XPHome crashed, lost administrator password (XPHome original )

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Hi All
My XP has gone PHUT in a bad way. I have a new notebook, only 3 months old. It was pre-loaded with XP home. Since i’ve had the machine I’ve added an external cdrom burner and software including Dreamweaver, Ulead Photo Impact, Nero Burning Rom. Nothing big bad or scary.

Everything has been rosy until this week when it just started turning itself off and re-booting for no apparent reason. This seemed to be completely random. I’m certain it’s not a virus as PCcillin is always running and up to date.
Got the blue screen of death a few times, and then it went into a cycle of getting halfway through bootup, then turning off and starting again. Forever.

Pressing F8 and trying all options there (safe mode, last good config etc) all have the same result.
Threw in the XP cd and attempted a Recovery.
Here it gets a bit weird. When it begins the Recovery it asks for an Administrator Password, which by default should be blank. Except it isn’t blank. Contacted the supplier of the machine to ask what he put as Administrator Password when he loaded the software. He said “XP has an administrator password???” Great.
So Recovery don’t work.
Tried to install over the top and repair. This appeared to work well until it got to about 99% when it said “Setup can not set the required Windows XP configuration information. This indicates an internal setup error. Contact your system administrator.”

According to MSKB the Internal Setup Error notice implies a piece of hardware is not compatible with XP. But the only peripheral that has been added to the machine is an external cdrom burner which has been fine since the day i got it 3 months ago.

So i’m completely stuck. Anyone got any ideas??? Is it possible to break the administrator password? What would the hardware incompatibility be??? I’m contemplating going back to win98. Hmmm…

cheers
–jo

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You need to try the recover withOUT the external devices. The recover will restore to the factory settings and then you must add your other hardware and software.

As for the Admin password all you needed to do was to hit the “enter” key, No spaces or any other keys.
Once you get your system running again, I would add a Admin password, so you have control of your machine.

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

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First thing i did was unplug the externals. Recover doesn’t work with or without the external devices.

And the admin password – hitting the enter key was exactly what I did do – it told me the passowrd was invalid, so i had to assume there was some other password entered at another time. Since I didn’t previously assign a password, and the guy who loaded the software swears he didn’t either, the whole thing is very strange IMO.

–jo

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This is a long shot, but is it possible you originally set up using your own id and password, the machine will take the first user as the “Administrator” unless otherwise told. (Did that make sense??????) I found that XP Home did exactly that, but had the grace to show the user name, underneath it does state Administrator. Then I had the option to remove the word Administrator if I wished, I never bothered to, but maybe you did? Try your first password if you have not done so already, have nothing to lose except your mind. 🙂

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Dave, do you have any thoughts, I am trying to change the “administrator” on a new XP Home notebook, I have tried creating another user account, then going into the properties of the original “Administrator”, but I am having trouble trying to remove the XP Administrator to another user (even though I have the correct password etc). What am missing?

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Not 100% sure what you’re aiming to do – the best route, if I understand it, is to give the new user profile administrative capabilities, and then disable the default account. This is a fairly common Windows NT security practice, since hackers will try to hit the “Administrator” account first – disabling it closes that loophole.

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Yes! Exactly right, more to see if it can be done rather than out of necessity. Fortunately the owner of the notebook was the first account I set up, not knowing it automatically takes on the role of Administrator. I have tried to give another user administrative capabilities, but as soon as I type in Administrator, XP correctly tells me the account already exists, therefore I figured I have to change it another way. I will try deleting the original account, in theory if I set it up, I should be able to do so, yes, she says hopefully. I’m learning, honest I am…..

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I stated in another post not so long ago that everything I learned, I learned by breaking. You’re light years ahead of my aunts and uncles, who lose every last shred of common sense the moment they turn their computers on!!

I seem to recall that you can’t delete the Administrator account. Just create a completely new user profile, with whatever name you want it to have (not Administrator) – and then make that new account member of the Administrators group. Once you’ve confirmed that the new admin account works, disable the default one that is actually named Administrator. Administrative privileges in XP are set by making the user a member of the administrator group, which is mildly confusing because there is also a user account with the same name.

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Amen, Mark, glad you said that. I just came on and was gonna jump in and tell her that you CAN’T delete the “Administrator” account, only disable (hide) it. It was recommended to me by a long-time NT/2000 user friend that I should create an additional user profile with Administrator rights and just let it sit there, unused, in case my “main” logon ever got broken.

