Can't remember your Administrator password?

Here's a great way to get back in.

Ok so you've lost your administrator password, or you bought a used computer and can't get administrative permissions. What you can do is start up windows explorer as a system service. It's actually not very difficult, and the system account actually has more authority on your system than the administrator does.
Here's the steps to do this: (I put quotes around commands and button presses, do not type in the quotes unless specified.

1. Click on "Start"
2. Click on "Run"
3. Type "cmd" and press "Enter"

No you should be at a "Command Prompt"




I don't know if you can read that but the path on the title bar is "C:\Windows\System32\cmd.exe. This is where the command prompt window program is located.

In the command window it shows another path, this path is where you are looking in the windows directories. It should say: C:\Windows\Documents and Settings\user
We need to be at C:\Windows.
You will need to change directories. You do that by using the cd command (change directory)
Type "cd .." and press enter. Repeat that until you are at: C:\Windows
If you want to you can actually jump as many as you want.
Say I was in C:\Windows\Program Files\Adobe\Images\Photos and I wanted to get back to C:\Windows , I would type "cd ..\..\..\.." and press "Enter"
Ok now that we are in the proper directory let's take the next steps. Look at what time it is and make sure that the time you put in the next step is at least 1 minute ahead of the current time, and you will also need to make sure to use the 24 hour format.

• Type "at 24:00 /interactive "cmd.exe" With the quotes this time.
  

What we did was used the "at" command which does things at a certain time. In this case 12 midnight or 24:00. We also added the /interactive switch. This will do whatever we specify as a local system account. In this case it will run "cmd.exe" as the local sysem.
Now wait until the time and a new command line window will pop up. Go ahead and look in your taskmanager "right click on the taskbar and choose taskmanager". In processes you will now see 2 cmd.exe's are going. One will be running as the user you are logged in as, and one will be the running as "local system". This is exactly what you want. Go ahead and close the first command interface you opened as a user, but leave the new one and the taskmanager open.

• In the taskmanager under the processes tab, look for "explorer.exe"
• Right click and select "end process"
  

This will kill Windows Explorer and your desktop icons, taskbar, and start button will disappear.
That's ok, cause it exactly what we want to see. Now in the "local system command window"

• Type "cd .." till you are at the "C:\Windows" directory
  
• Type "explorer.exe"
  

Now all the sudden your start button and taskbar will return. If you look at your task manager "processes" tab, you will see explorer.exe is running as the local system.

• Click start>run>type "compmgmt.msc" This will open an mmc console.
• Click on "local users and groups"
  
• Then right click "administrator"
• Select "set password"
• Type in your new admin password.
• Restart and logon as User: administrator Password: Whatever you picked.

This will not work on XP home I don't think, because I believe home doesn't have an mmc console, but I could be wrong. Please only use this for legitimate purposes. Have fun.