XP Password Recovery/Outlook Express Dictionary problem

[NeverNeverland]

My friend has 2 questions and I thought you guys might know the answers!


#1

So, my little 12 year old niece just called me in tears. Apparently she was messing around with setting a password on her new laptop and "accidentally" set a password that she does not know, or does not remember.

Does anybody know of any easy way to reset or recover the administrator password? I know that's asking a lot, but I thought it wouldn't hurt.


#2:

Briefly... my word expired, got new 2007, now my spell check for outlook express (word spell check is fine) is in FRENCH and FRENCH is the only option. WTF? Anyone?

Thanks

[Joe User 99]

My friend has 2 questions and I thought you guys might know the answers!


#1

So, my little 12 year old niece just called me in tears. Apparently she was messing around with setting a password on her new laptop and "accidentally" set a password that she does not know, or does not remember.

Does anybody know of any easy way to reset or recover the administrator password? I know that's asking a lot, but I thought it wouldn't hurt.

If she "thinks" she remembers it, make sure she has checked that things like the capslock weren't set when she set the password, etc.

If it's a brand new laptop, it should probably have a restore cd which will wipe the HD and restore it to like when it came out of the box.

If not, there are ways (it it's XP. If it's Vista, I don't know that anyone has released a password recovery tool yet or not) , but I don't want to get into debating the legality of those tools. But remember, Google is your friend.

#2:

Briefly... my word expired, got new 2007, now my spell check for outlook express (word spell check is fine) is in FRENCH and FRENCH is the only option. WTF? Anyone?

DOH!
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/932974/en-us

[figment1986]

whats the password set on, screen saver or the full name.

how new is the laptop?

[NeverNeverland]

I believe it's brand new, like a week or so.
Don't understand the PW question.

[figment1986]

I believe it's brand new, like a week or so.
Don't understand the PW question.

I thought all Brand new PCs shipped with vista now... oh well,

You can set up your screen saver to create a password prompt. this is independent from logging in / starting a computer.

if thats the case reboot and un-check the option, if its on the name itself. I don't know what to do. Microsoft might have something in their main site.

[NeverNeverland]

Well, maybe it has Vista. I don't know - what you saw was all my friend told me

[Jerren]

I would suggest trying Winternals Administrator's Pack. Or taking it to a shop that has it, you can boot from the Winternals CD and simply reset any password on the box. If you want to buy it it runs around $1,500 but is basically the swiss army knife for recovering PC's that are non-bootable. I have gotten more than my money's worth out of it over the past few years.

In a pinch you call them and order the software with a live person, they then email you a link to download the software and a 30 day temporary license key in an hour or so while they overnight the software to you.

You will need a spare PC with Internet access and a CD burner to make the boot disk or you can wait for the package in the mail.

From the company's web site: http://www.winternals.com/Products/AdministratorsPak/Default.aspx

Administrator's Pak is a complete suite of powerful, versatile tools that allow you to repair unbootable or locked-out systems, restore lost data, remove malware from infected systems while the system is safely offline using your existing antivirus software, and diagnose system and network issues. Administrator's Pak includes ERD Commander 2005, Remote Recover, Crash Analyzer Wizard, FileRestore, Filemon Enterprise Edition, Regmon Enterprise Edition, AD Explorer, Insight for Active Directory, and TCP Tools.