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As stated above the “administrator” can NOT be deleted. There will be times that you will NEED the administrator account. I have found that the best way is NOT to use it as a user account and to give it a password that NO ONE would remember, just make sure you can remember or have access to it a list of passwords and NOT on your machine. I think you can use up to 12 digets including upper and lower case and some special digets.

Also if you are running “Home” version the ONLY way to get to the “administrator” account is in the “Safe Mode”.

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

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Great tip Dave – thanks youI I’m only running XP Home on this new machine, and somehow managed to achieve the changes before reading your post about Safe mode. So, I don’t know how I fixed it without using safe mode, but so far it all seems okay. The test will be when I return the machine to the owner tomorrow, its a new notebook with 2 users, now a third with the administrator account kept apart. Maybe it was just luck because the machine was still in its box when I opened and began setting it up I feel confident with 98, and ME (which has not given me many problems actually even though it seems to be unpopular). XP is new to me, and I am only on an occasional machine using it. I will go cross eyed between the 3 platforms!

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Is Administator account different than an account with admin. privileges? How do you denote a Master admin from another admin account?

Finally, can you get to the/an Admin account outside of safemode in Pro?

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Bruce, AFAIK the Admin account is the same as an account with admin privileges. It is there so an account exists when you first start the machine that can do everything needed to get the PC where you need it. By Master admin if you mean the Admin that came with the machine leave it as Administrator but assign a strong password to it. If you don’t like to leave the admin account just create a new one with a name you’d know, assign a strong password, give it admin privleges, disable the original admin account. With XPP you can login using the administator account in normal mode. If you normally login to a domain you just have to login to the local machine (i.e. workgroup) instead when using the administrator account.

HTH, Joe

--Joe

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Joe ~

I like how you make your rounds and seem to be on it. I wasn’t sure about the master admin and such as the info above in this thread became obscured to me.

The reason I asked was on one machine with Pro, I have a full retail version and am improperly using the initial (master admin?) admin account with my name as a regular user account. I am not on a domain or LAN or the like. I know I need to change this, but am not sure how without re-installing OS.

Another unit is my dear ladyfriend’s and is an OEM version, Dell Optiplex GX-150 that was purchased second hand. We were bickering over whether to re-install the OS or not as there are Admin issues with original registered owner’s account.

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Bruce, I’ll running XPP at home. I’ll check the account structure tonight & let you know. On the Optiplex 150 is that XPP or XPH?

Joe

--Joe

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XPH/NTFS

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“Admin issues with original registered owner’s account”
The best thing to do to get rid of ALL the original owers settings and data is to format the drive and do a clean install. This will also clear any Admin issues, including setting your own Admin password..

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

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Yes, Dave, you are right. I advised that this would be the best course of action, but she was reluctant as she had installed a boatload of other software and was doing lots of work. I finally convinced her to back up what she really needs and we will reinstall and start right from scratch.

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I would look into NOT using NTFS. I have found NO use for it in the home world, but on the job there is a need for it.

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

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NTFS is the only way to use XP’s file permissions and protecting the folder contents of multiple user profiles.

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Bruce, I think it is a wise course to re-install on the XPH machine. Have you considered the same on your XPP machine? That would be the easiest way to straighten out the account problems. You could try to change things with the user manager. But you need to be careful not to end up locking yourself out of the machine.

Joe

--Joe

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I think I will follow suit on the unit w/ XPP. It just seems that backing up is never done!

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It just seems that backing up is never done!

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[/indent]That’s because it isn’t.

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——————————————————————————–
It just seems that backing up is never done!
——————————————————————————–
But hind-sight is 20/20! 🙂

Wow this thread is still going. I have been unable to get online the last few days. Re: the Administrators password, I say again, my problem (which sound the same as those in this thread) were solved by following the advice of this forum.

I too was stuck with the inability to change the Administrator, however I created 2 other accounts on the machine (XP Home), gave them limited access. Went into the Control Panel>Users, selected the Administrator account which then allowed options to alter to Limited access, then over to the one I wanted to be the Administrator (which I have since kept completely away from being a user account, and treated it as separate). Have encountered no problems at all since. In fact the machine is working perfectly so far, and I have been constantly loading programs, formats and a ton of stuff without indications of trouble.

