Forgot Win2000 admin password - way to recover?

[Rav3n]

So, I setup this computer with win2k on it, and everything was fine. Made some small user accounts - made them crippled of course - and put a nice little password on the admin account so no one messed up the computer. I wanted to install netscape 7 (for kicks). I realized that I forgot what the stupid password was for the admin account, and now I can't install netscape. I don't care that i can't install netscape, but I do care that I can't access the admin account.

I ABSOLUTELY DO NOT want to reformat, or install another copy of windows... what to do? any ideas? links? suggestions?

 

[TheVrolok]

Depending on your user rights, you might be able to pull that "make a copy of the cmd.exe and temporarily replace the logon.scr(logon screensaver, I think that's what it's called) with it and just wait a few mins at the logon screen for the cmd prompt to pop up and then try using the net command to add a new admin user with admin access" approach.. that might accomplish what you need. I know there are other ways to do it, that came to mind first tho.. If you need specifics I'm sure you can search for a site based on what I've said, I know they're out there. Good luck h@X0ring your system.

 

[Lord Evermore]

Yeah, the search feature.

Luckily there are ways to fix it, since otherwise you'd be screwed if you absolutely didn't want to reinstall and that was the only way.

 

[Rav3n]

Awesome... sounds like I am on my way to hacking my computer!!! I mean... recovering my computer.

 

[jackschmittusa]

There was a password cracking program shown on The Screen Savers tv show last night but I can't get on their site this morning to link to it.

 

[Rav3n]

Did some research, found that there a few apps which create bootable floppy disks, and wipeout the SAM files that windows creates, and resets them. Lots of source code around the net on how to make programs like that - pretty spiffy. Thanks for all the help!

 

[Phalnix]

um i thought sam was only on nt 4 and previous. wink2k has different password storage which is kerberos

 

[redbeard1]

This is the one from the screen savers show.

Trial cracker

 

[bsobel]

Originally posted by: Phalnix
um i thought sam was only on nt 4 and previous. wink2k has different password storage which is kerberos

Kerberos is an authentication protocol, not a password storage mechanism.
Bill

 

[howdyduty]

Search Google for 'NTAccess' and look for the linux boot disk to reset the admin password. Good Luck.

 

[nemaNIN]

ERD Commander is a nifty little shell that boots off a cd and forces access to all your NTFS stuff even when you're PC is totally shot. i screwed up my laptop by undoing a PM partition move and couldn't even begin to boot. ERD commander let me in!

It also has a password cracker that i havent used, but have heard good things about.

serach for it on imesh or whatever.