GoneToPlaid]

I also found a program called iSumsoft Windows Password Refixer. See:

https://www.isumsoft.com/windows-7-password-refixer/

See this YouTube video about how to use the software:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jM2ghRmUNac

The software appears to add an administrator account named iSumsoft. Then the user is supposed to set this account’s password to blank, and then reboot the computer. At that point, the user should then be able to set new passwords for the other accounts on the computer.

I do not know whether or not the above software contains any malware.

• This reply was modified 5 years, 8 months ago by GoneToPlaid. Reason: add video link

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I have pics of the under side of the computer but can’t figure out how to attach them here.

If you will send an email to (email address removed for security reasons) I’ll send them.

William Sharp

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[geekdom]

Go to the bottom of reply while logged in and include your picture.

Remove your mail address; it’s unwise.

On permanent hiatus {with backup and coffee}
offline▸ Win10Pro 2004.19041.572 x64 i3-3220 RAM8GB HDD Firefox83.0b3 WindowsDefender
offline▸ Acer TravelMate P215-52 RAM8GB Win11Pro 22H2.22621.1265 x64 i5-10210U SSD Firefox106.0 MicrosoftDefender
online▸ Win11Pro 22H2.22621.1992 x64 i5-9400 RAM16GB HDD Firefox116.0b3 MicrosoftDefender

• This reply was modified 5 years, 8 months ago by geekdom.
• This reply was modified 5 years, 8 months ago by geekdom.

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If you got into the BIOS and were able to change the boot device then it should work – unless you need the admin password to save the BIOS changes.
It seems more likely the USB device isn’t recognised as a boot device and that may be in the boot settings. Can you post details of the boot settings?

cheers, Paul

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I’m back with one last question. I don’t have administrator authorization. The software requires a password to do anything.  I can’t use BIOS to change the source from which I boot…can’t add or delete and programs.  I can sign on to one user account and use the machine for loaded programs.

We have tried everything to find and/or change the administrator password, but nothing worked because I can’t import or export files.

Is there a way to just wipe the hard drive?  I read somewhere on line that running a strong magnet across the bottom of the machine will wipe it clean.  I suspect it will also wreck the computer.

William Sharp

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Bill wrote:

Is there a way to just wipe the hard drive?  I read somewhere on line that running a strong magnet across the bottom of the machine will wipe it clean.  I suspect it will also wreck the computer.

Can’t rely on that working on anything made after about 2000. And if it does, yes, it most likely will wreck the computer.

At this point I’d say the best method to get this solved is to get local help. As in a trained (or at least well self-taught) technician with a screwdriver, and a second computer with a free drive connector (or a USB bridge for one). Physically remove the hard drive and attach it to the second computer, use the second computer to change things, then put the drive back…

Though, wiping the drive that way might also lead to you not getting much use out of it, if it still won’t boot from other devices.

And as this has been going on since mid-2018 … surely you could visit a town with a PC technician at least once per year, if you can’t get one to come to you?

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I don’t believe you can’t change the boot order in the BIOS. That is a standard feature of every PC I’ve ever used.

Are you able to get into the BIOS? (Press F2 a lot as soon as you turn it on)
This page has some blurb on BIOS passwords.

cheers, Paul

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Paul T wrote:

I don’t believe you can’t change the boot order in the BIOS. That is a standard feature of every PC I’ve ever used.

I’ve run into about 3 models from 2 different brands where this feature didn’t exist, and dozens of models where it could be locked behind a password.

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I can get into BIOS… but as a user.  I have changed to startup instruction but it doesn’t seem to “stick”…probably because I am not signing in as administrator.

William Sharp

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TL:DR
my question is here regarding the BIOS/CMOS settings not saving..
If the CR2023 (or whatever battery) that supplies a charge for the BIOS/CMOS settings were to be removed for 15mins whilst disconnected from the power socket, wouldn’t this just force a bios default and have no admin password whatsoever?
This would enable you to change settings within the BIOS and they would (should) stick when saved.
IIRC I’ve done this years ago on older tech resulting in reconfiguring the BIOS setup to achieve a full system boot. Couldn’t be that straight forward, could it?

2nd part in windows is still open for suggestions (no CD/DVDROM) USB ports ony.

Windows - commercial by definition and now function...

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Bill wrote:

I can get into BIOS… but as a user

BIOS access doesn’t usually have users / admins. What can happen is you can’t change anything without entering the admin password.
Is that what you are seeing?

cheers, Paul

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Paul T wrote:

BIOS access doesn’t usually have users / admins.

Usually, but counterexamples exist.

Particularly extreme (and rare, especially outside tightly managed corporate networks) counterexamples would include those where the BIOS itself is integrated with Windows domain login and groups.

Those can be a bother when one of those is forgotten on a shelf while the network is updated, and then later someone remembers it and tries to use it… so, the old domain controller is no longer around, and this thing doesn’t support the new authentication scheme?

Was a “fun” day, that.

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Thanks guys.  I will try again.

I don’t use admin passwords on my other machines.  Never had one on this one until installing the Apr 2018 rollup.

I have other machines that are all WIN 10 driven.  I hate to give up my old WIN 7 buddy.  After struggling through WIN 3.1, 95, 97. XP and Vista, WIN 7 was a breath of fresh air.

William Sharp

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Hi Bill,

In BIOS, try typing in “Toshiba” without quotes for the BIOS administrator password. Note that this is case sensitive with a capital T and the other letters in lower case. If this doesn’t work, then try the methods shown in this YouTube video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hb0fGxT9VYU

If the above doesn’t work, then Bill is going to have to short the U contact on jumper J1.

Bill emailed me photos of his laptop back in September. Please see the attached photos. Bill’s laptop is a Toshiba NB505-N508BL. The User’s Guide for Bill’s laptop is here:

https://support.dynabook.com/support/modelHome?freeText=3043211&osId=3333616

Chapter 5 in the User’s Guide contains information about the password features in the BIOS.

The BIOS has a feature to store a Windows password such that the user never needs to type in a password when booting Windows. Like other BIOSes, the BIOS also supports setting both user and administrator passwords for the BIOS itself.

Bill does not know the administrator password for the BIOS. If he knew that, then he would have access to the BIOS setting for either setting a new Windows password in the BIOS, or for completely disabling this BIOS feature. If Toshiba is not the administrator password for the administrator level settings in the BIOS, then Bill is going to have to ground the U shaped contact on jumper J1 by following the procedure in the YouTube video which is linked further below.

Toshiba realized that it is possible for a user to become locked out of the administrator sections of the BIOS. So Toshiba provided a jumber pad, labeled as J1, for clearing all passwords in the BIOS. All that is needed is a thin strand of copper wire. Bill can get a thin strand of copper wire by cutting a cheap dollar store electrical extension cord and using needle nose pliers to extract a single strand of copper wire.

The procedure for shorting the U shaped contact on jumper J1 is shown in this YouTube video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P516wdYnlYI

Best regards,

–GTP

1 user thanked author for this post.

cmptrgy

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Thanks for staying with me, GoneToPlaid.  I went into BIOS and typed Toshiba in the appropriate spot.  Then I opened Windows and tried to delete one shortcut from my desktop.  Didn’t work.

I will watch the YouTube piece again.

William Sharp

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GTP’s Post #2016487
“Toshiba realized that it is possible for a user to become locked out of the administrator sections of the BIOS. So Toshiba provided a jumber pad, labeled as J1, for clearing all passwords in the BIOS. All that is needed is a thin strand of copper wire. Bill can get a thin strand of copper wire by cutting a cheap dollar store electrical extension cord and using needle nose pliers to extract a single strand of copper wire. The procedure for shorting the U shaped contact on jumper J1 is shown in this YouTube video:”

@Bill, please try that.

BTW, have you attempted to contact a qualified technician yet?

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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One more time.

Because I must have an administrator password (which I don’t have) to add, delete or modify anything on my old WIN 7 machine, and the operating system will die soon, I would like to format the hard drive and install WIN 10.

Does anyone know how to format a hard drive without an administrator password?

William Sharp

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forums.tomshardware.com/threads/password-locked-hard-drive-reformat.1293451/h

The Hard Drive sounds locked.  So time for DBAN. Make a boot usb or Dvd with DBAN and boot to it. dban.org. That will reformat it. but all data will be gone!

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Have you tried getting to the safe mode and using the Administrator account?

Unless you set up an password for the Administrator account all you need to do is hit the enter key when in the Password field. Then you should be able to change your account to the Amin group and/or do the install of 10 using this account.

DaveA I am so far behind, I think I am First
Genealogy....confusing the dead and annoying the living

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If you are really lucky, you only have a Windows password set, and not a bios one.  If that were true, it would be easy to set the bios to boot from an install media and boot from a windows 10 install media.  If you unpartition and format during install, there is more risk you will lose your free upgrade to windows 10.  See other tutorials on how to get the upgrade free.  If you have a 7 key sticker, you are probably fine.  If you do not, normally you want to do an upgrade first before doing any clean install.

But this thread should not have gone on so long if the problem were that simple.  If the only problem was a windows password there should have been many relatively easy fixes, booting from “password restore” disks or doing a clean windows 7 install.  Most of the above seem to think you have a bios password or hard drive encryption password.

Create a bootable Windows 10 install media (either flash drive or DVD) using another computer.  Search for a Media creation tool tutorial.  Try to boot from it.  I assume this will not work, that having it inserted after a cold shutdown and pressing f12 or similar to boot from DVD, or changing boot order in the bios to allow USB or DVD boot will be inaccessible and will ask for a bios password.  But, it is worth a try.  If it did boot, you might be able to unpartition and reformat during the install process.  Again, a bios hard drive password or a hard drives own encryption password could block you at this stage, and formatting may lose your free upgrade to 10 license.   If those password prompts do occur even when successfully booting from the install media, then you are in real trouble.  Depending on your access to spare parts, trying the install media after replacing the computers hard drive with a spare blank one could lead to success if the problem is a hard drive encryption password.  Otherwise, the only way would be resetting the bios passwords.

As you likely know by now, resetting the bios password often requires disassembly of the machine and most repair shops will charge more to do (or worse some will charge you even if it fails) this than the machine may be worth.  Used prices for old laptops you can verify are quite low.

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You have a Toshiba NB505 with WIN 7 Pro.

The intent is to find out how you can get back into Windows 7 in order to upgrade to Windows 10 for free.
— Do you know the 25-character product key for your Windows 7 Pro?
Is you Powerpoint a stand alone or is part of a Microsoft Office program?
— Either way, you will probably need to know the 25-character product key also when you upgrade to Windows 10 Pro.

Bill’s post #206986
“I can boot to WIN 7. I can’t add or delete any programs that require administrator approval.
I have 6 user accounts: Administrator, Bub (my daughter), Guest, Mary (my wife), Home Group, and Toshita NB500.
I now sign on using Bub… because it’s the only one that doesn’t ask for administrator permission. I always can sign on.
— When you sign into Bub, are you sing a password?
The administrator and Toshiba accounts are both part of the administrator group. The others aren’t.
The administrator account has two blocks checked…”password never expires” and “account is denied.” When I uncheck the “account is denied and then click “apply” I get the screen that says “access is denied.”
I can’t find a way to create or change the administrator password.”
— Please verify, is that the administrator account you ar trying to log in to?
— I’m hoping that is the only issue as it opens the door to use the hidden Administrator account.

Toshiba NB500/NB505/NB520/NB525 NB550D/NB555D Series
http://web1.toshiba.ca/support/isg/manuals/pll5fc/NB500_NB520_NB525_NB550D_NB555D_EnglishManual.pdf
According to this users manual there is a Password Utility beginning on page 77/137: actual page 4-9.

The password utility allows you to maintain an additional level of security and provides two levels of password security: Users and Supervisor.

Passwords set in Toshiba Supervisor Password Utility are different from the Windows login password which we all know.
— Note that description doesn’t include the User account.
— It appears to me that you do not have an issue getting into your BIOS: is that true?
Please verify,
— is there a password assigned to Supervisor?
— is there a password assigned to Users?
— If Users is assigned a password, that’s probably the gateway for you to log-in to you administrator account.
Those might be repetitive questions but I’m having a hard time discerning that.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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I can log on to WIN 7 as a user.  I can get into BIOS as a user.  Any attempt to get into anything as administrator requires a password.

I don’t use any passwords to log on to WIN 7.  I never had a password for administrator.  When I downloaded a bill rollup in April 2018, I suddenly was being asked for a password.

Lots of folks on Ask Woody have suggested lot of things to discover the password and then open the administrator account.  It has been nearly two years trying just about everything… none worked.

I don’t know the the product code for my WIN 7 pro.  I previously had a lower version and download an upgrade.

I have another old machine that I converted from WIN 7 to WIN 10 and later upgraded that program by download.

I would like to give the two machines to grandsons.  I just have to get my little one running especially now that Microsoft is winding down support for WIN 7.  Seems like there should be a way to format my old little computer and install WIN 10 onto a clean drive

William Sharp

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Bill,

If you format the drive and don’t have the activation key for windows 7, you would need to buy a windows 10 activation key.  Image the drive before the format in case everything goes belly up.

This How-to Geek page

https://www.howtogeek.com/206329/how-to-find-your-lost-windows-or-office-product-keys/

has ways to discover the activation key for windows 7.  Three quarters down the page “Find the Windows Key Without Any Software (Advanced Users Only)” uses a VBscript to read the key in plain text from the registry.  If this gives you the 25 character key without “OEM” in it, the key should activate a clean install of windows 10.

Win 11 home - 24H2
Attitude is a choice...Choose wisely

1 user thanked author for this post.

cmptrgy

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What I posted yesterday must not have attached.

I found an product key.  It appears to be for the original software installed by Toshiba.  The machine was upgraded to WIN 7 Pro but I don’t see any stickers for that.  Since I must have an administrator password (that I don’t have) I’m wondering of I can format and install WIN 10.

William Sharp

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If you can run key finder software which would often need a windows admin password to run, and get your windows 7 key, great.  If you can’t, do what mledman said above with vbscript, that should give a windows 7 key, but pay attention to what was said about the signs that it is in the right format.