Re: Password problem – the folks in here are far more knowledgeable than I, but maybe it is worth trying an old tech’s trick, which is to load a new machine and enter in the password box simply the word “password” (waiting for the new owner to alter to their own), this is what I have done for a long time. If this sounds insane to those of you who have not heard of it, then maybe it is me who is crazy. 🙂 But at least I know on every machine I have setup, what the p/w is, and when and or if the owner forgets I have told them, often it is still there in the settings…………? Who knows, maybe when the obvious solutions are not working, perhaps the seemingly dumb ones might.

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You guys are just WONDERFUL. I have learned more in the last day about XP from you lovely people answering me than I have in the last 6 months. All comments helped heaps! Mark, thank you so much, I have successfully fixed the Administrator account, kept it separate from another 2 accounts created which now have “limited” access only. Very cool!

Al, thanks for your input too, now I understand I have to create another account and make sure it is in place as Administrator before altering or deleting the previous one!
Dave, as advised I have made the Administrator account, a non user account, which has made everything much easier. Between the 3 of you I believe I actually understand XP’s administrator purposes now! Once again, thank you all very much. Saved me a mountain of time.

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No one has mentioned it yet, so I’ll throw this in. Spontaneous reboots have been knwon to happen (to me) when there is BAD or incompatible RAM in a machine. Obviously this shouldn’t be the case with a 3 month old machine, but it could be. You didn’t say who “the guy” who loaded….etc. is, so I hope you’ve got a warranty of some kind. Best of luck….

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The problem with the blank administrator password for XPHome is a known issue at Microsoft. I have the same problem on my Dell8200. The problem is due to the software used to create the XP/Home image by OEMs. There is a MS KB article (Q308402) that describes a fix, but they note that should not be used unless it is an emergency. The fix is supposed to be included in the XP Service Pack due out soon. Check the KB article and call MS if you want to try it. I decided to wait.

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I suddenly seem to be in the same boat as the lengthy problem described by Dr. Jellyboat.

I’ve had XP Home installed since last year and have been impressed with its stability and robustness.

We suffer occasional power outages here – in the summer storm season, in the winter storm season and, it seems, in most seasons in between…

All earlier ones required only a reboot and I was back in business. However, we had another outage yesterday, and the machine has gone into the loop described by the first post in this thread.

I can’t seem to be able to boot in any of the less than full modes – safe mode seems to list a number of system files and then lock up. If I put my XP home CD back in, the Repari module won’t load, the upgrade module insists I’m not entitled to upgrade ( I had previously installed XP by upgrading quite legitimately from the accursed Windows ME) and a new install calls for an Administrator’s password which I have never created. Hitting enter is not accepted.

Any suggestions what the password might be – my user name, for example?

I’ve seached the Lounge and the MS knowledge base, and some not very relevant tips suggest I must be logged on first to make any subsequent changes, and of course I can’t get to even that stage.

Any advice for a forlorn out-in-the-computer-cold guy?

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I would reinstall XP. If you have an upgrade copy of XP, you may have to install ME first before the update will run. Then invest in a UPS power system to deal with the power failures. You can get something for under $100 that would protect you. It also might be a good idea to get disk imaging software (Drive Image or Ghost) and when you have a working system, image it to CD or other off-line storage. That way you could recover back to a working system. You could also try GoBack, that might help recover when the system gets corrupted, though that would not work if you can’t boot windows.

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Dave, you didn’t say whether you have any surge protection installed in light of all the power problems, but it seems to me that your situation is somewhat different than Dr. Jellybabe’s. Looks to me like you’ve got a corrupt Windows on your hands that might need re-installing. Sheesh, in your case it looks like even going back to your previous OS if you did an upgrade install of XP.

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Thanks for the suggestions – I had a horrible premonition that re-installation would be the solution, but was trying my best to avoid thinking about it too hard.

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Dave, If you re-install you do NOT have to start with ME. You need the ME install CD available. XP will check for an existing install of Windows and give you a chance to insert your ME CD as proof.

HTH,
Joe

--Joe

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Thanks very much, Joe, I couldn’t locate an actual ME CD, because I thought I’d throqn it out gleefully, In fact, ME is on the Compaq Recovery disk which came with my machine originally.

