passwordwindows
I have a number of Windows XP boxes left in my orgamization from a former system administrator. So I have no administrator passwords. How do I get administrator access to these boxes without reinstalling Windows?
P.S.: There's a neat solution "chroot with live cd" for linux, maybe there's something similar for Windows XP?
We use this : http://sourceforge.net/projects/phppassmanager/ (a little bit modified/tuned)
It's installed on a HTTPS web server with Active Directory authentication to restrict password retrieval to our team. Each member of the team knows a master password used to encrypt all the passwords stored in phppassmanager. They use it when they want to add/modify/read a password. The passwords are stored encrypted in a mysql database.
They potentialy have access to all the passwords but each password decryption is loggued, and the logs are shown to the whole team on the main page. This system is self-monitored and self-managed.
Best Answer
If these PCs are joined to a domain and their computer accounts are still valid, you can login using a domain admin account and reset any local passwords that way.
If they aren't on a domain, or their computer accounts have expired, been delete, etc. then you can try ntpasswd, a bootable utility for resetting passwords. It's Linux-based and has no fancy GUI, but it does work like a charm.