If you find your windows 7 key, and you can boot from windows 10 install media, then you can format and install and it should accept your key.  If possible, do a full image backup first to a backup drive.  If you are comfortable with it, it may be lower risk to remove the hard drive and install a blank hard drive, then boot windows 10 install media and use your 7 key to install.

If you are not sure that you have found a windows 7 key, or you know you have not, then it would be wise to bring the computer to a professional, and tell them that you are hoping they will find your windows 7 key and use that to install windows 10 on that computer.  They can remove your hard drive if necessary, or boot from Linux or proprietary tools, to find your key.  And as they attempt to install windows 10 they will quickly learn if there is a bios password that could make the job impossible, or if there are only windows administrator passwords that can be bypassed by formatting (or other tricks that they may know).

If you lose your windows 7 install and its key, that would be bad.  Buying Windows 10 home from Microsoft costs $140, almost as much as the lowest end new laptops.  If at all possible, find ways to get your key and to backup your current installation.

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Did you get a windows 7 key by using the “Find the Windows Key Without Any Software (Advanced Users Only)”  VBscript?  Is it in the format mledman said, 25 characters without an OEM?

If you don’t for sure know you have your windows 7 key, buying a windows 10 license can be very expensive.  We need to make sure you got one before you continue.  Some of this would be easiest if you can get a computer expert to help you in real time, either over the telephone or by chat (using a second computer, not the one that needs to be fixed).  Perhaps there is a local computer group or help center that could help coordinate that?

Another step that could be helpful that you can do while you are waiting is to create a bootable windows 10 install media.  This is easiest to do with a 8gb or larger USB flash drive, although burning a DVD may also be possible.  Don’t actually use it yet without further confirmation, but if you can work on the download and create bootable steps it could be useful later.

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[mledman]

I found an product key. It appears to be for the original software installed by Toshiba.

What was the original software?  Does this product key have “OEM” in it?

Win 11 home - 24H2
Attitude is a choice...Choose wisely

• This reply was modified 5 years, 3 months ago by mledman.

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The label says it is Home Premium…OEM.

As I said, it was upgraded and the software is now WIN 7 Pro

William Sharp

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I do not believe an OEM windows 7 key will activate windows 10 installed on a formatted hard drive.  If the VBscript produces a different key it most likely is the windows 7 pro key.  If that key does not have OEM in it, it should activate windows 10 installed on a formatted hard drive.

You could try an in place upgrade to windows 10 and choose not to keep your files and settings.  This might install a fresh, activated windows 10 pro without the password problem.  Or it could fail miserably.  Whatever you try, please image the windows 7 installation!  You will need a way back if things don’t go well.

Win 11 home - 24H2
Attitude is a choice...Choose wisely

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I can’t format the disc without administrator priviledges which means I have to have an administrator password.

The macine came with a starter version of WIN 7. It was upgraded to home premium and then to Pro.  I don’t have the product key for the Pro version.

Can the hard drive be wiped in a way other than command prompt?  There are no files on it that I need to save.

William Sharp

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You can’t format the the drive from the command prompt because the operating system is running on the drive your trying to format.  This Lifewire page

https://www.lifewire.com/how-to-format-c-drive-2626123

has options to format the primary drive.  Once you format the drive, The windows key is gone (unless you have an image).  I would try the free windows 10 upgrade and see what happens.

Win 11 home - 24H2
Attitude is a choice...Choose wisely

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You can wipe the drive from a boot CD/DVD/USB drive or you can pull the drive and hook it up to another computer with an adapter. Trying to format an a drive from within an active session would leave you ….where?

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Bill consider connecting your HDD externally on another PC in order to wipe it clean.

Unfortunately though I don’t have much confidence you will be will be able to upgrade to or clean install Win 10 Pro in your Toshiba NB505 with Win 7 Pro for free unless you know its 25-character product key.
— AFAIK, an Administrator’s account or it’s password if using a non-administrator account is needed to run a program to identify your 25-character product key.

I use ShowKeyPlus when I need to know an OS product key.
https://github.com/Superfly-Inc/ShowKeyPlus/releases/tag/ShowkeyPlus
For verification, I just tested it from a non-administrator account and the password for my local administrator account was requested.

In addition, the way your Toshiba BIOS controls your passwords is not good at all. Unless those passwords can be determined etc. I suspect it will not be possible to upgrade to or clean install Win 10 Pro in your Toshiba NB505 normally.
— If I remember correctly, you cannot correct the date/time in your BIOS w/o administrative permission: is that the case?

However I would be open to the following attempt with the following caveat: your Toshiba BIOS is set in stone and I don’t see a way around it w/o being able to clear, adjust or set it back to default.
— But I’ve never seen a situation like yours, however I would attempt trying the clean install completely off line.
— I believe it won’t take long for the BIOS to block that possibility if what I believe the BIOS most likely will do but I would verify it if it were my PC.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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cmptrgy, You’ve talking above my skill level.

I have a product key (25 characters) for the original install.

I bought the machine on-line.  It had been refurbed and there is a sticker on the bottom with a 14 character number.

I upgraded on-line to WIN 7 Pro SP1.  In device manager, I have a product ID that is 20 characters.

All software I have tried in the past two years immediately asked for an administrator password.

If I go into BIOS and attempt to change how the machine starts up, I don’t get any error message…it just doesn’t accept starting from a USB drive or CD.

I have no idea why the Microsoft rollup I installed added a demand for an administrator password.  I never had one before.  I am denied access or uninstall the rollup.

I’m the one who settled on the conclusion my only choices are to find the password or find a way to format the hard drive.

I have loved WIN7 but now know that I must move on the WIN10…if I can ever figure out how.

William Sharp

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Is there no data, other than the key, that you need from that computer?  Can you find online a service manual for your computer, to see how difficult it is to remove the hard drive?  Compare prices for used hard drives that are compatible with your computer.  Your drive, I believe, contains a Windows 7 key that you may not now be able to find.  But, that key could be accessed from another computer, if you don’t format the drive.  You should be able to buy a used drive for $30 or less.  This would allow you to install that instead and keep the old drive for later recovery of the key.

With a blank drive installed, I think the bios password will cause a Windows install to fail, but you may get lucky and it could work.  You can try to install Windows 10 as unlicensed (just click skip when it asks for a key) to verify that the computer is fully functional.

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[jabeattyauditor]

Given these two facts:

1. You can’t boot from USB because there’s a BIOS password set that keeps you from changing the boot order…
2. You can’t do an upgrade-in-place to Windows 10 because you don’t have access to an admin-level account

I can think of one way you can improve your situation without buying additional hardware or software, but you’ll need access to another computer and possibly a USB dock to accomplish it.

1. Remove the hard drive from your laptop
2. Using a USB dock, connect your hard drive to another PC or laptop that CAN be booted from USB or CD-Rom
3. Boot that PC or laptop using one of the freely-available password-cracking utilities, then use that utility to reset/remove the password(s) of the admin accounts on your original laptop’s hard drive
4. Power everything down, reinstall the hard drive in your original laptop, then boot it up and login using one of the newly-reset admin accounts.
5. Make whatever OS choice you want as long as it can be downloaded and installed from a running Windows 7 session – you may be limited to Windows 10, but some Linux distributions may install in a similar fashion.

You won’t have defeated your BIOS password using this approach, so you’ll still be prevented from booting from another drive or device, but you should be able to get your system updated and have admin-level access going forward.

Again, you’ll need access to another system, some utility software, and a USB dock.

• This reply was modified 5 years, 3 months ago by jabeattyauditor. Reason: Grammar

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The help you guys are offering is deeply appreciated…but way above my skill level.

Is there a way to find someone in the Kansas City, MO area who is recommended by an Ask Woody member?

I’m 76.  My hope was to give the machine to one of my grandkids.  I doubt I can figure out how to do the recommended steps.  By the same token, there isn’t much point in investing more than this old machine is worth to get it back to “normal.”

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Can you press f12 or some other key, during power on, with a bootable usb flash drive or bootable dvd inserted to get it to boot to that dvd or flash drive?  Most Linux DVDs would be an example of a bootable DVD, as would usually the disks that came with a computer, like a Windows Vista install disk.

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Hi Bill in your post #2124295
“If I go into BIOS and attempt to change how the machine starts up, I don’t get any error message…it just doesn’t accept starting from a USB drive or CD.
I have no idea why the Microsoft rollup I installed added a demand for an administrator password. I never had one before. I am denied access or uninstall the rollup.”

I understand what you are saying as well as not understanding the effect of the WU rollup for your administrator password as I feel the same way.
I believe that it isn’t possible to change your administrator password at the log-in time or some placement within your system is because it’s the BIOS that controls that and that’s where those passwords need to be dealt with.

Well another thought came to my mind
In your post #206407
“I go to a page that has options like “password never expires” and “account is disabled.”
— I know I’m speculating here but go into your BIOS and see if you can enable your account in there.

In my post #2087991
“Toshiba NB500/NB505/NB520/NB525 NB550D/NB555D Series
http://web1.toshiba.ca/support/isg/manuals/pll5fc/NB500_NB520_NB525_NB550D_NB555D_EnglishManual.pdf
According to this users manual there is a Password Utility beginning on page 77/137: actual page 4-9.
The password utility allows you to maintain an additional level of security and provides two levels of password security: Users and Supervisor.”
— Unfortunately though there isn’t any help when a problem comes into the picture and I haven’t been able to find a troubleshooting manual.
If you haven’t done so, go to Toshiba help community ask if there is way to reset the BIOS back to default in a situation like yours.

There have been recommendations to address your administrator password which should have worked, but they are not designed to deal with the source of the passwords stemming from the BIOS that I know of.

Your post #2124295 “I have a product key (25 characters) for the original install.”
— What OS is it for? Do you have an install CD for that original OS?

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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I opened the link to the Toshiba users manual. The section on passwords offers for changing user or supervisor password which I tried and have before.  The have no effect on administrator password.

I have tried clicking the F2 and F12 keys but they lead to bios and the same options as the Toshiba manual.

Can the product ID that appears in device manager be used for anything?  Seems like there should be something that opens the file where the administrator ID is so that I can delete it or change to something I can remember and use.

William Sharp

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Pressing enter at the password prompt to enter bios as admin does not work, right?

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Bill Post #206239
“My problem began shortly after I downloaded the monthly roll up in April (2018).”

I just did the following using my non-admin account and wasn’t requested to use an Administrator account/password.

Go to Windows lifecycle fact sheet
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/13853/windows-lifecycle-fact-sheet
Scroll down to “By Windows 10 version, below are the availability and end of service dates segmented by edition.”
For April 2018 you will see
Windows 10, version 1803 date of availability was April 30, 2018.
— End of service for Home, Pro, Pro Education, and Pro for Workstations editions was November 12, 2019.

You can also go to
Windows 10 release information
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/release-information/
Scroll further down and you will also be able to see Version 1803 is (OS build 17134)
In that section you will see the OS Build is 17134.1130 with an availability date of 2019-11-12.

Now let’s see if you can determine what your Windows Update information is on your PC.
— In your Start screen, type winver in the Type here to search box.
— The winver box will show up, click on Open
— Run as Administrator is available but it wasn’t necessary for me to select it.
An About Windows screen will show up and report what version you have
— In my case its Version 1809 (OS Build 18363.628)
— Please let us know what you have.
After closing out that screen, go to Settings and select Update & Security
— See what shows up on the Windows Update page
— Then select View update history and see how that looks.
In the left column, click on Activation. In my case it reads Windows is activated with a digital license.

Unfortunately those will not solve the necessity for you to have to be able to use an Administrator/ password just yet.
— But at least we’ll know what Windows 10 version is on your PC as well as verify if it’s still activated.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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unfortunately, I don’t  have WIN10 on the machine in question…it has WIN7

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I tried pressing enter when the screen comes up asking for an administrator password.

It just did a circle and returned to the same screen

William Sharp

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If you cannot enter bios as an administrator, and cannot boot from other devices, most next steps I can think of remove the hard drive.  There is one trick that I think has been mentioned above, where you intentionally corrupt the system to allow it to boot to the repair menu.  If I guess right though, there is just as much chance that it will not boot at all as do that.  To do that trick, you force power down the computer when it is actively writing to the disk, usually by holding the power button for many seconds (instead of just pressing for a moment, which starts a normal, not a forced shutdown).  You may have to do this a dozen times for it to cause the right kind of corruption to boot into the repair menu.

Even if you got into that menu you would need to enter a series of unusual commands to activate an administrator user.  Even if you did that, the unusual Toshiba connection between user accounts and the bios means that failure I think is almost certain.  Computers with a locked bios or unknown bios password sell on auction sites as “for parts” for pennies on the dollar, they are basically considered trash.

If you find a local computer pro, or someone who can remove the hard drive, there might be some hope.  But, I think that you may have to consider that the computer is basically trash, and if it is possible to use it to install a few programs as user or to run existing software like a browser or word processor that is all it will ever be able to do.

There are several sites that sell various priced software to reset an administrator windows (not bios) password, like isunshare, but most of those I think expect you to be able to boot a boot disk.  The only good news is since nobody knows the administrator password, it is much less likely for a virus to do much damage.

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anonymous wrote:

unfortunately, I don’t  have WIN10 on the machine in question…it has WIN7

Is that you Bill? Sorry for forgetting about that. My bad.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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[Paul T]

Bill, have you tried to reset the BIOS password as suggested here.

GoneToPlaid wrote:

Hi Bill,

I came across this video this morning for clearing the passwords in a Toshiba NB505’s BIOS. Others should review the video so that they can chime in as to whether or not this might resolve your issue. See:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P516wdYnlYI

Best regards,

–GTP

cheers, Paul

• This reply was modified 5 years, 3 months ago by Paul T.

1 user thanked author for this post.

cmptrgy

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Bill wrote:

Paul, I have been away for a few weeks, but I did try to use the Pogostick program. I download it, unzipped it, got into BIOS and set the system to boot from my USB disc where the Pogostick program is. I think because I can only sign on as a user, the changes didn’t “take.” I’m still stuck with the machine asking for an administrator password. Thanks for trying to help me. William Sharp

Did you make the “usb disk” with the Pogostick program on it bootable?  If not , the computer can not boot from it.