I’ve given the whole kit over to a computer service centre, and should have it back today to resume my home connected life.

Now I just have to get into the proper backku-up discipline – I understand XP can make this quite simple. I shall see.

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Dave, You’re welcome. Don’t forget that by default on an XPH system the backup software is not installed. You can do a search of the lounge in the XP forum for ‘install backup’ and get quite a few hits to see other comments about XP backup software. I use Drive Image at home. IMHO, it is one of the best.

HTH, Joe

--Joe

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Amen to what Joe said about Drive Image. Regular Loungers know that I’m also a big proponent of Drive Image and additional hard drives are not too expensive these days. I think you’ll be a little disappointed in the Windows backup software (maybe a lot disappointed!).

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Dr. Jellybabe, where are you? As often happens, your thread seems to have gotten a tad off course. Did you ever solve the spontaneous rebooting, OR, have you by any chance seen my oblique suggestion that it could be caused by a bad stick of RAM? A 3 month old machine shouldn’t be rebooting for no reason.

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Yes – still here! Very impressed to find this thread is still going…
Just recovering from 5 days in bed with the flu, during which time i went no where near any computer of any sort. In a fit of delirium on the 2nd day in bed, i called a courier and shipped the wretched XP machine back to the manufacturer and grumbled “fix it”.
They could offer me no explaination of what went wrong, but i must say i wasn’t really in a coherent state of mind for a proper cross-examination. XP is reloaded, and a proper Administrator account is now set up, and everything is fine. I guess i’ve only really learnt about the importance of a separate Administrator account – which is great – but not what went wrong with my machine in the first place.

Intrigued to learn that Dave turned up with the same problem as me – even though it seemed to originate from a different source (maybe). My machine locked up to a point where i couldn’t do a reinstall of XP over the top. Let us know Dave how you go…

thanks for everyone’s imput
–jo
Doctor Jellybabe

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Maybe you should’ve updated your anti-virus, eh, Doctor??

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lol

I discovered the reason for the whole spontaneous re-boot cycle problem in the first place. It was, as Big Al suggested, dodgy RAM. The manufacturers replaced the ram chips at their expense as everything is still under warranty.

–jo
DoctorJellybabe

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Yay fer You! Thought we’d never hear the answer. Glad it’s fixed!

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Go to http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?…b;en-us;Q298252%5B/url%5D and you will fine the following.
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Cannot Change the Password for the Administrator Account in User Accounts in Control Panel
The information in this article applies to:
Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition
Microsoft Windows XP Professional

Symptoms
After you log on as an administrator to a computer that is not a member of a domain, when you double-click User Accounts in Control Panel to change the password for the built-in Administrator account, the Administrator account may not appear in the list of user accounts. Consequently, you cannot change its password.
Cause
This behavior can occur because the Administrator account logon option appears only in Safe mode if more than one account is created on the system. The Administrator account is available in Normal mode only if there are no other accounts on the system.
Resolution Go to the web page and see the step by step indtructions.

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

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I have three accounts on one stand alone unit and have admin account visible and can change the password. I noticed the words “may” and “can” are used so does this indicate that this situation arbitrarily arises rather than a rule??

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Sorry Bruce, I don’t think you’re looking at THE Administrator account…..

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I agrre with Big Al, you are looking at a account with Admin premissions.

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

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Okay, now wait a minute…you gentlemen are giving me information that conflicts with previous information presented in this thread and then just left me hanging w/o qualifying your statements.

The account that was created when I first installed the OS is called the computer administrator account and I assigned my name to it as well. Is this NOT the admin account? Where would you see THE admin account if this is not what I am looking at? THE admin account is the account when you first set up the system, is it not?

If this is not correct then there exists incorrect information that was left unchallenged and has further obscured the facts with this topic for me as well as others that are surely reading and following this thread.

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It’s been eight months now, Bruce, so I’ll have to do another XP install to make sure it hasn’t changed. But, as near as I can remember, you CAN’T change the user name on the initial “Administrator” account that Windows creates. Windows only wants from you a password for that account. When you get all through with the install, you create your first user account and from there you’re on your own. DaveA, jump back in here – remember I’m old and it’s been eight months since I installed XP…..

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Okay, now wait a minute…you gentlemen are giving me information that conflicts with previous information presented in this thread and then just left me hanging w/o qualifying your statements.

