Geek Pop Quiz:

[theweaselking]

I have in my possession a laptop running Windows XP Home. I know the local administrator password, for the user Administrator.
I know the password for a user account on the machine.
There is a second Administrator account on the machine, to which I do not have the password

The problem:
It's got that abysmally stupid XP-style "choose your user" screen, where you must click on the username you want to use - and local admin isn't one of the options.

Your mission, should you choose to accept it:
Using only user-level access to the machine, either find a way to change that setting to the more traditional user/pass prompt, or find a different way for me to log in using the administrator username and password that I have.

Comments

[cmseward.livejournal.com]

Ctrl-Alt-Del twice at the login screen brings up the WinNT-style login. HTH.

[elffin.livejournal.com]

Yum. I did not know that tidbit. I've always done it the long and hard way - logging in on one of the displayed choices, going to the Control Panel, going to User Accounts, and checking "Require Ctrl-Alt-Del" and then authenticating as local Admin at the prompt.
Oh, the frustration that would have saved.

[cmseward.livejournal.com]

Works for XP Pro, also.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

... which doesn't work if the account you can log in to isn't Administrator.

It's a nice trick.

[elffin.livejournal.com]

XP Pro prompts for the Administrator password, I think. If not, then holding down Shift while right-clicking the User Accounts icon should give you the "Run As" option - I've been using "Run As" since Win2k. Make a shortcut on your desktop to CMD.EXE, go to the properties for it, the Advanced button, and pick "run with different credentials". Anything spawned from that window (like using "start c:\" and then typing "control panel" in the address bar) will run using those credentials as well.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Run As, I should have thought of, too. Another good option!

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

That does. That is, in fact, exactly what I was looking for.

Of course, the guy who actually knew the password for the non-Administrator admin account arrived *right* as I got the email about this post, but it worked anyway.

[cmseward.livejournal.com]

Of course. Help never arrives until after it's no longer critical - it's a law of computing, I think.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Heh. It was neither "help" nor "critical", just the other way around the problem. And it was his laptop, anyway, I was just getting a bad motherboard replaced.

[waterspyder.livejournal.com]

I'm not on XP at this moment, but last time I checked, one admin account is able to alter everything in other admin account.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Absolutely.

But I need to be able to *get in* to one of the admin accounts, first.

I can log in as User, I have the admin password for an account that I can't select, and there is an admin account that I *can* select that I don't have the password for.

Corey's solution (CTRL-ALT-DEL twice to bring up NT-style login) was exactly what I was looking for.

[waterspyder.livejournal.com]

My brain hurts me today.

I understand now.

[flemco.livejournal.com]

As always, I am your fucking messiah of god damned puters.

Go to Safe Mode. You will have a choice to log in as admin.

Yea, verily, and there was a great noise as the unwashed plebes huddled around me, screaming in sheer depraved lust for my semen.

[elffin.livejournal.com]

Safe Mode?

//SAFE MODE//?

BWAHAHAHAHAHAH

The Mighty Flemco is advocating something "SAFE"? PUSSY!

This is priceless. Ye shaell nevah leive these down, Herr GRant! mwahahahahah

[flemco.livejournal.com]

....I have no idea why, but you appearing to be wearing an awful lot of Retarded today, sir.

Yes, it's called Safe Mode. How droll. I also have a primary master and a primary slave on my computer. This does not, in fact, denote any ties to or advocation of slavery, nor does it touch on the topic of BD/SM. My CMOS may sound like a form of kelp, but this is patently not the case. My RAM has neither a stubby tail nor horns.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Did I tell you about the system that wouldn't boot last week? I opened up the case and the RAM fell out. In two pieces.

It kinda looked like a stubby tail and horns, at the break.

[elffin.livejournal.com]

It would not be difficult, Mein Fuhrer. Nuclear reactors could... I'm sorry, Mr. President... nuclear reactors could provide power almost indefinitely.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Safe Mode is *always* and option, but it's using a hammer to kill a fly.

Three-finger salute twice is much more elegant, as is Run As on the user panel.

[flemco.livejournal.com]

This is true.

HOWEVAR

You asked how to have the admin account displayed on the screen, and that is how to do it.

PRAISE TO ME!

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Oh, absolutely, your solution works. Praise and all that.

[ismarc.livejournal.com]

Since you've already been given ctrl+alt+del x 2 and safe mode I'll add a solution to the graphical Playskool login. In order to get rid of the annoying graphical login (which I despise) go into the control panel to "user accounts" and then to "change the way users log on" and uncheck "use the welcome screen". This way you get an actual prompt at startup.

Though it isn't applicable to your problem, for future reference should you ever need it, if you ever lose the Adminstratior password I recommend Petter Nordahl-Hagen's Offline NT Password & Registry Editor (http://home.eunet.no/~pnordahl/ntpasswd/). It's a linux based utility which access the SAM in order to change (or clear) the encrypted passwords, and it's capable of reading ntfs. It's avalable in both floppy and cd images, both bootable.

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

Oh, I know how to change the login procedures, but you can't change that from the user side. You need admin rights to change the way users log on.

And if I don't have the admin password but I have physical access to the machine, I can get it easily enough. What I was looking for was the fastest *easy* way to get what I wanted.