Win 11 home - 24H2
Attitude is a choice...Choose wisely

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[Paul T]

Paul T wrote:

Bill, have you tried to reset the BIOS password as suggested here.

GoneToPlaid wrote:

Hi Bill,

I came across this video this morning for clearing the passwords in a Toshiba NB505’s BIOS. Others should review the video so that they can chime in as to whether or not this might resolve your issue. See:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P516wdYnlYI

Best regards,

–GTP

cheers, Paul

• This reply was modified 5 years, 3 months ago by Paul T.

Bill please try the jumper process in that video.
— I have reviewed that process and have also done that on a couple of PC’s over the years.
— If that video doesn’t open on your PC, open it on a PC that works normally so you can follow the instructions.

Also is the time/date still set to it’s first date for your PC and cannot be corrected?

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

• This reply was modified 5 years, 3 months ago by cmptrgy.

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mledman wrote:

Bill wrote:

Paul, I have been away for a few weeks, but I did try to use the Pogostick program. I download it, unzipped it, got into BIOS and set the system to boot from my USB disc where the Pogostick program is. I think because I can only sign on as a user, the changes didn’t “take.” I’m still stuck with the machine asking for an administrator password. Thanks for trying to help me. William Sharp

Did you make the “usb disk” with the Pogostick program on it bootable?  If not , the computer can not boot from it.

Can that process be completed using a non-admin account?

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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Well guys, I did the procedure shown in the Youtube video of using a copper wire to jump the memory.  When restarted, the machine went to a screen that looked like the one I have seen in the past when I was trying to restart into safe mode.

Clicking on the option at the bottom of the list took me into BIOS.  It was the same screen I have seen before that does not include anything related to administrator.

When I exited, I was returned to the Widows user sign in screen.

I’m not making headway on getting to a place where I can install WIN 10.  I like the size of this little machine and know it would be a hit with grandkids.  After a year and a half of help from you folks, I may need to give up.

William Sharp

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Bill,

As this is a Toshiba NB505 netbook it doesn’t have the ability to boot from USB, only from HD, LAN or SD card (using the F12 key to display the boot menu from the Toshiba power-on screen). The SD boot option is only visible when an SD card is present in the shared memory card reader (which I think is at the very front of the netbook).

So, as booting from LAN, CD and/or USB are all not possible, that leaves creating a bootable SD card. It will involve downloading Rufus (a free utility) to create a bootable SD card using a password reset disk image. I suggest using the Offline NT Password & Registry Editor (another free utility) as this is one I have used successfully many times before. The SD card needed is tiny… the password reset image is less than 20 MB.

Is this something you want to try and, if so, do you have a spare SD card? If the answer is YES to both then I can create a step-by-step guide.

Hope this helps…

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Rick, I don’t have an SD card but will get one.  I see the slot…have never used it before.  Sure would love to get this old guy running on WIN 10.  Will let you know when I have the little card.

William Sharp

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Bill wrote:

Rick, I don’t have an SD card but will get one.  I see the slot…have never used it before.  Sure would love to get this old guy running on WIN 10.  Will let you know when I have the little card.

Bill, if you can boot from the SD card, I wouldn’t even bother hacking the Windows 7 admin password. Just setup the SD as a bootable Windows 10 installer, boot it up, and do the install straight from there.

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jabeattyauditor wrote:

Just setup the SD as a bootable Windows 10 installer, boot it up, and do the install straight from there.

It won’t be possible using an SD card as their maximum size is limited to 2GB and the Windows 10 installer is more than twice that size.

It would have to be an SDHC card of 8GB minimum.

To be honest I have my doubts whether the netbook will handle Windows 10. Unless it’s had a RAM upgrade to its maximum of 2GB, it’s only got 1GB of RAM and a single-core 1.66 GHz Atom processor (and a slow HDD).

I’ve put Windows 10 on similarly-specced Acer Aspire One and Asus EEE netbooks and performance was so dire they were almost unusable even with RAM maxed out. You have to do a lot of tweaking (like disabling services and scheduled tasks) to get them going without the ‘activity’ spinner having an almost constant presence. I wiped them and put Linux Mint XFCE on instead. Even then they are slow… but at least usable. (In fact, I’ll be using an Acer Aspire One D260A netbook with 1.6GHz Atom processor and 1GB RAM to test any bootable SD I create as it’s almost identical to Bill’s Toshiba NB505 netbook.)

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jabeattyauditor

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The program won’t let me change date and time without the administrator password on the WIN 7 machine.

I am about to run to the store and buy an SD card.  On-line there are several that have capacities of 32, 64 and 128 GB.

The RAM has previously been upgraded to 2 GB.  That’s the max this little device can handle.

It has 116 GB of storage on the hard drive.

William Sharp

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A previous post showed you were going out to get an SD card. There’s 2 ways of going about this:

1. Get an SD card. This will have a maximim capacity of 2GB ‘cos that’s all the specification calls for. However, an SD card is more than sufficient to create bootable password reset media. I’ve found an tiny little 32MB SD card to use in order to create and test the instructions.

2. Get an SDHC card. This will have a higher capacity. You will need a minimum capacity of 8GB in order to create a bootable Win 10 installer. I’ve found an 8GB SDHC card to use.

Let me know which route you want to take so I know which instructions to begin creating.

(Note: There is nothing stopping you from creating bootable password reset media using an SDHC card so an SDHC card offers greater flexibility.)

Hope this helps…

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I bought an SD card.  It is loaded in the computer and seems to work fine.  I copied a couple of file to it and then deleted them.

William Sharp

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Bill, it’s best to test at this point that your netbook can see the SD card from its boot menu.

Shut your netbook down then, with the SD card in the memory card reader, power it up and press the F12 key when the Toshiba boot logo appears. If you catch it right then a boot menu should appear. If the boot menu does appear, press and hold the power button until the netbook powers itself off. (If the boot menu doesn’t appear then your netbook will just boot into Windows as per normal.)

Let us know how you get on…

Obviously you won’t actually be able to boot from the SD card yet (as it hasn’t yet been made bootable) but this test will show whether the SD card is recognised by the BIOS from ‘power on’.

As you’ve bought an SD card I’ll prepare step-by-step instructions for creating a bootable SD card to run the Offline NT Password & Registry Editor. The instructions will be in 2 parts:

1. Creating a bootable SD card to run the Offline NT Password & Registry Editor utility.

2. Using the Offline NT Password & Registry Editor utility. It’s usually very straightforward but looks a little daunting if you’ve never used it before.

(There’s no point me creating the second lot of instructions for using Offline NT Password & Registry Editor until you confirm that the bootable SD card actually boots to the utility.)

Hope this helps…

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As per the Users guide-

Since the system is a quick-booting system, you must press the keys
immediately after pressing the power button

Win 11 home - 24H2
Attitude is a choice...Choose wisely

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In BIOS under “boot” I have:

HDD/SSD

FDD

LAN

USB-Generic-Muli-card-(USB 2.0)

With Windows open-in the only user account that is operating-it shows the SD card

William Sharp

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Bill, It looks like the media card reader is connected to the hardware bus controlling USB. To check, power off the netbook, remove the SD card, power on again and press F12.

If the ‘USB-Generic-Multi-card-(USB 2.0)’ disappears from the boot menu then this will confirm a) that the entry relates to the SD card and b) the SD card is recognised as a boot-capable device.

Hope this helps…

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I removed the SD card, went into BIOS and the USB option was not on the boot list.

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OK, that shows how the boot menu identifies the SD card – as ‘USB-Generic-Multi-card-(USB 2.0)’.

Now – step 1 – to make the SD card bootable:

1. Create a temporary folder, say C:Temp. This is just so downloaded files can be unpacked, kept together and not misplaced.
2. Download Rufus from the following direct link – Rufus 3.8 (1.1 MB) and save it to the temporary folder. Rufus will be used to create the bootable device from an ISO file of the utility.
3. Download the CD version (*not* the USB version) of Offline NT Password & Registry Editor from the following direct link – cd140201.zip (~18MB) and save the zip file to the temporary folder.
   (Even though it seems more logical, I could not get the USB version to work properly… and the instructions are more complicated.)
4. Unzip the Offline NT Password & Registry Editor zip file to the temporary folder then delete the zip file. You should be left with just two files in the temporary folder – cd140201.iso and rufus-3.8.exe.
5. Remove any USB storage devices that are attached to the device (this is important so there’s absolutely no chance of choosing the wrong device), ensure that the SD card is in the memory card reader then double-click on the rufus-3.8.exe file.
6. When Rufus opens, double-check that the Device dropdown (at the top) has selected the drive containing the SD card correctly.
7. Click on the Select button (a) then navigate to and select the cd140201.iso file.
8. Confirm that the Target system (b) and File system (c) are set as per the screenshot below then click on the Start button (d).
   
9. When creation of the bootable SD card is complete, close Rufus.

Post back when you get to this stage.

Hope this helps…

(The next stage is going to be a little tricky to document. I’m going to have to see whether I can use a virtual machine so I can get clear screenshots. If not then I’ll have to take photos of my netbook and hope I can get them well-focussed and level)

1 user thanked author for this post.

cmptrgy

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I downloaded and installed the rufus and cd402201 files and then put them on the SD card.  Those are the only two files on the card.

I removed all devices plugged into the machine…including the receiver for the wireless mouse.

I started the machine, went into BIOS.  Under the boot tab I chose the SD card, hit enter to save the change, went to exit and hit enter to save the change.

I immediately manually powered the machine off.

When I restarted, it went to boot from the hard drive.

It seems to not accept any changes unless I enter as administrator.

 

William Sharp

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Bill, did you follow the procedures above to make the SD card bootable? You can’t just copy the files to it…

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I downloaded the rufus file and copied it to the SD card.

I unzipped the cd402201 and then copies the unzipped file to the SD card.

You’re a patient dude, Rick.

William Sharp

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Bill wrote:

I downloaded the rufus file and copied it to the SD card. I unzipped the cd402201 and then copies the unzipped file to the SD card.

This is not the correct procedure. The two files, cd140201.iso and rufus-3.8.exe should be on your computer, not the SD card.  Once you have moved the files to your computer, follow Rick’s instructions at post #2153338 starting at step 5.

Win 11 home - 24H2
Attitude is a choice...Choose wisely

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I cannot download any files directed to the WIN7 machine…or delete any files or move any files without the  administrator password.

I thought what I was doing was forcing the machine to look at the SD card.

I will try again.

William Sharp

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You don’t need to download them to the W7 machine.
Leave them on the machine you downloaded them to, then run Rufus to burn the ISO to the SD card.

cheers, Paul

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[mledman]

Bill,

You are trying to install an operating system (Offline NT Password & Registry Editor) onto your SD card and then use the SD card to boot your Toshiba.

Bill wrote:

I downloaded the rufus file and copied it to the SD card. I unzipped the cd402201 and then copies the unzipped file to the SD card.

If you did this with your windows 10 computer, you can use your windows 10 computer to create the bootable SD card.  Copy the files (cd140201.iso and rufus-3.8.exe) to your windows 10 desktop and follow Rick’s instructions starting with step 5.  Remove any usb storage devices to be certain the rufus program is burning the Offline NT Password & Registry Editor to the SD card.

Once the rufus program is running, make sure the top entry (device) lists your SD card.

Win 11 home - 24H2
Attitude is a choice...Choose wisely

• This reply was modified 5 years, 2 months ago by mledman.

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“I immediately manually powered the machine off.”
— Can you shut the machine down normally by going to the Start button, clicking on the Power icon and then selecting Shut down instead?

“It seems to not accept any changes unless I enter as administrator.”
— Were you asked for an administrator password when making changes and then selecting to save changes and exit the UEFI BIOS?

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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The least disreputable company I have heard about that helps log in to a windows administrator when you don’t know the password is isunshare.  When you buy their products  one report was that they provided helpful support.

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Bill’s post #2141222
“Clicking on the option at the bottom of the list took me into BIOS. It was the same screen I have seen before that does not include anything related to administrator.”
— Were you able to correct the date/time in the BIOS w/o being requested for an administrator password or whatever was being requested before?
— Go back and see if you can do that.
— That is very important and it reminds me of the Y2K days.
— After that I would consider exiting by selecting default settings.

“When I exited, I was returned to the Widows user sign in screen.”
— What occurred? Were you asked for Administrator password as before?

“I’m not making headway on getting to a place where I can install WIN 10.”
— I want to believe you are on the verge of getting there.

In your post #211161
“I am asked for a password as the machine powers on.”
— Do you still have to do that?

In your post #1874187
“I want to find a way to wipe the hard drive. Can’t figure out how to do that without a password.”
— If the BIOS is set back to normal especially in default settings, that should be possible but not within Windows.

With all of that said I just read the Rick’s post #2141263 and I see he can help you with a step-by-step guide which I believe is very applicable to your situation.

Post #2087991 includes the Toshiba NB500/NB505/NB520/NB525 NB550D/NB555D Series manual
— Is this the correct manual for your unit?
http://web1.toshiba.ca/support/isg/manuals/pll5fc/NB500_NB520_NB525_NB550D_NB555D_EnglishManual.pdf
Page 26/137: actual page 2-1 shows the Memory media slot on the front of the unit as 1.
Page 28/137: actual page 2-3 shows the Universal Serial Bus (USB 2.0) port on the Left side of the unit as 6.
— Rick would it be possible to use that USB port to boot by?

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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cmptrgy wrote:

Rick would it be possible to use that USB port to boot by?

I haven’t been able to confirm from any Toshiba site but from what I read on forums elsewhere the BIOS does not support boot from USB, only HDD/LAN/SD.

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cmptrgy

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I carefully copied the downloaded rufus-3.8.exe, opened it, got a screen matching the screen shot in your previous post and copied it to the temp folder I created on my WIN 10 desktop.  I upzipped the downloaded cd140201.zip and got cd140201.iso and moved it to the temp folder.

