Windows 7 Password Reset

By Gerowen
in Microsoft (Windows)

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Grand Master

Gerowen

Posted
Posted

I have a lady's computer and she's asked me to do some maintenance. She had forgotten her password. I've been unable to log into her account, and the local Administrator user doesn't show up even under Safe Mode. I've used chntpw from my Linux computer, I've used ERD Commander 2005, and I used password-changer. On all of these I set it just to "clear" the password. After using password-changer, the user account appears broken because now instead of just getting told it's the wrong password, I get "The parameter is incorrect". The computer is running Windows 7 Home Premium. What can I do to get logged into any account on the computer? Even creating a new one via some 3rd party software or SOMETHING just so I can get logged in to do the things she originally wanted me to do.

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https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/998748-windows-7-password-reset/
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Grand Master

Seizure1990

Posted
Posted

OPHcrack takes ****ing forever to recover passwords. It's PURELY a cracking tool, since the only reason you'd need it is to break into a computer without the owner knowing. As opposed to...

outright clearing/editing it in seconds with offline password changer

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

Grand Master

Gerowen

Posted
  • Author
Posted

I've tried all these tools. I even booted the "Repair Your Computer" option and ran the command prompt, then used:

net user Administrator /active:yes

And when I try to log into the Administrator account manually I still get told it's disabled. I'm not quite sure what else I can do.

Mentor

JonathanVP

Posted
Posted

First, ask for sexual favors and then help her out!

Seriously, I had this same issue. The below procedure works but you need to create a bootable USB before resetting the password.

http://4sysops.com/archives/forgot-the-administrator-password-the-sticky-keys-trick/

Grand Master

Seizure1990

Posted
Posted

Did you remember to save the file in NT Password Editor? There's a final question at the end where it asks if you'd like to actually write the changes to the file. The changes are only theoretical until then, and if you quit without saving, nothing will happen.

Grand Master

sc302 Veteran

Posted
  • Veteran
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The account "administrator" is disabled by default in vista/win7. You need to make another account that has admin rights or you need to clear the password on the existing account. I would not recommend enabling the admin account. She didn't tell you the password and wants you to fix what is wrong, reset the password to her account.

hirens boot disk has some great password reset utilities in it.

Grand Master

Gerowen

Posted
  • Author
Posted
  On 20/05/2011 at 16:27, sc302 said:

The account "administrator" is disabled by default in vista/win7. You need to make another account that has admin rights or you need to clear the password on the existing account. I would not recommend enabling the admin account. She didn't tell you the password and wants you to fix what is wrong, reset the password to her account.

hirens boot disk has some great password reset utilities in it.

I tried using hiren's from a Falcon 4 disk and it seemed broken, I'll see if I can track down a standalone copy. I'm thinking that one of these tools has corrupted the SAM file or something. Now when I boot one of the utilities, they all have "Clear Password" ticked on her account, but it still says "Invalid Parameter" if I try entering no password. If I enter a password it just says wrong username/password. Also on almost all of them now the last letter of her username has been either clipped off or replaced with a strange character.

Grand Master

sc302 Veteran

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  On 20/05/2011 at 22:29, Seizure1990 said:

Just FYI, Hiren's is an illegal compilation. That particular utility, which you can get stand-alone, is not.

What is illegal about it?

Everything has been replaced that was illegal. Perhaps the windows pe environment...oh wait that is free too.

How to build a pe environment:

http://www.nu2.nu/pebuilder/

Whats needed:

The files from your Windows Installation CD-Rom.

Supported Windows versions are:

Windows XP Home Edition (must be slip streamed with Service Pack 1 or higher)

Windows XP Professional (must be slip streamed with Service Pack 1 or higher)

Windows Server 2003, Web Edition

Windows Server 2003, Standard Edition

Windows Server 2003, Enterprise Edition

PE Builder runs on Windows 2000/XP/2003/BartPE systems.

CD/DVD writer if you want to creat a bootable CD/DVD.

Or if you have an oem pack, it comes with the kit to make a windows pe environment.

Grand Master

Seizure1990

Posted
Posted
  On 20/05/2011 at 23:12, sc302 said:

What is illegal about it?

Everything has been replaced that was illegal.

Doesn't the latest copy still have Active Password Changer, which is pay software? Also HDD Regenerator. Are those demo versions? I've seen them in action, and they seemed full-featured to me.

Grand Master

sc302 Veteran

Posted
  • Veteran
Posted
  On 20/05/2011 at 23:19, Seizure1990 said:

Doesn't the latest copy still have Active Password Changer, which is pay software? Also HDD Regenerator. Are those demo versions? I've seen them in action, and they seemed full-featured to me.

