Disabled network setting and now can't logon to PC

jazza77

Hope someone is able to help with this one. A few months back when work was getting rid of PCs I was allowed to take one home for my kids to use.

In the office the pc had been networked, obvioulsy at home it cannot find the network, but we were still able to log on using my user name and password. Kids only used it for non-internet stuff so all was fine.

Last week however I decided to try to set it up to use our wireless router at home, but although the pc was able to see the router it was not able to connect to it.

In network connections I disabled the old (work) network, although the pc still wouldn't connect to our router.

Thinking they could just continue to use the pc without internet in the meantime I logged off. When we cam to try to log on again the pc now does not recognise my user name or password and advises the network could not log me on.

Have tried PC login now and http://pogostick.net/~pnh/ntpasswd/. Neither has worked - the boot cd cannot find the partition with windows xp on the pc.

Any ideas on what can be done short of re-installing XP? My kids are rather upset with me

martinthebandit

Are you trying to connect it wirelessly to the router?

Are you sure it has a wireless card? Was it networked wirelessly at work?

Lucero_2

I assume you were joined to a work domain. Now that the connection has been removed, it appears that the "cached credentials" have been removed too.

Do you still have a "logon" box when you boot the PC? If so, it is possible to log on as the machines "local" administrator.

However, to do this, you need to know the machines name and the local Administrator password.

Now, you might be lucky here. Years ago, there was a massive issue about this "local" Administrator as no one really knew it existed. It meant that, unless the organisation specifically set it, it would effectively remain blank.

If you are lucky enough to be in this position, you just need to know the machine name. You then type that with a \Administrator in the username box and press enter (ie machinename\Administrator).

If that doesn't work, or you don't know the machine name, it's possible to gain access using the recovery CD. I can help you with that later if required.

TakeThis

jazza77 wrote: »

Hope someone is able to help with this one. A few months back when work was getting rid of PCs I was allowed to take one home for my kids to use.

In the office the pc had been networked, obvioulsy at home it cannot find the network, but we were still able to log on using my user name and password. Kids only used it for non-internet stuff so all was fine.

Last week however I decided to try to set it up to use our wireless router at home, but although the pc was able to see the router it was not able to connect to it.

In network connections I disabled the old (work) network, although the pc still wouldn't connect to our router.

Thinking they could just continue to use the pc without internet in the meantime I logged off. When we cam to try to log on again the pc now does not recognise my user name or password and advises the network could not log me on.

Have tried PC login now and http://pogostick.net/~pnh/ntpasswd/. Neither has worked - the boot cd cannot find the partition with windows xp on the pc.

Any ideas on what can be done short of re-installing XP? My kids are rather upset with me

Why not just run a clean install? Make and model of PC? That way you can customise it for your needs.

jazza77

Martin

I was trying to connect wirelessly to the router using wireless usb adapter (which works fine in my other pc). The machine was hard wired at work.

martinthebandit wrote: »

Are you trying to connect it wirelessly to the router?

Are you sure it has a wireless card? Was it networked wirelessly at work?

jazza77

Thanks Lucero - will try that. I am pretty sure I know the pc name. I did try to log on as administrator, however perhaps crucially, I did not include the pc name as per your example. Will let you know how I get on.

Lucero wrote: »

I assume you were joined to a work domain. Now that the connection has been removed, it appears that the "cached credentials" have been removed too.

Do you still have a "logon" box when you boot the PC? If so, it is possible to log on as the machines "local" administrator.

However, to do this, you need to know the machines name and the local Administrator password.

Now, you might be lucky here. Years ago, there was a massive issue about this "local" Administrator as no one really knew it existed. It meant that, unless the organisation specifically set it, it would effectively remain blank.

If you are lucky enough to be in this position, you just need to know the machine name. You then type that with a \Administrator in the username box and press enter (ie machinename\Administrator).

If that doesn't work, or you don't know the machine name, it's possible to gain access using the recovery CD. I can help you with that later if required.

jazza77

TakeThis, I may just have to do a clean install - although I have the windows xp CDs I'm not sure that I have copies of all the software installed on the machine, so was hoping to avoid the need to do a clean install.

The machine is HP Compaq dx2250 running Windows XP Professional SP3.

TakeThis wrote: »

Why not just run a clean install? Make and model of PC? That way you can customise it for your needs.

Lucero_2

Yeah, otherwise you'll be trying to log on as the domain Adminstrator. You'll need the PC Computer name. If you can plug it in to your router, you can often see the name of the machine connected through the router webpage

Anthonis

Emm there is a way, but I don't remember now how. You need UBCD http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/download.html (ultimate boot cd), Download, burn cd, boot this cd, then launch UBCD free dos I think.. It will boot up system which has bunch of tools. There is password reset tool, it will show you username of system. There is also registry editor, so you can find all info or edit something. If somebody would tell where in registry is machine name, then you could just reset password and login normally without any reinstalling or loosing apps....