I then copied the two files in the temp folder to the SD card that is inserted in the WIN 7 machine.

I checked to make sure there were no other devices plugged into the WIN 7 machine.

I clicked on the rufus file and immediately got the screen asking for an administrator password.

William Sharp

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I then copied the two files in the temp folder to the SD card that is inserted in the WIN 7 machine.

You’re not going to copy any files to the SD card.   Using your WIN 10 computer, Rufus 3.8.exe is going to burn the cd140201.iso file to the SD card, creating a tool on the SD card to fix your Toshiba computer.

The two files, rufus-3.8.exe and cd140201.iso, stay in the temp folder you created on your WIN 10 computer.  The SD card also goes in your WIN 10 computer.  Now follow Rick’s instructions at post #2153338 starting with step 5.

Close the Rufus program when it is done, then remove the SD card.  Post back when you are done and Rick will give you the next steps.

Win 11 home - 24H2
Attitude is a choice...Choose wisely

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To late to edit:

In Rick’s step 6, make absolutely certain the device listed (at the top) is your SD card.  If you are not sure, stop, and post back.

Win 11 home - 24H2
Attitude is a choice...Choose wisely

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After you tried the jumper trick, will BIOS allow you in to change settings.  If yes, go fix the date/time, then exit and boot Windows normally.

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Rick Corbett is probably right and Windows 10 on that speed CPU with 1 or even 2gb of ram may be too slow.  Still, hopefully you can be helped getting Windows 7 running properly, by using a password reset bootable SD card to activate or login to an admin account.

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Are the things I am writing getting to you guys?

I don’t them among the various posts.

 

William Sharp

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I hear it’s been a long ordeal, but fixing the BIOS date is the key.  If there’s no BIOS password, or even if one exists, there should be no restriction on updating clock from the basic setup menu.  Administrator passwords are designed to block more sensitive details like changing boot devices, network or enabling advanced security options.

When your original backup battery went dead, and after replacing it the BIOS will reset to some factory date.  Typically it will be several years behind, even if you’ve been using a new battery for a while. If you had rights to change time from Windows, BIOS would sync to match.

Windows security model doesn’t like it when the current time is long past, or in the far future, when checked against its last written settings.  This problem might be that simple that a BIOS edit can fix.

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garlin wrote:

I hear it’s been a long ordeal, but fixing the BIOS date is the key.  If there’s no BIOS password, or even if one exists, there should be no restriction on updating clock from the basic setup menu.  Administrator passwords are designed to block more sensitive details like changing boot devices, network or enabling advanced security options.

When your original backup battery went dead, and after replacing it the BIOS will reset to some factory date.  Typically it will be several years behind, even if you’ve been using a new battery for a while. If you had rights to change time from Windows, BIOS would sync to match.

Windows security model doesn’t like it when the current time is long past, or in the far future, when checked against its last written settings.  This problem might be that simple that a BIOS edit can fix.

Bill’s post #2141654
“The program won’t let me change date and time without the administrator password on the WIN 7 machine.”

Bill has been constantly requested to use an unknown administrator password trying to work in Windows as well as in the BIOS.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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I take back my previous statement, after reading this Toshiba doc. This is BIOS is highly unusual (read: weird).  Maybe these instructions will work for him, now that the jumper trick might have worked.

https://support.dynabook.com/support/viewContentDetail?contentId=108503

But there’s hope:

To change or remove the BIOS Password, it’s necessary to know the existing password. Otherwise, it can only be removed by a Toshiba Authorized Service Provider. To locate a Toshiba Authorized Service Provider (ASP) anywhere in the world, visit Toshiba’s Global ASP Locator at: http://pcrepair.toshiba.com

Bill mentioned he’s near KC, and there’s two service providers located in Overland Park and Lenexa.

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See this post https://www.askwoody.com/forums/topic/win-7-administrator-password/#post-2169415

You want to use a different computer to perform steps 4 and beyond to create the SD card.  The different computer, runs rufus to I will call it “burn” the ISO to the SD card.  Not simple copying.  Once the SD card is made bootable in this way you put it back in the Toshiba and try to boot it.

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I haven’t forgotten all you guys.  I have been very carefully following the various instructions you guys have given.  Here’s where I am.

I downloaded the rufus and cd14201.zip files to a machine running WIN10.  I put them in a temp folder and also on the desktop.

I unzipped the cd file and got the iso file to show up on the rufus screen.

I copied the rufus and iso files to the SD card with the card in the slot of the WIN10 machine.

I then put the SD card in the WIN7 machine and clicked on the rufus file.  I got the interrupt asking for an administrator password.

William Sharp

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Hi Bill, you continue to use this word ‘copy’, when others are hoping to see you say ‘burn’ or ‘write the image’. Are you aware of the difference in meaning?

Rufus is a small utility application. When you ‘run’ or ‘open’ this executable program it will present you options to select in a graphical interface. After learning and making the correct selections, Rufus will unpack the .iso file and write the image to the SD card you indicate. This process is what creates a boot-able drive.

This is very different than a simple drag and drop copy function, or a COPY command. Is this larger concept already known to you, and we are only confusing words. Or do you need better instruction to complete this task?

Many are happy to do, but need to know what you need to know.

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You’re suspicions are correct.  I don’t know the difference between “burn” or “write the image” and copy.

When I “copy” files, I select it and hit ctrl C.  Then I open where I want it to be and hit ctrl V.

When I have tried to get a screen the looks like the one Rick put in his email have downloaded the rufus file and have downloaded the zip file and unzipped it.

Based upon my understanding of previous instructions, I “copied” the rufus and iso files to my desktop.  When I clicked on it, I got a screen identical to Rick’s.  I then “copied” the rufus and iso files to the SD card (using my WIN10 machine) and inserted it into the old WIN7 machine.

When I click on the rufus file on the SD card (in the WIN7 machine) I get the screen requesting a password.

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OK, good. We are reconnecting now. Your understanding of COPY is correct. Further, I think you now understand that making a boot-able drive requires something more. I want to ask you to do two things:

First, read again Rick’s #post-2153338 from further up on this page. You have done some steps correctly, but then went astray.

Second, ask questions when the words change and don’t quite match what you already know. This indicates where more information needs to be given. If a clean sheet and a new topic would help, go ahead and start a “Boot from SD” topic. If you are more comfortable remaining on this page where so much information is already written, good.

I think Rick’s item #5 needs special attention, where you launch the Rufus program. But I also admit my own confusion as to where the actions diverge from the directions. I hope I have assisted in a small way here. But believe you are better served by the several advisors who have contributed already.

1 user thanked author for this post.

Elly

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Bill’s post #2172793
“When I click on the rufus file on the SD card (in the WIN7 machine) I get the screen requesting a password.”

Unfortunately everyone, I don’t see how it’s possible to get around the request for a password especially if the UEFI BIOS is the source of how passwords are managed.
— In addition Bill hasn’t been able to correct the date/time in the UEFI BIOS since he has been asked to provide a password.
— Bill, is that still true?
Bill, when you did the jumper process and then exited out of the UEFI BIOS, did you select to save it as its default settings?
— If you did, were you requested for a password?

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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I tried a couple times more to go into BIOS to changed the date and time.  It still asks for an administrator password.

When did the jumper process, and started the WIN7 machine, it initially went to the CMOS(?) screen. I have forgotten the choices but it seems like one was similar to “continue.” I clicked on it and was taken to BIOS.

I couldn’t see that anything had changed, chose exit and save, was taken to Microsoft sign in.  Once there, if I attempted add, delete or move any files I was asked for an administrator password.

William Sharp

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Bill wrote:

I then “copied” the rufus and iso files to the SD card

Do NOT do this. It will not allow you to boot from the SD card.

On your W10 machine.

1. Insert the SD card.
2. Open Explorer and navigate to the temporary directory where you have Rufus and the ISO.
3. Double click on Rufus.
4. Select the SD card under “Device” in Rufus. It might already be selected.
5. Under “Boot selection” choose “Disk or ISO image” and click “Select”.
6. Browse to and select your ISO.
7. Click “Start”.

When Rufus has finished eject the SD card, put it in the W7 machine and re-boot to the SD card.

cheers, Paul

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Okay Rick and Paul, I think I correctly followed instruction to open rufus on my win10 machine and got the iso file unzipped and moved to the temp file I set up.  Once everything seemed finished, I copied the rufus and iso files to the SD card.

That’s where I am.  I have not tried to open the SD card on the win7 machine.  Actually, I have no idea how to do that.  The last time I tried, I went into BIOS of the win7 machine, changed the boot location to the SD card then saved and exited BIOS.  The machine booted from Windows on the hard drive.

I’m about to have an anniversary of this problem.  It was April 2018 when the update file I downloaded goofed up the Win7 computer.

William Sharp

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I am not sure if you have successfully made a bootable SD card with the unlock software on it.  Your description of what you did when you should have used rufus to burn the iso to the sd card sounds confusing to me and does not match with exactly following post #2153338 from 1 thru 9 exactly, especially clicking A B C and D as in the screenshot.  Anyway, to test if you have made a bootable sd card, boot it using the Windows 10 computer that you have full control over.  Press the key to pick a temporary boot device using the Windows 10 computer during the boot process and pick sd card.  If it boots into the unlock utility, power down the computer and make sure not to select any options.

Ideally you would backup the Windows 10 computer before doing even this.

 

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Bill – In a previous post you wrote “This is the only machine I have that is WIN 7. The others are WIN 10.” In a subsequent post you wrote ” I have a laptop and desktop that are both on WIN 10″.

My apologies. I made a fundamental error in not making it *absolutely* clear that step 1 is to use your Win 10 laptop to CREATE the bootable SDHC card using Rufus.

It is only when the bootable SDHC card has been created that step 2 is to USE it in your Win 7 Toshiba NB505 laptop… and it doesn’t sound like you have finished step 1.

Please go back to my previous post and – using your Win 10 laptop – carry out the instructions again. Do not *copy* Rufus or the cd140201.iso file to the SDHC card.

Instead, leave both files on your Win 10 laptop then double-click on Rufus to run it as a program then direct it to the cd140201.iso file.

Once the setup looks like the screenshot I provided (except the top ‘Device’ dropdown will show the name/drive letter of *your* SDHC card, not mine), click on Rufus’ Start button (labelled d in the screenshot). This will tell Rufus to make the SDHC card bootable using the cd140201.iso file as a source.

Please post back when that’s been done to let us know whether Rufus shows that the creation was successful. If it helps, write down every step of what you’ve done so we can check.

Hope this helps…

(PS – This topic has become rather unwieldy so any further replies from me are always going to be added to the end. I’m getting tired and confused scrolling up and down trying to keep track of the latest additions to it.)

 

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How to find new posts.

cheers, Paul

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One of you guys made an important point.  This string of correspondence is getting very long…after also 2 years it has lots of old stuff.

Does Ask Woody have a way to delete a gob if this correspondence?

William Sharp

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Long as it is, this thread might save someone else a considerable amount of time, if they have a similar problem. At some point a summary of diagnostics and methods tried might be even more helpful. Starting a new thread, can be helpful, as well… if continuing to work on this. I believe in learning from failure- my own, but also from others, rather than deleting the documentation of it all…

Personally, I’ve just been given a HP laptop- have to get a compatible charging cord for it. Sticker not readable. No idea what any of the passwords are. No idea of the operating system, but stopped using it when the charging cord broke and the battery went dead… a mystery to be solved, and perfect for a technically challenged person to experiment with! So been reading up, and deciding on a plan of action, while waiting on a charging cord.

I’ve promised to return any pictures I find on the hard drive… and I may just turn it into my Linux Mint machine… but it is worth exploring, just to have a system to learn on! However, I’m still working on learning W10- and it definitely isn’t configured and tweaked the way my Windows 7 was, and I’m taking my time with it. The mystery laptop will be my first machine dedicated to my personal learning and experimentation, rather than an all-in-one workstation that I protect, because it has things on it that I need and use every day. There is a lot of information in this thread about what to look for, how to look for it, how it should work, and how it does or doesn’t work. Please don’t try to delete it!

Non-techy Win 10 Pro and Linux Mint experimenter

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SueW

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How would you decide which bits to delete? And who will put in the time to read through the whole thing to decide?
I can’t see the value in that effort.

cheers, Paul

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Elly

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If you decide to start a new thread, please include in your opening post a nutshell description of the current effort — making an SD card into a bootable drive, and investigating whether that will crack this hardware block you’ve had.

But also very important to give a reference link for this topic https://www.askwoody.com/forums/topic/win-7-administrator-password , and any others you feel relevant. This would assist a future reader in finding how this developed at their leisure. Please add this to your opening post.

Once the new topic has been assigned a URL, you could post that as a link here, in a final “bottom line” post directing to the new topic. I admire your efforts.

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Elly

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I have decide to take the suggestion to create a Cliff’s Note version of this two years of correspondence and the many suggestions I have tried to get an administrator password for my old WIN7 machine and/or format it so I can load WIN10.  This will take some time.  I’ll be back when I finish.  Then I would like to wipe all the accumulated correspondence.  I don’t know how to delete stuff, but when I ready I will appreciate some help.  Thanks guys.

William Sharp

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Elly

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Well guys, here we are 4 months later.  I downloaded all correspondence on my WIN 7 administrator password issue and started stripping it down to a Cliff’s Notes version.  It is 57 pages of 7 point type over 2+ years.  I got through about 20 pages and decided not to devote any more time to the project.

I have decided to find a tech dude to format the hard drive so I can install WIN 10.  I’m in Kansas City, MO.  Do you have any suggestions for a person with really good software skills near me?

William Sharp

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Why do you need a” tech dude to format the hard drive so I can install WIN 10″ ?

Download a copy of Windows 10 1909 from Heidoc.net. create a bootable USB stick with the free Ventoy app. Boot and run a clean install.