You tell me. Going by the change logs they got rid of a lot of their pirated software in 11.0. 10.6 log was the last version that mentions that software.

http://www.hirensbootcd.org/hbcd-v132/

Hard Disk Tools

?Active Kill Disk 4.1.2393: Securely overwrites and destroys all data on physical drive (Dos Freeware).

?Darik?s Boot and Nuke (DBAN) 1.0.7: Completely deletes the contents of any hard disk it can detect (Linux Freeware).

?DiskView 2.4: To view graphical map of your disk, allowing you to check where a file is located or, by clicking on a cluster, seeing which file occupies it (Windows Freeware).

?DiskWipe 1.2: Securely erases the contents of a disk replacing it with random data or leaving the drive completely blank (Windows Freeware).

?ExcelStor?s ESTest 4.50: ExcelStor hard disk diagnostic utility (Dos Freeware).

?Fujitsu HDD Diagnostic Tool 7.00: To check IDE drives for possible defects/problems (Dos Freeware).

?Fujitsu IDE Low Level Format 1.0: Low Level Format Tool for Fujitsu Drives (Dos Freeware).

?Gateway GwScan 5.12: Gateway hard drive diagnostic utility (Dos Freeware).

?Hard Disk Sentinel 1.00.5: Hard Disk health, performance and temperature monitoring tool (Dos Freeware).

?HDAT2 4.53: The main function is testing and repair (regenerates) bad sectors for detected devices. A freeware alternative of HDD Regenerator. (Dos Freeware)

?HDD Capacity Restore 1.2: This tool allows you to restore factory capacity of any hard drive. it does not read from or write to the user data area or perform any kind of formatting, only alters HDD firmware (HPA and DCO settings) (Windows Freeware).

?HDD Erase 4.0: Secure erase using a special feature built into most newer hard drives (Dos Freeware).

?HDD Low Level Format Tool 2.36: Low-level format tool for S-ATA (SATA), IDE (E-IDE), SCSI, USB, Flash Cards and FIREWIRE external drive enclosures (Windows Freeware).

?HDD Scan 3.3: HDDScan is a Low-level HDD diagnostic tool, it scans surface find bad sectors etc (Windows Freeware).

?HDTune 2.55: HD Tune is a hard disk health, benchmarking, error scanner and information tool (Windows Freeware).

?IBM Hitachi Drive Fitness Test 4.16: Quickly and reliably tests SCSI, IDE and SATA drives (Dos Freeware).

?IBM Hitachi Feature Tool 2.15: Allows you to control some of the features of the the HDD (Dos Freeware).

?Maxtor amset utility 4.0: Utility for changing Acoustic Management on the hard drives (Dos Freeware).

?Maxtor Low Level Formatter 1.1: Maxtor?s Low Level Format Utility works on any harddrive (Dos Freeware).

?Maxtor PowerMax 4.23: Designed to perform diagnostic read/write verifications on Maxtor/Quantum hard drives (Dos Freeware).

?MHDD 4.6: Precise diagnostic of the mechanical part of a drive, perform Low-level format, Bad Sector Sepair, access raw sectors, manage S.M.A.R.T (SMART) and other drive parameters such as acoustic management, security, Host Protected Area, etc. (Dos Freeware).

?Samsung Disk Diagnose (SHDIAG) 1.28: To diagnose the disk when suspected to have failures (Dos Freeware).

?Samsung ESTOOL 3.01v: Drive Diagnostic, Automatic Acoustic Management, Enable/Disable SMART etc (Dos Freeware).

?Samsung HDD Utility(HUTIL) 2.10: The Drive Diagnostic Utility (Dos Freeware).

?SeaTools for Dos: GUI 2.23 Text 1.10 versions to test Seagate or Maxtor Parallel ATA (PATA and IDE) and Serial ATA (SATA) interface disc drives (Dos Freeware).

?SmartUDM 2.00: Hard Disk Drive S.M.A.R.T. Viewer (Dos Freeware).

?Toshiba Hard Disk Diagnostic 2.00b: Toshiba hard drive diagnostic utility (Dos Freeware).

?Victoria 3.33e and 3.52rus: A freeware program for low-level HDD diagnostics (Dos Freeware).

?Victoria 4.46: Universal program for testing storage devices (Windows Freeware).

?ViVard 1.0: HDD low-level diagnostics, Surface test with remap, SMART-attributes etc (Dos Freeware).

?WDClear 1.30: Restore/Erases the drive back to a factory condition (Dos Freeware).

?WDIDLE3 1.05: Modifies the behavior of a Western Digital Green drive to wait longer before positioning the heads in their park position and turning off unnecessary electronics (Dos Freeware).