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[/indent]Here, let me qualify them for you. You’re getting free advice from people that are often learning as they go, just like you. When you’re giving that kind of attitude it’s a miracle you get any questions answered at all sometimes.

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Where would you see THE admin account if this is not what I am looking at?

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[/indent]Why don’t you clear up the record as to what’s actually on your system and go to the Computer Management applet of the Adminstrative Tools, and click on Users. What do you see? Perhaps with this information we can all figure it out together.

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Hi, Keely ~

I am not sure what you read into that, but there was no attitude, certainly not negative, in my response. The folk in this particular discussion are all pretty familiar with each other and I am sure there was nothing taken out of context here by these gentleman as indicated by the tone if read from the beginning. If I am wrong, then I am penitent, will stand down and accept your censure.

Per your request, I have attached the CM window which indicates I may or may not be the Administrator as well as a user with admin rights. The first account is THE admin account.

I appreciate your assistance offer. There seems to exist a certain amount of confusion over the accounts and the like. I am sure the FAT32/NTFS makes a difference as far as permissions are concerned and the names of built-in admin, admin rights accounts and groups only add to the confusion.

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Nah, you ain’t wrong, Bruce, but evidently I SURE WAS! Here’s a similar shot from my PC with “THE Administratoe” account indicated by the arrow – the name I thought Windows wouldn’t let you change, but yours sure says YOUR NAME. On my machine (I use the “Welcome Screen” method for logon) that account DOESN’T show up unless I boot into Safe Mode, like the Microsoft article says. The only thing on my machine I don’t understand is that if I do boot into Safe Mode, there will be TWO choices – THE Administrator and AEH, which is my normal logon.

Well, we may be beating our foreheads togedder fer nuthin’, pal! By the way, the one you see at the bottom of my screen, called ZULU is my emergency profile that I never use and it has administrator rights, just in case I ever need it.

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I just did a test of something I’d never bothered with. I changed my Windows logon from “Welcome Screen” wherein I for one have confirmed that you cannot logon as “Administrator” (user name) as stated by Microsoft – Safe Mode required, to the classic method of logon screen, which requires you to enter the user name and password. In so doing I’ve discovered that Safe Mode is NOT required to use the user name “Administrator.”

The point of all this is to ask you, Bruce, are you using the classic logon screen rather than Welcome Screen? I know, I know, you’re probably sleeping in on this long holiday weekend…..

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Bruce, similarly to BigAl I’ve got the first Adminstrator account named “Administrator”. My guess is that when you set up your machine, during the installation process you did a 1-user setup and the “master administrator account” as you’ve called it was assigned the name you gave it. You’ve since created a couple of additional users, one with you name but slightly different (as I’m sure you would have encountered an error trying to give it an identical name to your “master adminstrator” account) and assigned whatever rights to them.

During setup, I followed the practice I had been accustomed to with W2K and kept the first setup (“built-in”) account “Administrator” and then created users with more limited prvilieges from there for daily use. As to your question re: the difference between FAT32 and NTFS affecting how you set up the Administrator accounts, I’m not sure it makes a difference strictly in that sense. I use FAT32 on HD0 which includes the WXP partition and I believe, although I can’t state for certain, that I could have changed the first setup Administrator account’s name if I had chosen to. Of course, you’re right about the ability to restrict folder access being exclusive to NTFS.

To access your built-in Bruce Administrator account, from a the WXP welcome screen logon, two CTRL+ALT+DEL’s will get you to the classic logon screen where you can type in your Bruce Administrator name (I don’t have your graphic in front of me right now). Safe mode is not necessary in WXPP – BigAl has noted that above.

The new information I’ve gained from this whole long thread is that not only are you able to disable the built-in Administrator account (if you have another account with admin rights on the machine), but it’s desirable from a security standpoint. Personally, I’m in the situation that I have to have admin privileges on my daily user account due to a few programs that sync with my Treo – I don’t like it from a virus/trojan protection standpoint, but unfortunately I’m stuck. I’ve gone ahead and disabled my built-in Administrator account and feel somewhat more comfortable.

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Hi Keely ~

You noted that you created additional users from the built-in account for daily use. Are these Admin rights or Limited accounts? Now, you personally haven’t disabled your built-in account as you say you need admin privs. Don’t you get admin privs w/ the daily user account that holds admin rights?