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wavy

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Ales, I can’t remove or install anything.  A little over 2 years ago I downloaded a bug windows update.  It installed a requirement for an administrator password to make any changes requiring administrator privileges.  I never had an administrator password.  As the above correspondence shows, lots of talented guys led me to an incredible number of actions and software to find out what password might exist, or how to remove the password, or format the hard drive.  The inability to make any changes whatsoever without administrator privileges had stopped action.  That’s why I’m trying to find so horsepower.

William Sharp

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The reason for creating a bootable USB drive is to move from trying and failing to do things within Windows, to booting from the USB drive (which is an external drive that is completely separate from your current Windows system) and using it to install a clean W10 to your current drive. The USB doesn’t need permissions from your current drive, and a clean install means that you start from scratch… including passwords. It basically wipes out what you have, and puts a new operating system over it. Trying to upgrade in place, saving your files and programs would likely continue the password access problem. By doing a clean install, it wont matter.

It will give your old laptop new life…

If you want to go step by step, start a new thread. What’s to lose, except a the fee you’d pay a local geek to do it for you?

Non-techy Win 10 Pro and Linux Mint experimenter

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The challenge I have had with trying to boot from an external source is that I have make a change in BIOS that “sees” the external drive.  Others have helped me try, but because I am not making changes in BIOS as an administrator, the change in boot instructions is ignored.

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Elly

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“Others have helped me try, but because I am not making changes in BIOS as an administrator, the change in boot instructions is ignored.”
Unfortunately that’s typical.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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Bill wrote:
The challenge I have had with trying to boot from an external source is that I have make a change in BIOS that “sees” the external drive. Others have helped me try, but because I am not making changes in BIOS as an administrator, the change in boot instructions is ignored.

Hi Bill.

Sorry you’ve been unable to solve your problem, and apologies in advance for not reading and digesting the 200+ previous replies posted earlier by others…

But is there any chance your device has a function key mapped to a boot menu? In other words, a function key that if pressed during startup would present a TUI-type menu allowing you to choose your boot device “on the fly” (i.e., for the current boot only, so no change to BIOS)?

Seems likely this was considered earlier, but figured I’d ask just in case.

Hope this helps.

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I was one of the early reply-ers here. To recap:
For an obscure reason (Bill attributes this to a Windows update), the computer has password protection on the BIOS (and on the ‘admin’ user) so he cannot access fundamental computer functionality. (There is an unusual quirk in the OEM design that supports a Catch-22 situation – too long to review here.)

First thought:
The only solution now is to physically remove the disk and format it on an external attachment. Then do a bare-metal Windows installation.

Second thought:
BUT, Bill — Since the BIOS presently is locked down, and assuming that Win 10 is newly on the disk – and that it boots — how will you be able to get to that OEM Utility that lets you clear/reset the BIOS Password? That utility was included with the OEM set of add-ons, but it is not a part of Win 10. Clearing the disk does not touch the password that is in the BIOS.

I’ve forgotten, but I don’t recall that you have any OEM material (DVD?) from which you could get that particular utility. And if you do, would it work under Win 10?

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Sounds like a BIOS password not Windows. Any way to clear via jumper on motherboard or removing the cmos battery?

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PaulK wrote:

I was one of the early reply-ers here. To recap:
For an obscure reason (Bill attributes this to a Windows update), the computer has password protection on the BIOS (and on the ‘admin’ user) so he cannot access fundamental computer functionality. (There is an unusual quirk in the OEM design that supports a Catch-22 situation – too long to review here.)

First thought:
The only solution now is to physically remove the disk and format it on an external attachment. Then do a bare-metal Windows installation.

Second thought:
BUT, Bill — Since the BIOS presently is locked down, and assuming that Win 10 is newly on the disk – and that it boots — how will you be able to get to that OEM Utility that lets you clear/reset the BIOS Password? That utility was included with the OEM set of add-ons, but it is not a part of Win 10. Clearing the disk does not touch the password that is in the BIOS.

I’ve forgotten, but I don’t recall that you have any OEM material (DVD?) from which you could get that particular utility. And if you do, would it work under Win 10?

That’s a pretty good summary PaulK

Bottom line is that’s why Bill’s post #2281950
“I have decided to find a tech dude to format the hard drive so I can install WIN 10. I’m in Kansas City, MO. Do you have any suggestions for a person with really good software skills near me?”

Bill, refer to garlin’s post #2141789
“To change or remove the BIOS Password, it’s necessary to know the existing password. Otherwise, it can only be removed by a Toshiba Authorized Service Provider. To locate a Toshiba Authorized Service Provider (ASP) anywhere in the world, visit Toshiba’s Global ASP Locator at: http://pcrepair.toshiba.com

Bill mentioned he’s near KC, and there’s two service providers located in Overland Park and Lenexa.”

I would also consider the cost of that vs. buying a new device that would be expected to match your needs.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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Elly

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Thanks guys for staying with me.  My trips into BIOS have not been to change passwords.  I have tried to change the boot sequence so that I can boot from a CD or USB drive.  The system won’t let me do anything without administrator authority.  I have created and purchased some software that could make changes but I can’t get past the interrupt message to enter an admin password.

I was (and still am) trying to get this old machine up and running again for grandkids.  Now with covid-19 forcing our school district to go to virtual learning, it’s even more important. A major challenge is that the machine only cost $300 when I bought it.  I am hesitant to pay Toshiba $200 to get it running again.

I don’t think I have an OEM boot disc.  Seems like that is something I should be able to buy and it would cost too much.  It also seems there should be some geeks who skills to format my hard drive.  I’m just soldiering on.

William Sharp

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Elly

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We hear you Bill.

“I don’t think I have an OEM boot disc.”
Take a look at Lenovo Restore Disk Sets
http://computerrestoredisks.com/lenovo-restore-disks.html
Call 800-598-5598 & find out if they can help you.

Unfortunately, I’m not confident that will work especially because of
Your post #206311 “I have a password that I assigned for all user accounts in bios.”
But you will not know unless you find out.
— At the same time, it seems they use CD/DVD’s.

Bill I also looked for Refurbished laptops on-line.
This site is mostly for Dell and the prices look reasonable.
https://discountelectronics.com/used-laptops/refurbished-laptops/

Following is a summary of some posts in this topic.

You have a Toshiba Notebook 505 per your post #210857. OS is WIN 7 Pro SP1 per your post #206986.

Post #2141654 you have the max RAM of 2GB & 116 GB of storage on the hard drive.

Post #2111770 “The macine came with a starter version of WIN 7. It was upgraded to home premium and then to Pro. I don’t have the product key for the Pro version.

Post #210819 Post date is August 15, 2018 at 10:11 am: a new cmos battery was installed.

Post #2110278 “I found an product key. It appears to be for the original software installed by Toshiba. The machine was upgraded to WIN 7 Pro but I don’t see any stickers for that.”

Post #2111257 “The label says it is Home Premium…OEM.”

Post #2124295 “I have a product key (25 characters) for the original install.”
“I bought the machine on-line. It had been refurbed”
“I upgraded on-line to WIN 7 Pro SP1. In device manager, I have a product ID that is 20 characters.”

Rick Corbett’s post #2141661 “Get an SD card. This will have a maximim capacity of 2GB ‘cos that’s all the specification calls for. However, an SD card is more than sufficient to create bootable password reset media.”
— Your post #2152922 “I bought an SD card. It is loaded in the computer and seems to work fine.”

Rick Corbett’s post #2153338 “the boot menu identifies the SD card – as ‘USB-Generic-Multi-card-(USB 2.0)’”
— Instructions to “to make the SD card bootable” are included.
Your post #2154134 “When I restarted, it went to boot from the hard drive.
It seems to not accept any changes unless I enter as administrator.”

Bill’s post #210857 #1877173 “The machine operated very well for years…until April 18, 2018 when I downloaded a microsoft rollup update. If I can wipe the requirement for an administrator password from the system, I would go back to what I had before…no password.”
— That was ok to sign into your log-in account w/o a password.
— Unfortunately, though, do you know the password for all user accounts in bios?
Bill’s post #206311 “I have a password that I assigned for all user accounts in bios.”

Further attempts have not been successful.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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@Bill,
If someone takes the time to suggest a fix, kindly return the courtesy by aknowledging whether you have actually tried it by posting your results.

Windows - commercial by definition and now function...

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I remember with mixed feelings the many times I formatted my machine when it was running WIN 95.  It always took a gob of time, but I could get the thing running again.

This little machine can’t do much, but grandsons in elementary school don’t need much computing power.  I will ship this little old guy to anyone you guys think can either find the administrator password or format the hard drive.

William Sharp

1 user thanked author for this post.

Elly

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Surely the HDD can be replaced on this model? (A NB505 should have a SATA HDD of usually 250 GB, right?)

Because the one thing I’d do is still the same, detach the HDD, attach it to another computer and then work on it through there…

I mean, should be possible to reset any locally stored Windows passwords that way if the disk isn’t encrypted; and if it is, could at least format it.

Might still not open the BIOS side though. (Didn’t on some of those others.)

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mn– wrote:

Might still not open the BIOS side though

If the disk is formatted and empty the PC will attempt to boot from anything else.
It will probably boot from USB if you just remove the hard disk.

This video claims to successfully clear the BIOS password.

cheers, Paul

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Paul T wrote:

If the disk is formatted and empty the PC will attempt to boot from anything else.
It will probably boot from USB if you just remove the hard disk.

Probable but not certain, yes. And if it’s UEFI, it might hang up on boot signatures or some such.

That’s why just reworking the Windows credentials “hive” is the safest method.

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Bill, I suspect you have Legacy BIOS” per Post #2111770 “The macine came with a starter version of WIN 7.” Please verify.

I don’t have Windows 7 anymore but I hope these instructions will come through for you.
— I have a non-admin account on my Win10 PC and this is what works for me w/o being demanded to use an Administrator password.
Go into your non-admin account you can still get into that I know of, get into System Information, select Open (Do not select Run as administrator), scroll down to BIOS Mode: let us know.

Also PaulK’s post #206448 indicates you have BIOS
“According to https://support.toshiba.com/support/viewContentDetail?contentId=4009426 , Windows 7 uses BIOS; UEFI applies to Windows 8.”

On the video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P516wdYnlYI Toshiba NB505 Bios Password Removal,
I suspect you have already tried that according to your post #2141222 and it wasn’t successful.

Also I believe you have a bootable SD card ready to be used. Please let us know if that is the case.
— Use it if you reach the point of having your HDD formatted.
— BTW, at the present time, do you use a password in order for the HDD to boot-up?

Unfortunately though I still think trying to get through the requirement for an administrator password in the BIOS is still the drawback.
— As usual though, since we can’t see your laptop, continue to repeatedly inform us that the requirement for an administrator password whether you are in the BIOS or Windows log-on screen or anywhere else as you have been.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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By now I believe clearing the BIOS password is not the issue.

If the BIOS password were the issue, that password would be needed to enter the BIOS.
— Bill doesn’t have to do that that I know of.

The issue is the password that isn’t known within the BIOS.
— In fact the time/date cannot be corrected w/o whatever the needed password is.

Also in Bill’s post #206311 “I have a password that I assigned for all user accounts in bios.”
— That is the process that Lenovo allows that to be accomplished.
— Chances are that’s the process that needs to be undone and that adds to the challenge of fixing Bill’s situation especially since the BIOS is a completely different system than Windows itself.
— Bill since I don’t recall, have you tried the password in the BIOS that you had used when you had set that up?

Also Bill, in your non-admin account that I believe you are still able to use, check Windows Update history (Remember I don’t use Windows 7 anymore) and let us know what Windows Update failures show.
— I don’t know what we can do about what you find out but let’s see where you are at please if possible.

How I wish we could see your device.
I’d like to volunteer to help you on your device but we would have to talk about first but I don’t know how we can contact each other.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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cmptrgy wrote:

If the BIOS password were the issue, that password would be needed to enter the BIOS.

Not a given. There have been occasional “advanced BIOS” things (and this *is* one of those if it integrates with Windows credentials management) that allowed read-only access to BIOS as a non-admin user.

Also it being one of those means there very likely are “special” drivers, which it …might… even need for booting. (Worse case than usual if so, means a generic Windows boot media might not work – don’t know before getting that far and trying…)

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cmptrgy

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mn– wrote:

cmptrgy wrote:

If the BIOS password were the issue, that password would be needed to enter the BIOS.

Not a given. There have been occasional “advanced BIOS” things (and this *is* one of those if it integrates with Windows credentials management) that allowed read-only access to BIOS as a non-admin user.

Also it being one of those means there very likely are “special” drivers, which it …might… even need for booting. (Worse case than usual if so, means a generic Windows boot media might not work – don’t know before getting that far and trying…)

I agree. I’ve worked in Legacy BIOS systems only a couple of times over the years.

Do BIOS or UEFI systems ever provide an error code or descriptions in some cases?

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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cmptrgy wrote:

Do BIOS or UEFI systems ever provide an error code or descriptions in some cases?

Ever? Yes.

Reliably and standardized between manufacturers, or even versions from same maker? No.

I mean, you might get the error code in beeps out of the speaker, a quick-disappearing numeric or hex code on “primary” display, some random electronic method on a dedicated port on the motherboard that might not be accessible with the case closed, machine-readable on a management interface (possibly LAN or on older models RS232), only stored in some onboard management register (RAM or NVRAM) that you’ll need a special application or driver to read (chicken and egg anyone?)

… or in very rare cases even as friendly text.

(Yes, I’ve encountered all of those kinds.)

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cmptrgy

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cmptrgy wrote:

How I wish we could see your device. I’d like to volunteer to help you on your device but we would have to talk about first but I don’t know how we can contact each other.

AskWoody’s DirectMessage function to exchange direct contact details. I’ve used it before for this very purpose.

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cmptrgy

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Bill, as much as I’d like to volunteer to help out, I believe you need to resort to the original factory image if possible, regardless of any other method of bootable media even if you have bootable SD card ready to be used because the original BIOS set-up needs to be brought back into the picture.
— Unless of course you can find a qualified person to address the issue at hand which is something you are not in favor of due to the cost.
— In my post #2282140 “I would also consider the cost of that vs. buying a new device that would be expected to match your needs.”
— I understand your hesitation to do that but the reality is the constant requirement for an Administrator password & the inability to address the unknown BIOS password are major issues.