?Western Digital Data Lifeguard Tools 1.22: To perform drive identification, diagnostics, and repairs on most WD drives (Windows Freeware).

?Western Digital Data Lifeguard Tools 11.2: For the installation of Western Digital EIDE Hard Drives (Dos Freeware).

?Western Digital Diagnostics (DLGDIAG) 5.19: To quickly and efficiently verify the status of the drive (Dos Freeware).

MBR (Master Boot Record) Tools

?BellaVista 1.1.0.54: Formerly BCD Editor with lots of options to configure Windows for a developer (Windows Freeware).

?Boot Partition 2.60: Add Partition in the Windows NT/2000/XP Multi-boot loader (Dos Freeware).

?BootFix Utility: Run this utility if you get ?Invalid system disk? message (Dos Freeware).

?BootICE 0.9.2011.0406: A boot sector manipulation utility to edit MBR/PBR/BCD (Windows Freeware).

?BootSect 6.0.6: Boot Sector Manipulation Tool, This tool replaces FixFAT.exe and FixNTFS.exe (Windows Freeware).

?DiskMan 4.2: All in one tool for cmos, bios, bootrecord and more (Windows/Dos Freeware).

?FbInst 1.6: A tool to create universal flash boot disk that boots from all computers (Windows Freeware).

?grub4dos 2011-03-27: An universal boot loader based on GNU GRUB, can boot off DOS/LINUX or via Windows boot manager/syslinux/lilo or from MBR/CD, builtin BIOS disk emulation (Linux Freeware).

?Grub4Dos installer 1.1: An universal boot loader GRUB for DOS GRLDR installer (Windows Freeware).

?HDHacker 1.4: Load/Save/View MBR and BootSector from a physical/logical drive (Windows Freeware).

?isolinux 4.03: A boot loader for Linux/i386 that operates off ISO 9660/El Torito CD-ROMs in ?no emulation? mode (Linux Freeware).

?MBR SAVE / RESTORE 2.1: BootSave and BootRest tools to save / restore MBR (Dos Freeware).

?MBR Utility 1.05: To manipulate a drive?s master boot record (MBR) via the command line (Windows/Dos Freeware).

?MbrFix 1.3: To backup, restore, fix the boot code in the MBR (Windows/Dos Freeware).

?MBRTool 2.3.200: Backup, verify, restore, edit, refresh, remove, display, re-write and more (Dos Freeware).

?MBRWizard 3.0.73: Directly update and modify the Master Boot Record (Windows/Dos Freeware).

?MBRWork 1.08: A utility to perform some common and uncommon MBR functions (Dos Freeware).

?MemDisk 4.03: To allow booting legacy operating systems, floppy images, hard disk images and some ISO images (Linux Freeware).

?PLoP Boot Manager 5.0.11: A small program to boot different operating systems harddisk, floppy, CD/DVD or from USB, it can boot from an USB/CD/DVD even without BIOS support (Linux Freeware).

?RMPrepUSB 2.1.620: Partition and format your USB drive and make it bootable (Windows Freeware).

?Smart Boot Manager 3.7.1: A multi boot manager (Linux/Dos Freeware).

?XOSL 1.1.5: A graphical boot manager that supports multi-booting of various operating systems (Dos Freeware).

Password Tools

?ATAPWD 1.2: Hard Disk Password Utility (Dos Freeware).

?Autologon 3.0: Enables you to easily configure Windows? built-in autologon mechanism, so you don?t have to wait on the login screen (Windows Freeware).

?BIOS Master Password Generator: Collection of password generator tools to reset BIOS Power on Password / Administrator password on Acer, Compaq, Dell, Fujitsu Siemens, Hewlett Packard, Phoenix, Samsung and other generic brand Laptops (Windows Freeware).

?BulletsPassView 1.00: Reveal the passwords stored behind the bullet (asterisk) characters in Windows / IE (Updated Asterisk Logger) (Windows Freeware).

?Content Advisor Password Remover 1.01: It Removes Content Advisor Password from Internet Explorer (Windows Freeware).

?IE PassView 1.26: It allows you to view username and passwords saved by Internet Explorer (Windows Freeware).

?Kon-Boot 1.0: To bypass Login Password of Windows (32bit, any password) and Linux login as kon-usr (Linux Freeware).

?LicenseCrawler 1.2.0.98: Find the license keys and serial numbers of your programs (Windows Freeware).

?Mail PassView 1.73: Recovers mail passwords of Outlook Express, MS Outlook, IncrediMail, Eudora, etc (Windows Freeware).

?MessenPass 1.42: A password recovery tool that reveals the passwords of several instant messangers (Windows Freeware).

?NTPWD: Utility to reset windows nt/2000/xp administrator/user password (Dos Freeware).