I understand now it is desirable to disable the built-in account for security reasons. Are daily user accounts w/ admin rights more secure or just as vulnerable as the built-in admin account?

What exactly does it mean when you have ‘disabled’ the built-in Admin account or daily user accounts w/ admin rights? Does this mean you cannot gain access through this account anymore? If you have a serious issue, how do you get back in to the account to wield the rights of that account if need be?

I apologize for the seemingly endless series of queries, but there does not seem to be a clear definition held by anyone regarding the confusingly similar-named account types and the manner in which they should or are preferred to be structured and the MSKB certainly doesn’t lend itself well to clarity either. This, I feel, is an important aspect of XP to know and understand.

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Let me try to be more clear.

1. When I installed XP, I had “Administrator” = built-in administrator account with adminstrator privileges.
2. I added a few user accounts, all of which had limited privileges, including “Keely”.
3. I used “Keely” on a daily basis for work, and used the 2x CTRL+ALT+DEL technique or RunAs… to install programs.
4. I later needed to have adminstrator privileges on my daily user account because some PalmOS software requires it when syncing (Adobe Acrobat Reader for PalmOS is one example), so I made that change.
5. Recently, while logged on as “Keely” with administrator privileges, I disabled the built-in Administrator account – for instructions on to accomplish this, try this MSKB article.

When it comes to the relative vulnerability of the built-in Administrator account and user accounts with administrative privileges, I think that both are equally vulnerable to trojans that want to wreak havoc with system files that a person with limited privleges could not modify. I read somewhere that I now can’t recall that a hacker’s first stop when trying to gain access to a system from the outside is to try finding a password for an account named “Administrator”. My understanding is that by disabling this account, which yes, by definition means a person can’t use it, is just another puny little step that can be taken.

If I had serious issues and needed to get back into the account, I would use the user account I’ve granted admin privileges. Only a user with admin privileges can change privileges for its own account and for other users, right? Otherwise, I would use the back door account that DaveA recommended in this post. I thought DaveA had done a good job in answering very similar questions of yours there.

I think a good deal of confusion exists as to the role of Adminstrators because Microsoft cannot fathom that a person in a non-domain-controlled environment could possibly ever use WinXP Pro, and would by definition use WinXP Home. Sophisticated users running home, home office or small business offices in a P2P setup seem to be completely off their radar screen.

Bruce, unless you go out there an take a course, I think you’re just going to have to satisfied by an operational understanding of what the accounts mean. Beating your head against a wall for a more esoteric understanding seems to be a poor use of time – unless you’ve got a lot more than the rest of us do. In any event, this is the best that I can do.

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Hi, Keely ~

Thanks for your reply.

Two questions:

If the built-in Admin account and daily user account with admin privs are the same, then the only thing to gain by disabling the built-in account is blocking an intruder seeking out the ‘Administrator’ named built-in account……is this correct?

You said “I would use the user account I’ve granted admin privileges…..Otherwise, I would use the back door account……” The post you referred to is very unclear and in fact, non sequitur, in lines 5 and 6. The ‘back door’ account…..is this not just a second user account you’ve granted admin privs?

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If the built-in Admin account and daily user account with admin privs are the same, then the only[/i] thing to gain by disabling the built-in account is blocking an intruder seeking out the ‘Administrator’ named built-in account……is this correct?

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[/indent]I guess so. Like I said, this is the extent of my knowlege, the best I can do, it’s all I’ve got.[indent]

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You said “I would use the user account I’ve granted admin privileges…..Otherwise, I would use the back door account……” The post you referred to is very unclear and in fact, non sequitur[/i], in lines 5 and 6. The ‘back door’ account…..is this not just a second user account you’ve granted admin privs?

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[/indent]You asked how I would get back into the computer if I had disabled the built-in adminstrator account. My reply was that I would use my user account with admin privileges or a back door account as described in DaveA’s post that I previously hyperlinked. I understood his post, and since his advice directly led to my change in practice on my computer, there seems to be a logical progression from DaveA’s post to my replies here (that would be the opposite of non sequitur for the rest of us).