See what you think about this following information.

I’m using PaulK’s post #206448
Toshiba NB500 Series mini notebook NB505-N508BL
https://support.dynabook.com/support/modelHome?freeText=2861099&osId=31.
Model or serial number [If you don’t know either one, you’ll have to take the chance to use the original factory image described below anyway. Then select Windows 7 (32-bit).

toshiba_miniNB505-N508BL.pdf
https://support.dynabook.com/support/staticContentDetail?contentId=2865605&isFromTOCLink=false
Posted Date: 2015-12-30
Toshiba mini NB505 Detailed Product Specification1
Operating SystemC1 2 Genuine Windows® 7 Starter 32-bit

NB500 Series User’s Guide
https://support.dynabook.com/support/staticContentDetail?contentId=2865070&isFromTOCLink=false
Posted Date: 2015-12-30

Page 50/199 “You can recover the original factory image (returning the computer to its out-of-box state) using the utilities stored on your computer’s internal storage drive or using recovery DVDs/media, if you have created such media. To recover using the first method, follow the procedure below.”
You need to use the first method if possible “using the utilities stored on your computer’s internal storage drive”
— The procedure doesn’t indicate if you need to this as an Administrator which I suspect would be the norm.
BTW, when I was in the working world, I had to write specifications for the processes I was responsible for and if I didn’t include an Administrator account was required, I’d be more than confronted with that, maybe even be “administrated” out the door.
— Anyway, the only way to find out is to try your non-admin account: if it isn’t possible which I suspect, game over.
— If it is possible, continue with the procedure and let us know when it’s completed.

With all of that said, I don’t like to be the bearer of bad news but I believe the reality to the solution is to resort to the original factory image if possible or a qualified technician to be involved.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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I can enter BIOS.  There are no passwords show under security.

I was able to get the clock in the computer working by making changes while in BIOS.  I had not been able to change the date/clock while in Windows.

I will root around to see if I have a rescue disc.  This tiny machine does not have a CD player so whatever I might come up with has to be on a USB drive.

Without the password, the machine will not accept the program Rick guided me to create on an SD card.

I have previously purchased a CD that was supposed to open the password information…but it didn’t.

My computer skills are low but I’m good at following instructions and have tried a gob of things you folks have recommended over the past 2 years.

William Sharp

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Being able to change things in the BIOS is a good start.
Do you have a USB stick? What size?

1. Download Hiren’s boot CD, about 1.5GB, and burn it to the USB using Rufus.
2. Disconnect / remove the existing hard disk and attempt to boot from the USB.
3. If it works, shut down, reconnect the hard disk and attempt to boot from the USB.

If you can do all of those then you can reinstall Windows and remove any passwords you have.
Make a backup first, of course.

cheers, Paul

1 user thanked author for this post.

cmptrgy

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[cmptrgy]

Bill wrote:

I can enter BIOS.  There are no passwords show under security.

I was able to get the clock in the computer working by making changes while in BIOS.  I had not been able to change the date/clock while in Windows.

I will root around to see if I have a rescue disc.  This tiny machine does not have a CD player so whatever I might come up with has to be on a USB drive.

Without the password, the machine will not accept the program Rick guided me to create on an SD card.

I have previously purchased a CD that was supposed to open the password information…but it didn’t.

My computer skills are low but I’m good at following instructions and have tried a gob of things you folks have recommended over the past 2 years.

Thanks for that information.

I can enter BIOS. There are no passwords show under security.
— I was under that impression for entering the BIOS.

“I was able to get the clock in the computer working by making changes while in BIOS.”
— I was under the impression you were being asked for an Administrator password when you were trying to do that.
— I was also under the impression that when you were making changes in the BIOS, the changes were not maintained and it wasn’t possible to revert to default settings.

“I had not been able to change the date/clock while in Windows.”
— I’ve seen that a couple of times but since the PC’s I was working on had an Administrator account it was possible to correct it.

“This tiny machine does not have a CD player so whatever I might come up with has to be on a USB drive.”
In PaulK’s post #206448 for Toshiba NB500 Series mini notebook NB505-N508BL manual
https://support.dynabook.com/support/modelHome?freeText=2861099&osId=31
— Is that the correct manual for your device? I believe it is. It’s important for us to know that.
In that manual, there are 2 methods to return to the original factory image (returning the computer to its out-of-box state) on page 50/199.
— The first method is using the utilities stored on your computer’s internal storage mentioned in post #2283088.
— Return to that post if you wish to review it.
— I have to admit that since you cannot access an Administrator account, it isn’t possible to follow through on that.
Then there is a 2nd method
— “using recovery DVDs/media”
— That tells me it’s possible to use DVD’s and you are not limited to using only USB’S.

“Without the password, the machine will not accept the program Rick guided me to create on an SD card.”
— Let’s clarify “Without the password”
— To me that means you cannot log-in to your Administrator account but that’s because your Administrator account isn’t accessible and the only accessible account you have is a non-admin account.
— But then, when you are in the BIOS, aren’t you asked for a password?
— If so what kind of password is being requested?
— Is it for an Administrator password so you can access any one of your multiple accounts?”
— In other words, does the password set-up generate through the BIOS?
— “Your post #206311 “I have a password that I assigned for all user accounts in bios.”

“I have previously purchased a CD that was supposed to open the password information…but it didn’t.”
— Earlier “This tiny machine does not have a CD player”
— How were you able to at least try the CD that was supposed to open the password information…but it didn’t.”?

Moving on,
I haven’t had to use a Hiren’s boot CD but please follow through on PaulT’s recommendation in post #2283346.

In the meantime

Bill, I’m willing to use “AskWoody’s DirectMessage function to exchange direct contact details.” Per rick-corbett’s post #2283060.
— Is that OK with you?

In addition, I have a retail (not OEM) Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 32-bit DVD I’m willing to send to you.
— There isn’t anything wrong with it.
— I had used it on a PC I picked up for free back in the Windows 7 days that was in a disastrous condition.

Also, I have an external DVD player that you can have if you need it.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

• This reply was modified 4 years, 9 months ago by cmptrgy.

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Storm power failure wiped out what I had written.  Will try to remember.

I have an external DVD/CD player that attaches to the computer via USB.

I have been guided to using lusrmgr.msc to look at user accounts.  I can’t make any changes… always get “access denied” interrupt.

The computer has an SD card slot and I have created by-pass software, but can’t run it without the password.  I can’t download, delete and change anything without the password.

I’m very willing to use DirectMessage or anything you guys recommend.  I’ve never used that service and don’t know how to access it.

William Sharp

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Paul T wrote:

Being able to change things in the BIOS is a good start.
Do you have a USB stick? What size?

1. Download Hiren’s boot CD, about 1.5GB, and burn it to the USB using Rufus.
2. Disconnect / remove the existing hard disk and attempt to boot from the USB.
3. If it works, shut down, reconnect the hard disk and attempt to boot from the USB.

If you can do all of those then you can reinstall Windows and remove any passwords you have.
Make a backup first, of course.

cheers, Paul

Bill, that’s an excellent idea: have you tried to do that?

I’ll do the DirectMessage tomorrow as I am willing to help.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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[PaulK]

Bill:
1 – Over these 2 years you’ve tried many guesses at a password, 1 to 4 spaces, among other things. Have you ever tried just hitting the Enter key, that is, no password at all? Perhaps this is too simple.
2 – Concerning DM – Direct Message. This is the name of a ‘Private Message’ within AskWoody.
Look at the ‘Title Bar’ here in AW; DM is listed near the right end.
One can create and send a message to any AW member.
If your AW profile is set up properly (see note), when someone sends to you a DM you will receive an email that alerts you to the fact that a DM is waiting for you. Log on to AW, click on DM, and read the Message. And reply as desired. It’s pretty slick.

Note – Click on Direct Message; click on the button ‘Settings’; ensure that there are check marks on all 3 of the Preferences.

• This reply was modified 4 years, 9 months ago by PaulK.

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I downloaded the Hiren’s program.  before doing the other steps, I plugged in the USB with the Hiren’s program on it and turned on the computer.  It recognized that the was another boot program, but won’t allow it to be opened without the infamous password.

William Sharp

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According to comment 21, this method should work for a Toshiba NB500.

https://www.jaysonjc.com/diy/removing-bios-password-in-toshiba-netbook-nb200.html

 

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anonymous wrote:

According to comment 21, this method should work for a Toshiba NB500.

https://www.jaysonjc.com/diy/removing-bios-password-in-toshiba-netbook-nb200.html

 

The issue isn’t with the BIOS password

The issue is to address
“I have a password that I assigned for all user accounts in bios.” per post #206311

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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I previously had no passwords in BIOS.  I added some for users and supervisor quite some time ago on the advice it might work.  It didn’t.  I went back in and removed the passwords.  To best of my knowledge there are none in BIOS.  I am not asked for a password to sign in to Windows or any user account.

Once I’m in Windows I am asked for an administrator password to do anything.  It was suggested I get the date/time correct.  Windows will not let me do that.  However, in BIOS I was able to get them corrected.

William Sharp

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Bill wrote:

“I have a password that I assigned for all user accounts in bios.” per post #206311

Does that mean this doesn’t apply anymore?
“I have a password that I assigned for all user accounts in bios.” per post #206311

AFAIK, the only way you can sign into Windows is via your non-admin account.
— The non-admin account doesn’t allow you to correct the time/date.

Trying to sign in to any of the Administrator accounts invidiously demands a password.
— That started when a Windows Update was either installed or failed.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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Bill wrote:

I previously had no passwords in BIOS.  I added some for users and supervisor quite some time ago on the advice it might work.  It didn’t.  I went back in and removed the passwords.  To best of my knowledge there are none in BIOS.  I am not asked for a password to sign in to Windows or any user account.

Once I’m in Windows I am asked for an administrator password to do anything.  It was suggested I get the date/time correct.  Windows will not let me do that.  However, in BIOS I was able to get them corrected.

Bill for some reason I had included the wrong quote in my previous post #2284708.
— So I’m repeating my response here with more questions.

Does that mean this doesn’t apply anymore?
“I have a password that I assigned for all user accounts in bios.” per post #206311

AFAIK, the only way you can sign into Windows is via your non-admin account.
— What is the non-admin account user?
— The non-admin account doesn’t allow you to correct the time/date even though it’s corrected in the BIOS.
— I wondering if that is the normal result when an Administrator account isn’t accessible.
— When you try to correct the date/time in the non-admin account, are you asked for for an Administrator account password?

Trying to sign in to any of the Administrator accounts invidiously demands a password.
— That started when a Windows Update was either installed or failed.
— Being in Windows 7, what browser are you using?

Since you were able to correct the date/time in the BIOS, can you go back in and let us know the BIOS version?
— In addition, can you set the BIOS to default settings?
— If you try that, does it hold?

If I remember correctly you have 4, maybe 5 Administrator accounts, non of which are Microsoft accounts. Is that true?
— None of them had a password: Is that true?
Then you have one non-admin account and does not have a password: Is that true?

On your Administrator accounts, which one would you prefer the address a password issue?

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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Bill wrote:

I downloaded the Hiren’s program

1. Start Windows.
2. Plug the Hiren’s USB in.
3. Click the Windows flag and hover over Shutdown.
4. Hold down the Shift key and click Restart.
5. From the “Choose an option” screen select “Use a device”.
6. Select the USB device. If it’s not shown the USB is not recognised.

This will boot to the Hiren’s USB.
Let us know how it goes.

cheers, Paul

Reply | Quote

Did the steps but got stopped at #5.  Never got the “choose and option” so I didn’t get to choose”use a device.”

If I plug in the USB before starting, the program tell me there is no operating system and to remove all portable devices.  If I start Windows, I can plug in the USB with Hiren’s on it and can set any files on it.

If I click on the HIREN’s file, I get a request for an administrator password.

William Sharp

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You have probably not created a bootable USB from the Hiren’s ISO.

1. Download the Hiren’s ISO file (HBCD_PE_x64.iso).
2. Plug in your USB.
3. Download and run Rufus (currently Rufus-3.11.exe). If you can’t run Rufus, copy the files to a USB and ask a friend to do it.
4. Rufus should have the USB selected under “Device”.
5. Click the “Select” button and browse to HBCD_PE_x64.iso.
6. Do not change anything in Rufus.
7. Click Start, sit back and relax.
8. Close Rufus when it finishes.

Now you can try booting from step 3 in the post above.

cheers, Paul

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cmptrgy

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Paul, I suspect Bill’s Toshiba Notebook 505 is a 32-bit system if this is the correct spec sheet for his device presented in PaulK’s post #206448.
— If so, I think the Hiren’s ISO file 32-bit iso version is the one to be used if there is one.

Bill, is this the correct spec sheet for your device?
toshiba_miniNB505-N508BL.pdf
https://support.dynabook.com/support/staticContentDetail?contentId=2865605&isFromTOCLink=false
Posted Date: 2015-12-30
Toshiba mini NB505 Detailed Product Specification1
Model Name: NB505-N508BL Part Number: PLL50U-01R00C UPC: 883974683024
Operating SystemC1 2 Genuine Windows® 7 Starter 32-bit

Bill, go into Control Panel, click on System and let us know the System Type
— It reports both OS & processor type.
At the same time, I think it’s a good idea to know the BIOS version.
— You should get that information when you go into the BIOS.

With all of that said, I hope I’m correct.
I haven’t had to use the Hiren’s boot CD and I don’t use Windows 7 anymore.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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[Paul T]

Thanks for checking, either should be OK – the N455 chip is 64bit.
https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/49491/intel-atom-processor-n455-512k-cache-1-66-ghz.html

cheers, Paul

• This reply was modified 4 years, 9 months ago by Paul T.

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cmptrgy

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Here is some system info:

Intel Atom Legacy 32-bit

2.0 RAM, 116 GB of storage still open

WIN 7 Pro SP1

Rufus .8.exe

Hiren’s

I again tried to do the windows key, shift, etc but can’t get anything to open without the password.

