WinXP Temp & Standard accounts

[Gondor]

Temp account and standard accounts...

Hey all, a friend of mine is running WinXP and his computer is completely screwed up.. I have been trying to help him fix it since the beginning of the year and its still messed. Its not just WinXP that is messed, its just about anything we put on it, but we have replaced the RAM, the hard drive, removed his extra video card and more... Now, in winxp when he logs in, it logs him in on a temporary account because the system has lost his administrator and user account, is there any way to restore those?

His Specs:
ABIT KT7A board
1.3 GHz Athlon
256 meg of PC133 Crucial RAM
40 gig Maxtor HD on the Promise 133 hard drive controller

 

[Phantasm66]

if its just a lost password

well, apart from actually reinstalling there is a linux hack disk which can be used to retrieve lost administrative passwords, if that is what you want to do.

i can send you a file, which, when used with the rawrite or windows command prompt tool can create a bootable linux floppy.... you then follow the instructions to change the administrative password for your XP box....

if you contact me on phantazmm@hotmail.com I will see if I can send you this file. perhaps you should arrange a time to be on the 3DS IRC channel and I can send the stuff you will need to you over that. 3DS IRC is on starchat network, #3dspotlight. or i will leave the file with the other regulars and one of them can give it to you if you miss me due to time differences.

don't worry i will get this file to you.

if the administrative account is actually gone
then you might have a bigger problem. things are probably that badly messed up, though, that even a normal account might be able to create a new administrator account and add it to the administrators group using the users and group section of the windows management console (right click my computer, manage....)

to be honest, a complete reinstallation is probably your best idea. i think you have a number of problems....

you could try copying the "default user" profile from "Documents and Settings" into the "administrator" profile folder using windows explorer.... it might be that you only have a damaged profile. or try deleting the administrator folder in documents and settings again and try logging in....

but if the account is completely damaged and unusable, not just the profile or a lost password, i think you may have had it and might have to completely reinstall...