Can't Remeber Password for Admin User Account

Our old church secretary changed her password for her user account, and she can't remember it. The problem is that her account is set as the administrator for the computer, and all the printers are run through her account, etc.

We have sat down with her for hours and have tried every word that could have been the password, with caps, with no caps; all to no avail.

There is very important documents that are needed, so re-installing the operating system is our last option on the list. Is there any type of program out there that we can use to let us access her account?

Her operating system is Windows XP. I can give more details on the computer if needed.

Hi Jack,

Thanks for the help. I've actually checked out both the above sites in the past couple of days, and they were really helpful.

I was just wondering if anyone could vouch for any programs.

Thanks again!

I've never used any of these particular programs, although I have used similar ones in the past to reset the password on a Windows 2000 PC. The first link that I sent looks totally safe as it doesn't alter anything on your PC. It just copies the password file to a floppy disk, which they will then decrypt for you (either at a cost or for free if you can wait 3 days). This seems perfectly safe to me - at the possible risk of receiving mailings from them in future.

The other solutions - which reset the password - are in principle safe enough, but they do write to your disk. Therefore there is a possibility, however remote, that something could get messed up. That's why I suggested trying the first suggestion if your data is irreplaceable.

The next step I would suggest, once you've got things working again, is to devise a backup strategy to regularly copy important files somewhere else for safe keeping. Next time you might be faced with a corrupted hard disk - then you really will be in trouble!