William Sharp

Reply | Quote

Ok folks-

Per @Paul-T ‘s post just above, the Intel Atom N455 processor is indeed 64 bit. HOWEVER, that doesn’t mean the system itself is 64 bit. I looked up the detailed spec sheet for the NB505 laptop (link below at the end of this post), and there’s a disclaimer on the second page (which is actually called “page 3 of 5” at the very bottom of the page), a footnote actually labeled “C1”.

That footnote states: “C1  64-bit computing:
64-bit computing requires that the following hardware and software requirements are met:
– 64-bit Operating System
– 64-bit CPU, Chipset and BIOS (Basic Input/Output System)
– 64-bit Device drivers
– 64-bit applications”

So, in light of what that footnote says (I added the bolding above), it could be that, although the computer does have a 64 bit capable processor, Toshiba cheaped out on the motherboard’s chipset and/or BIOS rendering it only actually capable of 32 bit computing. That would also help explain why it’s only capable of handling 2 gigs of system memory AND why Toshiba only installed a 32 bit version of Windows 7 in the factory in the first place.

The spec sheet is at the following link. Scroll down a bit, and click the “Manuals & Specs” tab then click on the pdf file name of “toshiba_miniNB505-N500BL.pdf”, which should bring up the full spec sheet.

https://support.dynabook.com/support/modelHome?freeText=2871355

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cmptrgy

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Bill wrote:

My machine runs on WIN 7 Pro SP1.  It has an Intel Atom processor.

I can boot to WIN 7.  I can’t add or delete any programs that require administrator approval.

I have 6 user accounts:  Administrator, Bub (my daughter), Guest, Mary (my wife), Home Group, and Toshita NB500.

I now sign on using Bub… because it’s the only one that doesn’t ask for administrator permission.  I always can sign on.

The administrator and Toshiba accounts are both part of the administrator group.  The others aren’t.

The administrator account has two blocks checked…”password never expires” and “account is denied.”  When I uncheck the “account is denied and then click “apply” I get the screen that says “access is denied.”

I can’t find a way to create or change the administrator password.

Again, thanks for staying with me on this.  By comparison, there are much bigger issues going on in the world, but this like the princess and the pea for me.

Can you verify the exact wording of “account is denied.”
— In looking around I’ve seen different wording of Windows 7 “account is denied.”
— I’ve also seen that Windows may not have permission to load the user profiles in question.
— I wonder if that could hinder recovering from password issues.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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Bill wrote:

I again tried to do the windows key, shift, etc but can’t get anything to open without the password.

When you hold Shift down and click Restart you get a password prompt?

Can you remove the hard disk and attempt to boot from USB?

cheers, Paul

Reply | Quote

Bill, I hope you will be successful when removing the hard disk and attempting to boot from USB.

At the same time, I’d like to mention the following which I should have clarified by now.

In my post #2283560
“I have a retail (not OEM) Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 32-bit DVD I’m willing to send to you.”
— I repeated that in my Direct Message the other day.
What I should have mentioned is that since it’s known bootable media, it would be worth trying it.
— Not to change anything but to test if it will boot into your device.

And I’m hoping that others more adept than me might see a way to have it help in a particular troubleshooting situation.
— I’ll even send it by overnight delivery if I can get your address.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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Somewhere in this chain Bill has said that the machine has no optical drive. And there have been suggestions given to create a bootable USB stick. But Bill has said that he is stymied by the requirement for a password when he attempts to do (boot) this. (All this from memory and my following the drama; I’ll locate the posts if requested.)

I believe that resolution will require hands-on by someone who has expertise and resources.

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PKCano

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IMO, Bill has yet to create bootable media.
I agree that it should be looked at by someone who has expertise and resources.

Reply | Quote

I have both but how do we do such things from a distance?

cheers, Paul

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Bill, I still hope you will try
“Can you remove the hard disk and attempt to boot from USB?”
Per Paul’s post #2285709.

Even if it fails, it still needs to be known before considering an appropriate next step.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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My post #2285506
“At the same time, I think it’s a good idea to know the BIOS version.
— You should get that information when you go into the BIOS.”

If this is the correct information for your device, you will see 9 versions
https://support.dynabook.com/support/modelHome?freeText=2861099&osId=31
— Let’s see if the version in your device is one of those in the reported 9 versions.

I know I’m thinking optimistically but when you get your device into running order (hopefully not if), we might be finding out that none of those 9 versions apply.
— I just want to make sure we work with the BIOS version in your device if needed.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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PaulK wrote:

Somewhere in this chain Bill has said that the machine has no optical drive. And there have been suggestions given to create a bootable USB stick. But Bill has said that he is stymied by the requirement for a password when he attempts to do (boot) this. (All this from memory and my following the drama; I’ll locate the posts if requested.)

I believe that resolution will require hands-on by someone who has expertise and resources.

I double-checked my notes before posting the following information.

Bill’s post #2284023
“I have an external DVD/CD player that attaches to the computer via USB.”

Bill’s post #206311 “I have a password that I assigned for all user accounts in bios.”

My post #2282948
Also in Bill’s post #206311 “I have a password that I assigned for all user accounts in bios.”
— That is the process that Lenovo allows that to be accomplished.
— Chances are that’s the process that needs to be undone and that adds to the challenge of fixing Bill’s situation especially since the BIOS is a completely different system than Windows itself.

Bill’s post #2284692
“To best of my knowledge there are none in BIOS. I am not asked for a password to sign in to Windows or any user account.”

My post #2284708
Does that mean this doesn’t apply anymore?
“I have a password that I assigned for all user accounts in bios.” per post #206311

In my estimation today Aug 5, since there isn’t a usable Administrator account, it’s more than a challenge on what needs to be done.

In addition, in my post #2285685
“Can you verify the exact wording of “account is denied.”
— In looking around I’ve seen different wording of Windows 7 “account is denied.”
— I’ve also seen that Windows may not have permission to load the user profiles in question.
— I wonder if that could hinder recovering from password issues.”
I still wonder about that.

Bill is still working toward Windows 7 bootable media.

If it doesn’t help, professional help should be considered for sure.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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PaulK

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Passwords I put in BIOS quite some time ago was my faulty thinking that maybe I could put a password in that would replace whatever the administrator password is.  It didn’t work so I erased the passwords in BIOS.

It’s true that I found WIN 7 easy to use after struggling through earlier versions of Windows.  Since WIN 7 is no longer supported by Microsoft, I would fine with installing WIN 10.  First, I have get past the “administrator password” issue to install anything.

I don’t have confidence in my ability to remove the hard drive in my little machine.  As I have said, my skills are low.

I will take a run at loading a program later so I can let you know the exact wording I get.

William Sharp

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[cmptrgy]

Bill I just saw what you posted and that’s good to do.

When you go into the BIOS, please review as it stands now.
Are there any passwords in there such as a User or Administrator or anything else?
If so please let us know what password is referred to?
Is it possible to have the BIOS saved as default?
— If a password is requested please let us know.
At the same time, let us know the BIOS version.
— Is the time & date still intact?

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

• This reply was modified 4 years, 9 months ago by cmptrgy.

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Bill wrote:

Passwords I put in BIOS quite some time ago was my faulty thinking that maybe I could put a password in that would replace whatever the administrator password is.  It didn’t work so I erased the passwords in BIOS.

It’s true that I found WIN 7 easy to use after struggling through earlier versions of Windows.  Since WIN 7 is no longer supported by Microsoft, I would fine with installing WIN 10.  First, I have get past the “administrator password” issue to install anything.

I don’t have confidence in my ability to remove the hard drive in my little machine.  As I have said, my skills are low.

I will take a run at loading a program later so I can let you know the exact wording I get.

Bill, let’s investigate on if it’s possible to remove to remove the HDD.

Open the manual NB500 Series User’s Guide
https://support.dynabook.com/support/staticContentDetail?contentId=2865070&isFromTOCLink=false
Go to page 41 as it shows the Memory module slot cover
On page 42 it shows how to remove the Memory module slot cover

Shut down the device. Disconnect the power connector to the wall socket.
Remove the battery.
Hold the power button down for about 20 seconds.
Turn the device over so you can remove the Memory module slot cover according to the manual.
— You have already upgraded your device from 2GB RAM to 4GB RAM so you might know how to remove that Memory module slot cover
— Don’t touch anything, just let us know if you can see the HDD also.
— You might see only 1 screw in place and might be able to remove the HDD by lifting it out of place or sliding it out from the side of the device.
— The manual doesn’t explain how to do that but maybe in your case the HDD isn’t removable by a user.
— Just let us know what you observe.
— If you can take a picture of its location and post a screen shot it might help us let you know our opinions.

On “I would fine with installing WIN 10” that would be good if possible but it would cost you upfront and it isn’t known yet if your device is upgradeable to Windows 10.
— Since you have a 25-character product key, you should be able to restore to whatever Windows 7 version it applies to and it appears you believe it’s for your original Windows 7 starter 32-bit.
https://support.dynabook.com/support/staticContentDetail?contentId=2865605&isFromTOCLink=false

The key is to upgrade to Windows 10 instead as upgrading to Windows 10 is still free.
That means getting your Windows 7 back up and running first.
— If your device is upgradeable that’s when it will need to be determined. If I can find out, I’ll post it.

With all of that said, if the any BIOS passwords are not applicable there might be the possibility of clearing the Administrator password being asked for but you might want to look into the NB500 Series User’s Guide manual,
https://support.dynabook.com/support/staticContentDetail?contentId=2865070&isFromTOCLink=false

Go to Page 123 Secure The features available in this category are: Supervisor password & User password and see if there’s anything applicable over the following few pages in your case.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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Bill’s opening post #206158
“I’m only trying to get one thing repaired…administrator password.”
“When I bought the little machine, it offered an option to create an administrator password. I chose not to do it. So, anytime I was installing or removing software and was asked for an administrator password, I hit “continue” and whatever was supposed to happen did.

Bill’s post #206986
“I have 6 user accounts: Administrator, Bub (my daughter), Guest, Mary (my wife), Home Group, and Toshita NB500.”

Bill’s post #2286591
“Passwords I put in BIOS quite some time ago was my faulty thinking that maybe I could put a password in that would replace whatever the administrator password is. It didn’t work so I erased the passwords in BIOS.”
— I didn’t go back to determine when that was done but at least you were able to erase the passwords in BIOS.”.
— That did not eliminate the requirement for an Administrator account password.

Is it possible that your Administrator account you were using is the hidden Administrator account?
— W/O having used a password and using the Administrator whichever account consistently isn’t safe.
Usually when creating an account it’s normal to give it an appropriate name such as Bill and then assigning it as an Administrator account vs Administrator name.
— Since the account you were using is named Administrator, I’m wondering if the system became “confused” between the hidden Administrator account even though it could have been as net user administrator /active:no along with your named Administrator account.
Eventually “access is denied.” becomes a major issue meaning that full Administrator rights have now become “denied” for whatever reason.
— I haven’t experienced this issue, but whether or not you do/don’t have a password, “access is denied.” is a major issue because a working Administrator is necessary to correct that AFAIK.

Another concern is: could your device have been attacked by a virus?

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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I am rewording the way I wrote my post #2286897 the other day as I included extra information that wasn’t needed to be included.
— Sorry about that Bill

So now my intent has become focused on “access is denied.”

Originally there was a sudden unknown Administrator account password to contend with.
There was a time in which BIOS passwords seemed to be an issue but Bill eventually erased “the passwords in BIOS.”
That did not eliminate the requirement for an Administrator account password.

I lost track of what post it was mentioned in, but Bill let us know that “access is denied.” was included.
— I consider that very important and that means the Administrator’s right’s are being denied and that’s what needs to be addressed in order to move on.
— If “access is denied.” is corrected, I suspect the password issue will be able to be addressed.
— If I’m wrong, just let me know please.

Bill, what is the exact wording of “access is denied.”?

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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On the “access is denied”, I first have to remember where I saw it.  I’m pretty confident it popped up when I was trying to load the rufus file or perhaps when I was attempting to install WIN 10 from a USB drive.

I don’t have any problems getting to Windows during start-up.  I’m not asked for a password to get the screen that shows user accounts.  When I select the only user account available, I am not asked for a password to open Windows desktop screen.

As long as I am using internal files, everything works.  For example, I can go a folder and open a DOC file into WORD.

If I try to remove an icon from the desktop or open any file ending in .exe, I am asked for the password.

I can’t download any file to the hard drive without the password.

As I have said, I have no bond to WIN7.  I will gladly switch to WIN10, but have to find a way to load the installation files.

William Sharp

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In your post #206239 July 27, 2018 at 6:24 am.
“My problem began shortly after I downloaded the monthly roll up in April (2018)”

Your first mention of “access is denied” is in post #206407 July 27, 2018 at 2:27 pm.
“I got very close (I think). After putting in the lsgrmgr.msc I was able to click through to the page that has users and groups. In the middle column I see all user accounts including administrator. To it’s right there is “Built-in account for administering the computer/domain.” Clicking on administrator, I go to a page that has options like “password never expires” and “account is disabled.” I unchecked the “disabled” box and tried to click the apply box and am taken to a screen that says “access is denied.” Trying to make changes to user accounts brings up the same screen.
If I double click on “administrator” I can get to a “member of” tab that shows administrator is a member of administrators and users. I tried deleting “user” but get the “access denied” screen.”

Both are on July 27, 2018 which makes me think “access is denied” is already applicable.

In your previous post #2287156
“As I have said, I have no bond to WIN7. I will gladly switch to WIN10, but have to find a way to load the installation files.”
— Please do not consider that route yet.
Windows 7 needs to be recovered first.
— Installing Win10 should become upgrading to Win10 if it’s possible to do so which cannot be determined yet.

