You can recover your password with a special program called OPHcrack that cracks and gives you all user passwords to any Windows computer.
Assuming that the computer that you want to get the passwords for is locked out (because you need the password to get in the admin account where you could install OPHcrack), there is a LiveCD version of OPHcrack that runs your OPHcrack on your computer without loading up Windows.
You will also need an alternate computer to download the necessary files and create the CD. The computer with the unknown Admin password (the one we are fixing) will be reffered to as Computer A and the alternate computer will be reffered to as Computer B. Please note that Computer B must have a CD Burner.
1) First, get a blank CD-ROM. If you do not have a blank CD-ROM, you can usually get a 10 disc pack at your local OfficeMax, Staples, Best Buy, Fry's, etc. For about $5-10 USD.
2) On Computer B, download Active@ ISO Burner (
software.lsoft.net and install it.
3) Insert 1 blank CD-ROM into the drive of Computer B.
4) Download the ISO file for OPHcrack on Computer
B here:
downloads.sourceforge.net Start up the Active@ ISO Burner. Where the "Source" area is, click on the "..." button and navigate to (and select) the downloaded ISO file. Click "Open".
6) (If Computer B does not have 2 or more CD Burners then skip this step) In the target section, make sure that in the "Target" area the first drop-down menu has the drive with the blank CD selected.
7) Click "Burn". Burning the disk may take a while, so wait until the ISO Burner software says that the burning is completed. Once it is completed, eject the CD from the CD Burner (if you have a Sharpie, you may want to write "OPHcrack 2.3.1" on it. Of course, this is not necessary and is completely optional)
8) Now, go to Computer A (turn it on if it isn't already). Open the computer's disk drive and place the CD in there. Close the CD-ROM drive and turn the computer off.
9) Set Computer A to boot from the CD-ROM. Look at this guide (on Computer B or by printing it out) to set up Computer A to boot from the CD-ROM:
www.hiren.info Once you have saved the new settings in the BIOS, let the computer boot up. Instead of seeing Windows you should see a title screen for OPHcrack. It should say "Objectif Securite" on the top (don't worry, OPHcrack is English). Hit enter and wait for OPHcrack to boot up. You might see some text flash by, but just sit in your chair and wait for the user interface to load up. OPHcrack's user interface is something like Windows but with a green style to it.
11) Wait. Don't try and click on any windows or anything, OPHcrack will automatically try to get all passwords for the computer.
12) Once OPHcrack gets the all the user passwords for the system, it will display all user passwords for each user in the last column in the table on the topmost window. There might be some weird users that don't appear to be on your system: Ignore these, this is just random stuff that Windows puts there that's not really necessary to know. Write the passwords to all of the accounts down on a peice of paper.
13) Shut down the computer, go in the BIOS, and reset your BIOS so that the first boot device is Hard Drive, like usual. Just follow this guide again (but except of setting it to CD-ROM, set it to Hard Drive instead):
www.hiren.info Save the BIOS settings and allow Windows to come up. Now that you have the passwords, use the recovered password for your admin account. Tada! You should be able to enter the account.