How else do I say it? If I got to the point where I was going to do something risky, I’d first create the backdoor admin account that DaveA described as a backstop if I messed up my user admin account. That gives me two accounts through which I can (hopefully) repair problems. It’s true that I haven’t yet created that account – I’ve been a little busy lately and I haven’t been doing a lot of really risky things on my computer – maybe that’s where you’re confused.

How about a chart.

1. Administrator (built-in) = admin privileges = disabled
2. Keely = admin privileges = daily use
3. BackDoor = admin privileges = hopefully never to be used, haven’t created it just yet, but I will when I feel it’s necessary
4. User2 = limited privileges
5. User3 = limited privileges

…and so on. Does that help?

If you want something better than these equivocal answers, you’ll have to go somewhere else than Woody’s Lounge. Since I’m now repeating myself, I think we’ve also exhausted this thread.

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Bruce –

Just further to Keely’s post, it makes good security sense to disable the built-in account named Administrator. Why? Because if I were planning to hack into a Windows NT based computer, that’s the first thing I’d look for – it exists on all Windows NT based systems and is an obvious target. Sure, you still have an account with Admin privileges – you have to, to perform certain functions – but why make life easier for those who would intrude? Make them work to gain access. Chances are fairly high that they will give up and choose an easier target.

I realize you may have come to that conclusion on your own – but it bears repeating for those who haven’t.

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Ah, but you don’t have to disable it. From the Computer Management Console, if you click on the Administrator, or any other account, with the other mouse button, which results in a popup menu. Select ‘Rename’. The login name can be changed.

On my machine, I do this for all accounts. The reason is security. A hacker that may have your login has an easier time hacking if your folder names are known.

First, I always set up to have two admin accounts including the (renamed) default. The reason for this is that occasionally an account profile gets hosed. (You can tell by unusually long login times and frequent crashes of applications, especially Explorer.) When an account is first logged into a directory (folder structure) is created in “Documents and Settings”. The name of the folder is the same as the login. After the account is logged into and then exited, I log in w/ an admin account and change the login.

By the way, I also change all the std account names (i.e. Documents and Settings, Program Files, WinXP). Then set them as hidden so directory listing doesn’t show them.

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Thank you, Joe, for letting me know I am not crazy

I am able to rename the default Admin account, I am able to change the password of the default Admin account, and it does appear in my control panel. Regardless of the reason, others may or may not be enabled to do the same.

Since there is no difference between user accounts w/ admin privs and the default Admin account, the only gain to be had by disabling it is to stave off intruders seeking access via this account due to the known name. Simply changing the name of this Admin account with strong password protection relegates it to the ranks of the regular user accounts w/ admin privs which and is no less inherently secure than these user accounts.

The bottom line is you have one less account to create in addition to x number of accounts initiated, one less account to manage, no requisite disabling/re-enabling when applicable, and the gain of proactive control.

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Hers are a few items to think about:

If you rename the built-in local Administrator account and then attempt to log on to Recovery Console, you are still prompted for the password for the account named Administrator.

Your account has been disabled. Please see your system administrator. Error Message: Your account has been disabled. Please see your system administrator. Explanation: The administrator of this workstation has disabled this user account.
Note, when this happens you will need the “Administrator” account to act as the administrator. If you have renamed the administrator account and are using it , you will need to do a “Repair” on your system.

After you log on as an administrator to a computer that is not a member of a domain, when you double-click User Accounts in Control Panel to change the password for the built-in Administrator account, the Administrator account may not appear.

Error Message: Your account has been disabled. Please see your system administrator. Explanation: The administrator of this workstation has disabled this user account. User Action: See your administrator to have your account reenabled. See above

Error Message: Your account has expired. Please see your system administrator. Explanation: The system administrator determines how long you have an account on a workstation, and yours has expired. User Action: Contact the administrator. See above

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

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Hi, Al ~
I wasn’t sleeping in (at least not as a result of this weekend), but just ran short of time in getting back here .

How did you change your welcome screen to the classic method of logon? The only way I know is the way Keely describes above. When I access that window, I get my only my name and an area to receive the password.

Actually, I use a custom logon screen that I edited in the beta version of LogonStudio.

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Control Panel, Users, Change The Way Users Logon, yields this screen:

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Al ~

Boy, what a dunce I am! I looked at that window 50 times but skipped the smaller text. I kept looking for ‘Classic logon prompt‘ or similar looking heading!

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