Also your chipset is Intel NM10 Express Chipset .
https://support.dynabook.com/support/staticContentDetail?contentId=2865605&isFromTOCLink=false
I cannot find Win10 drivers for system via Toshiba or 3rd party suppliers yet.
If you know the model or serial number, visit https://support.dynabook.com/drivers

There are Toshiba Win10 drivers for newer versions of Intel NM10 Express Chipset
Toshiba NB500 Notebook Drivers Free Download
https://www.toshiba-drivers.com/download-toshiba/toshiba-nb500-notebook-drivers-for-windows/
Toshiba-Drivers.com provide free toshiba Drivers Download for windows 10, windows 7, xp, vista, 8 32 bit or 64 bit, 8.1, you can search and download all Toshiba NB500 Notebook drivers free. You can update Toshiba NB500 Notebook drivers free from our site, Just Download & Update Drivers of Toshiba NB500 Notebook for Your PC Now!
— These are for Toshiba PLL5ZE, PLL50E & PLL60E Notebook drivers.

With all of that said, please see if the known bootable Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 32-bit DVD I sent you will boot to your device.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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Bill, do you have a friend who can create and test bootable USB for you?
Then you know you have something you can test on your machine.

cheers, Paul

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Paul T wrote:

Bill, do you have a friend who can create and test bootable USB for you?
Then you know you have something you can test on your machine.

cheers, Paul

Thanks a good one Paul.

Bill, I have bootable USB’s. Most are for Windows 10 but I do have a few for other purposes.
I’ll check with you later today & tomorrow.
I’ll be glad to send you what you can use to test what Paul mentions.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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Paul, I have two other computers that run on WIN10.  One has an internal CD drive.  The other is a Surface laptop with no CD player.  However, I have my trusty old iOmega DVD player/recorder that attaches to any computer via a USB cord.

Lawrence has sent me a WIN 7 rescue/install disc. I should be able to find out fairly quickly if the disc will open with through a combination of the iOmega drive plus the Toshiba notebook.

 

William Sharp

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I push power then F2 and enter BIOS with no request for a password.  A couple of months ago, I changed the date and time in BIOS. When I exit BIOS, WIN7 starts loading, I am not asked for a password.  I chose a user icon and continue opening Windows.

A couple of days ago, I connected my iOmega CD player to the Notebook.  I turned on the player and then the computer (which was off).  The machine loaded to Windows as usual.  I was able to choose the CD player and see the files on it.  I clicked on setup.exe and got a request for an administrator password.  I tried another couple of exe files on the disc and always got the request for a password.

I tried to delete a couple of icons on my desktop screen and send them to the recycle bin.  Can’t do it without a password.

I can’t download any file…let alone open it without a password.  I can’t delete any files without the password.

William Sharp

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Based upon what you describe above, it sounds to me like you have a somewhat corrupted profile, with a setting or two messed up deep within the registry that is causing your problems.

I’ve seen some really weird things happen as a result of corruption within profiles, both mine and others’.

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“I push power then F2 and enter BIOS with no request for a password. A couple of months ago, I changed the date and time in BIOS. When I exit BIOS, WIN7 starts loading, I am not asked for a password. “
— We are aware of that. If anything changes about that, update us please.

“I chose a user icon and continue opening Windows.”
— I imagine you mean the non-admin Bub(?) account.

“A couple of days ago, I connected my iOmega CD player to the Notebook. I turned on the player and then the computer (which was off).”
— If you were using the known bootable Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 32-bit DVD, you might need to set your BIOS to boot via USB iOmega CD player.
— Try it that way next time.
Before I sent that DVD to you, I ensured the Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 32-bit DVD is still bootable using my external DVD player would boot. It did w/o a problem.

In your case “The machine loaded to Windows as usual. I was able to choose the CD player and see the files on it. I clicked on setup.exe and got a request for an administrator password. I tried another couple of exe files on the disc and always got the request for a password.”
— setup.exe will not work because you cannot install Windows within Windows that I know of.
— If it’s possible to install Windows within Windows, I’m pretty sure the procedure is different than using setup.exe.
— The known bootable Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 32-bit DVD needs to boot at boot-up.

Please go back and
— If you were using the known bootable Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 32-bit DVD, you might need to set your BIOS to boot via USB iOmega CD player.
— Try it that way next time.
You might be requested for the infamous password, but it won’t be known w/o trying that.

With all of that said, I still suspect “access is denied” is a very important factor.
In fact, if you cannot get past “access is denied”, that’s a major hindrance of trying to recover from an infamous password issue.
What is the exact wording?

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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Bill, connect your CD and turn on the computer.
As soon as you turn the machine on press F12 lots. This should give you a boot menu. Does it?

If you get the boot menu, select the CD as the boot device.
Does Windows boot from the CD?

cheers, Paul

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I recreated the sequence I used in July 2018 to get to user accounts.  Administrator is one. I attempted to change the password and got the “access is denied” message.

I went to BIOS.  One of the options was ATAPI DVD drive.  I chose it and exited BIOS.  Then I turned the machine off.  When I restarted it, it loaded Windows in the usual way…from the hard drive I suppose.

William Sharp

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Pressing F12 or F2 at startup should give you a boot device option. Does it?

cheers, Paul

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When I go to the BOOT tab in BIOS, the options are: HDD/SSD TOSHIBA MK2565GSXN-(S1), then FDD, then LAN, then CD/DVD ATAPI DVD W DHDHW1P-(USD 2.0)

William Sharp

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Set the CD as the first boot device, save and boot.

Does it boot from the CD?

cheers, Paul

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I have set the CD as the primary boot source.

Because I can’t make the change as an administrator, it seems to reject my changes as a user and boots from the hard drive.  However, it accepted my changing the date and time but that’s it.  Once it boots to Windows, I have no ability to change anything…including date and time.

William Sharp

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I understand that the BIOS is not letting you save changes to the boot priority order but you should be able to change it on a ‘one-off’ basis.

1. Power on and press F12 to display Boot Priority.

2. Use the arrow keys to select the CD as boot device then press ENTER.

Does this not work? It seems strange… because “Under the default startup sequence, the computer looks for the startup files in the external media before checking the internal storage drive.” (according to page 182 of the User’s Guide) so, if a bootable CD was present then I would have assumed it would work.

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“I have set the CD as the primary boot source.”
— Please try again using the F12 procedure as requested.
— Immediately upon booting up press and hold F12.
— Double check Rick’s explanation please.

“Because I can’t make the change as an administrator, it seems to reject my changes as a user and boots from the hard drive. However, it accepted my changing the date and time but that’s it. Once it boots to Windows, I have no ability to change anything…including date and time.”
— You’re doing ok Bill.
— Those items will be addressed when i’s time but hopefully the Windows 7 install DVD will come through for you.

The purpose right now is to get the Windows 7 install DVD to boot into Windows 7 the way it should.
— Once it does, let us know immediately before moving forward with it.

Now I’d like to mention you have a CD external drive: maybe it won’t work well with a modern DVD install media but that’s what we can find out.

If problems persist, I’m willing to send you my external DVD unit as it’s known to work together with the Windows 7 DVD.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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Send Bill a USB stick with boot files?

cheers, Paul

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BINGO!  After 2 years and 4 months of trying things, I got the machine to boot from the CD drive and loaded the WIN7 program Lawrence sent me.

Somehow I lost the driver for the network adapter so I’m not connected to the Internet yet.

I was careful not to install a password and put in key numbers.  I think when I connect to Internet via WiFi, I can complete the registration and be up and running.

You guys are amazing.  The patience you’ve had throughout this ordeal is beyond what old, dumb guys like me could ever expect.

I will now start searching for the network adapter driver.

Later, I may upgrade to WIN10 but will have to calculate if this little machine has enough capacity to do it.

Thanks again, guys.

William Sharp

4 users thanked author for this post.

mledman, Elly, cmptrgy, geekdom

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The first thing I would do now that you can boot from CD is to backup your hard disk.
Do you have an external USB hard disk that you can use?

cheers, Paul

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Paul T wrote:

Send Bill a USB stick with boot files?

cheers, Paul

I have an appointment to at our senior center this afternoon hoping they still have a Win7 laptop I’ll be able to use. I want to send Bill a USB Win7 SP1 (maybe SP2 (?) Clean install media and I’m glad you asked about it. Is there a reliable tutorial to do that? I’ve looked some up but I don’t know which one to trust. If it weren’t for the pandemic “shut-down” along with management changes I would have looked into that when I started paying attention to Bill’s issues.

What I’m looking for is to make sure any Win7 install media is for Bill’s Windows® 7 Starter 32-bit. Bill has a product key and he suspects its for the original system.
https://support.dynabook.com/support/staticContentDetail?contentId=2865605&isFromTOCLink=false

— If the product key isn’t for the original system, I suspect that’s the key to use anyway and accept whatever further Win7’s were are his laptop.

On the “USB stick with boot files”, what process would I use to do it that way?
— I’m a simple user and want to keep the process as simple as possible.
— Even though I have used Rufus a couple of times, I’m not a fan of using it.
— Both of my PC’s were originally Win7 and I was good at keeping them in tip-top shape: now I do the same for the upgraded Win10 on those PC’s.

I don’t know if this is possible but could Bill copy or burn the Windows 7 install DVD to USB on his Windows 10 PC?

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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Bill wrote:

I will now start searching for the network adapter driver.

This is the location of the RealTek ethernet adapter driver (Win 7 x32) from the Toshiba website. Just click on the download button.

Hope this helps…

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The second thing would be to reset the admin password using Hiren’s boot CD. Once that is done you should be able to install software and make changes.

cmptrgy, can you send Bill a Hiren’s CD?

cheers, Paul

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cmptrgy wrote:

I don’t know if this is possible but could Bill copy or burn the Windows 7 install DVD to USB on his Windows 10 PC?

Bear in mind that Bill’s netbook doesn’t appear to support ‘Boot from USB’. He hasn’t mentioned it nor can I see it shown as an option in the User Guide.

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cmptrgy wrote:

If the product key isn’t for the original system, I suspect that’s the key to use anyway and accept whatever further Win7’s were are his laptop.

One option – now that it’s booting – is to make a backup of its current activation. This can then be used to re-activate automatically if, for example, the product key is unavailable. (Many laptop’s Windows product keys/COA stickers became unreadable due to heat damage from where they were stuck on the underside of the laptop body.)

See this Raymond.cc article – 3 Tools to Backup and Restore Windows 7 and Vista OEM Activation License – for more info. I’ve used the first 2 tools mentioned and they both worked very successfully. The third tool – Raymond’s own – looks even easier.

Hope this helps…

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Bill wrote:

BINGO!  After 2 years and 4 months of trying things, I got the machine to boot from the CD drive and loaded the WIN7 program Lawrence sent me.

Somehow I lost the driver for the network adapter so I’m not connected to the Internet yet.

I was careful not to install a password and put in key numbers.  I think when I connect to Internet via WiFi, I can complete the registration and be up and running.

You guys are amazing.  The patience you’ve had throughout this ordeal is beyond what old, dumb guys like me could ever expect.

I will now start searching for the network adapter driver.

Later, I may upgrade to WIN10 but will have to calculate if this little machine has enough capacity to do it.

Thanks again, guys.

Kudo’s to everyone on this team in your topic Bill: kudos to you to Bill for not giving up.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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I spent a little time yesterday looking for drivers for my network adapter.  I’m now connected to the internet and will download the programs I want on the little computer I will be giving to my grandkids.

Thanks again guys.

William Sharp

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cmptrgy, Microfix, Elly

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You deserve a medal for persistence, Bill. I’d have taken a mallet to it years ago! I’m sure it will bless your grandkids.

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cmptrgy, Microfix, Elly

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Bill I’d like to include a few recommendations.
BTW, what I’m mentioning I do for my grandchildren.

Once the laptop is running properly and just before giving it to your grandchildren, create a system image backup.
— I know our grandchildren are our adorable part of our our families but PC’s need proper “maintenance” regimens based on how they are used.
— Since you have Windows 7, use a security program that works with it. Others would have to recommend what should apply on Windows 7.

On user accounts, make absolutely sure the primary account is a password protected local administrator account. I would also recommend TFA by using a PIN: just make sure the primary account password is never forgotten.
— Another recommendation is to create an additional password protected local administrator account even if it isn’t to be used often. Why? Because if something goes awry with the primary password protected local administrator account or any other account, you’ll have the ability to work with the issues at hand.
— If you create non-admin accounts for your grandchildren, make sure they know that there will be times an administrator password will be requested.
— If you create local administrator accounts for your grandchildren instead, train them to contact you if something doesn’t go right all of a sudden.
— The idea is to minimize the attempts to fix issues and as you know, if there isn’t a local administrator account available, it isn’t enjoyable trying to work out what needs to be addressed.

With all of that said, good luck & happy computing.

HP EliteBook 8540w laptop Windows 10 Pro (x64)

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I want to delete this entire exchange.  The problem is solved and it is not likely anyone will have a similar problem.  How do I delete this file?

William Sharp

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Can you tell us what you did to solve the problem?

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I finally was taught how to go into bios and instruct the machine to boot from a CD.  Another member mailed me an install CD.  As it ran, I did not choose to install a password (which was the original problem).  The new version is not as complete as the one I had, but it works fine for a little guy doing his elementary education via computer.

William Sharp

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GoneToPlaid, geekdom

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This has been a very instructional thread on so many levels. Sometimes things just take time, patience, and many approaches before resolving a problem. There were many concepts explored here and this thread will be useful to others in the future.

On permanent hiatus {with backup and coffee}
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offline▸ Acer TravelMate P215-52 RAM8GB Win11Pro 22H2.22621.1265 x64 i5-10210U SSD Firefox106.0 MicrosoftDefender
online▸ Win11Pro 22H2.22621.1992 x64 i5-9400 RAM16GB HDD Firefox116.0b3 MicrosoftDefender

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SueW, mledman, GoneToPlaid

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Delete this entire thread? Seriously? This is one of the most legendary threads of perseverance here on Ask Woody!

5 users thanked author for this post.

cmptrgy, SueW, geekdom, mledman, RockE

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I’m learning. I just thought it was an issue taking up space.  In my “first of the year clean up mode” , I thought I would do my part.  I’ll leave it.  Thanks for the heads up.

William Sharp

4 users thanked author for this post.

cmptrgy, mledman, GoneToPlaid, geekdom

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