How do I gain administrative access to a secondhand computer?

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There is one more easy way to get in without using any special access software.

Microsoft in its infinite wisdom does not set the password for the administrator account when it is installed. It just hides this account from general access. But then provides an easy way to access it. In fact two ways. If the seller of that computer is naive enough to leave the data on the disk, it is likely that he/she has not set this most important password. Take a chance on this one, after fully understanding the risks involved in accessing the system.

1. Boot in safe mode. That shows the Administrator account along with the other user account. And you are in....

2. Another way to get to the Administrator account is: Log off from the regular account and get to the log-on screen that lists all users. Here enter the keys ctrl-alt-del twice. A logon dialog pops up. Enter Administrator as username, no password and you are in....

Of course if this password is set, then the utility Leo mentions does the trick.

This worked for me. I shut down the PC, turned off all power and waited about 40 minutes for the capacitors to discharge then removed the battery.
After an hour, I replaced the battery, hooked up and restarted the PC and "VOILA!" no Administrator password!

There is one very good reason to be able to access the administrator account on a used computer, depending on the rights have been set for other user accounts on the machine. You may need to recover the install key for Windows and other installed software from that computer before doing a clean install by first installing and using a key-finder utility like "Magical Jelly Bean Finder." If the ability to install software on the computer has been restricted to the administrator account, then access to that account will be necessary to accomplish this task.

Re: 'I shut down the PC, turned off all power and waited about 40 minutes for the capacitors to discharge then removed the battery.'

That process has no effect on the OS password for the admin account. The OS password is data written on the disk. It is not a CMOS/BIOS issue to be addressed by defeating the CMOS/BIOS password (what the process above is doing).

A tech once told me to short out the speaker and you are in. He used this tech when repairing pcs.

intresting....they all do work...but not in all cases...so give this a try:
.1.google..and searche for ophcrack live cd..burn it...and log in to it..and just exit...while exiting...all admin passwords and names will pop out ;) very easy and no swette.
.2. that is a bit tricky...but nice..but also require some command knowleges..so what to do:...while ur in the user(not admin)...locate the screen saver path and copy there the cmd.exe (command promp) and set it up!!!! well its not that simple but u can make it...
after that reboot...and dnt loggin just wait for the screen saver(replaced by command prompt)..and start surfing with admin priv.....
gd luck..;)

A neighbour called me one time. She bought someones computer that was password protected. To bypass it I just booted up in safe mode, went into the user accounts, created a new account for her - as administrator, restarted the computer - to make sure she could sign in and then deleted the old account.

You don't need to be a hacker to get pass this.

http://www.geocities.com/terryhollett2003/

Remember, that once the computer is yours, any information on it is yours now, too. Any information. Including all that child porn which the previous owner had downloaded. Something to think about when those nice friendly FBI agents come bashing in your door wearing bulletproof vests and carrying assault rifles in a no-knock raid at 5:00 in the morning...

Hey! Maybe reformatting that drive and reinstalling from scratch isn't such a bad idea after all!!!

Hello. I found this article about administrator very interesting. When we bought our laptop some years ago, without knowing what was happening I filled in all details asked for and put in a password. All of our family members have their own details but none of us know what the first password was. (I am in my 70's and not a computer person). All of what you have written seems very difficult to do. Is it?

The "right way" is the safest way - I mean what would you do if the PC had a key logger or FBI-arrest-and-jail-you-forever porn still on it? During a "right way" reinstall you will probably need the Windows Product Key - if there's no Genuine Label on the PC (its on the case, right?) then run Produkey or Magical Jelly Bean to get the in-use key for the re-installation. Good Luck and buy your boyfriend a beer to do the installation!

Now that we've said that you can skip a lot of trouble by doing a "right way" disk wipe and then installing Knoppix on your laptop (which is free of legal encumbrances and has lots of the newest drivers) and is much faster on startup. Or use an Ubuntu Live CD if its a plain pc! Yay Free Software!

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