Okay, here's the basic story...my mom just died and I inherited her computer. It's not that great of a computer, but she may have put some stuff on there that I would be interested in reading. My problem is she has windows password protected. I can't figure out how to override or bypass the password. If anyone needs to know, it's Windows XP. Does anyone know a way to get around the password to see what she's got on the computer? Any help is appreciated.

8/20/2006 10:59:14 PM

ntpasswd

8/21/2006 12:20:01 AM

sorry to hear about your mom...

8/21/2006 12:56:40 AM

try rebooting in safe mode and logging onto the default admin account, might not have a password, odds are she didn't make one for it so you might be good to go

8/21/2006 4:08:38 AM

if you just want to read the files on there, a good solution might be knoppix (http://www.knoppix.org/)

it's a cd-sized linux distribution. what that means, basically, is you download the file from that website, burn it onto a cd, and then you can boot into a self contained, fully loaded operating system

you'll be able to access most of the files on the hard drive, and can determine from there if you need to do anything to move them to another computer

that'd be a quick way to just take a peek and what's inside without having to do too much work

8/21/2006 5:28:02 AM

http://www.petri.co.il/forgot_administrator_password.htm

8/21/2006 6:29:02 AM

You have a couple of options:

1) Find a tool/do some Googling on how to recover/crack a Windows password. Unless she was a security nut, should be LANMAN and easy to crack.

2) Easier method is to put her hard drive in another desktop (or external USB case) and get whatever files you need from there.

8/21/2006 7:11:12 AM

ERD Commander

8/21/2006 8:00:35 AM

was there a password "hint"?

& srry to you

8/21/2006 8:05:06 AM

Quote :

"try rebooting in safe mode and logging onto the default admin account, might not have a password, odds are she didn't make one for it so you might be good to go"

You shouldn't have to go through the trouble (long boot time) of booting in safe mode. Just press Ctrl+Alt+Del twice at the login screen to get the traditional Windows 2000 user/pass entry window.

Note: If you have trouble pressing Ctrl+Alt+Del twice simultaneously, just press and hold Ctrl+Alt and while holding those two press Del twice.

8/21/2006 8:16:54 AM

I'd suggest Ophcrack. You simply download it, burn it to a CD, and restart your computer. It will boot into a GUI and automatically display the passwords for all of your user accounts. It takes only a few minutes.

http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/ophcrack/ophcrack-livecd-1.1.1.iso?download

8/21/2006 8:37:09 AM

I've used this

http://home.eunet.no/~pnordahl/ntpasswd/

[Edited on August 21, 2006 at 12:58 PM. Reason : end link in wrong place]

8/21/2006 12:58:07 PM