?NTPWEdit 0.3: Password editor for Windows NT based systems to change or remove passwords for local system accounts (Windows Freeware).

?Offline NT Password Changer 2010-06-27: Utility to reset/unlock windows NT/2000/XP/Vista/7 administrator/user password (Linux Freeware).

?Password Renew 1.1: Utility to set/reset windows NT/2000/XP/Vista/7 (32bit only) passwords (Windows Freeware).

?PasswordFox 1.30: Allows you to view the user names and passwords stored by Mozilla Firefox Web browser (Windows Freeware).

?ProduKey 1.50: Recovers lost the product key of your Windows/Office (Windows Freeware).

?PST (Outlook) Password Recovery 1.16: PstPassword is a small utility that recovers lost password of Outlook .PST (Personal Folders) file (Windows Freeware).

?Router IP/Passwords: The complete list of Default Router Passwords and Default Router IP Addresses, can be useful if you have misplaced the manual or lost your router password (Windows Freeware).

?SniffPass 1.12: A password monitoring tool that listens to your network, capture the passwords that pass through your network adapter, it works on POP3, IMAP4, SMTP, FTP, and HTTP protocols and recovers lost Web/FTP/Email passwords (Windows Freeware).

?WindowsGate 1.1: Enables/Disables Windows logon password validation (Windows Freeware).

?WinKeyFinder 1.73: Allows you to View and Change Windows XP/2003 Product Keys, backup and restore activation related files, backup Microsoft Office 97, 2000 SP2, XP/2003 keys etc (Windows Freeware).

?WirelessKeyView 1.34: Recovers all wireless network keys (WEP/WPA) stored in your computer by WZC Wireless Zero Configuration (Windows Freeware).

?XP Key Reader 2.7: Can decode the XP-key on Local or Remote systems (Windows Freeware).

Grand Master

Gerowen

Posted
  • Author
Posted

So hirens worked for enabling the administrator account, which I then used to fix her account. Weird though because the software looked to be a frontend for chntpw, which I tried from my Debian box without success. Oh well I got it working.

On the topic of things full of pirated software, look up Falcon 4. Some soldier in the military made it and it's loaded with stuff like a full version of ERD, for free. Last time I checked ERD had been discontinued, and was pay software. While I am a huge supporter of the GPL when it's used properly, this guy thought he could protect his pirated stuff by slapping a Linux bootloader on a disc and including a copy of the GPL.

Grand Master

sc302 Veteran

Posted
  • Veteran
Posted

lol....

erd commander still exists, however it is under microsoft now and much harder to pirate being that it isn't in the wild as much as erd was. I have a full install for erd 2005 does not work for newer oses though (vista and 7).

Erd commander is part of this now

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/enterprise/products/mdop/dart.aspx

  Quote
Accelerate IT responsiveness

The toolset helps IT professionals quickly respond to and resolve user issues. Key capabilities include Emergency Repair Disk (ERD) Commander, which boots unresponsive systems into a familiar Windows-like repair environment; Crash Analyzer, which helps determine the most likely cause of a crash; and System Restore, which lets IT staff safely remove changes that could be causing the system to malfunction.

Not bad, falcon 4 was updated 2 years ago....

I haven't used erd2005 in about 2 years. Pointless for new oses.

Grand Master

sc302 Veteran

Posted
  • Veteran
Posted
  On 21/05/2011 at 02:10, TechGuyPA said:

http://www.ubcd4win.com/

I suggest UBCD. Its got all the tools you need built into it by default.

Thats what I use

alex

so does hirens, but you don't need a xp cd to make the cd image. the iso is already made, just download and burn. there are more tools provided in the hirens image, some run in the pe environment some run in the unix environment. it is multiboot. don't bring a knife to a gun fight, bring a bazooka.

Grand Master

Neo003

Posted
Posted

http://windowspasswordrecovery.net/index.html

I *think* this is the software I used to recover my windows 7 password, at the time the trial version only gave the first few charecter which let me to remember what the password was.

or this

http://www.windowspasswordsrecovery.com/product/index.htm (I strongly think this is the one)

Grand Master

+BudMan MVC

Posted
  • MVC
Posted
  On 21/05/2011 at 01:56, CoMMo said:

So hirens worked for enabling the administrator account, which I then used to fix her account. Weird though because the software looked to be a frontend for chntpw, which I tried from my Debian box without success. Oh well I got it working.

Really need to run through a thread people -- before you continue to make suggestions on software.

Grand Master

Neo003

Posted
Posted

Not every time, some users without knowing would make/use only one admin account and they end up having to reinstall the whole damn thing. Windows saves the password in encrypted form in a file name "sam" which is a part it's in system32\config dir, it?s just the matter of clearing the password.

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