Posts Tagged ‘free windows password reset’

Reset Windows 8 or 7 Password with the Freeware NTPasswd

July 3rd, 2015 by Admin

“My laptop was installed with Windows 7 with only one account, but no reset disk was created. Now I had forgotten my administrator password and don’t know how to reset it.

Had tried Ophcrack to burn its ISO into a flash drive, but failed to recover my password. Is there any way to reset my password without formatting my whole system disk?”

Fortunately, if you have lost your Windows password, there are several approaches you can take for either recovering or resetting the forgotten password. In this tutorial we’ll show you how to reset Windows 8 or 7 password with the freeware NTPasswd (Offline NT Password & Registry Eidtor). NTPasswd is a small Linux tool that allows you to reset Windows admin/user password on a computer where you forgot your password.

How to Reset Windows 8 or 7 Password with NTPasswd?

  1. First go to the official website of NTPasswd and grab a copy of the bootable CD image. To install NTPasswd onto a blank CD, Right-click on the ISO file and then click “Burn disc image” option. If your system doesn’t have built-in support for burning, you can take use of the free burning tool ISO2Disc.
  2. When the bootable NTPasswd CD is ready, it’s time to reset your lost Windows password. Insert the CD into the optical drive and restart the target computer. You might have to adjust the BIOS to allow booting from the CD.
  3. After booting to the NTPasswd tool, you have to select which partition that has Windows installed. In most cases, there will be only one partition so you can just hit Enter to use the default value.

    select-partition

  4. Next, select which part of registry to load, press Enter to leave it as default option which is “Password reset [sam]”.

    load-sam

  5. When you see the chntpw Main Interactive Menu, press Enter to select “Edit user data and passwords” option.

    ntpasswd

  6. Choose the user account where you want to reset the password. You can find the RID, which you have to enter now, to the left of the username.

    select-account

  7. On User Edit Menu, type 1 and press Enter to select “Clear (blank) user password”.

    clear-password

  8. If there is nothing wrong, you should see a message Password cleared!. Then, type q and press Enter to quit editing the user.

    quit-ntpasswd

  9. Next type q to quit the NTPasswd tool and type y to save your password reset changes. Press Ctrl + Alt + Del to restart your computer. You should be able to login to Windows without any problems — remember to change the password to something complex that you can still recall easily.

Note that NTPasswd could be used to reset password for local account only. If you need to bypass Windows 8 Microsoft account, or reset domain user password, you might need to take use of the commercial software PCUnlocker.

How to Reset Forgotten Windows Password with Ultimate Boot CD (UBCD)

January 15th, 2015 by Admin

In this tutorial we’ll show you how to crack and reset Windows password when you forget it or want to unlock a computer with an unknown password. There are tons of recovery tools available to bypass password, but here I’ll use the freeware Ultimate Boot CD (UBCD).

Ultimate Boot CD is a Linux-based bootable disc with loads of useful software for repairing or fixing almost any Windows problem. The built-in chntpw utility could be used to wipe windows passwords and view/edit the registry. Here’s how.

Note: Ultimate Boot CD is a freeware so don’t expect it to work with domain controllers. If you want to find a more powerful yet easy-to-use password recovery software, try the PCUnlocker Live CD.

How to Reset Forgotten Windows Password with Ultimate Boot CD?

Before getting started, you need to download the Ultimate Boot CD (about 588Mb) from its official website, and then burn it to a CD. With the CD you can follow the steps below to reset forgotten Windows 8/7/Vista/XP password:

  1. Boot your locked computer from Ultimate Boot CD. On the boot menu of Ultimate Boot CD, choose Parted Magic and press Enter.

    ultimate-boot-cd

  2. The next screen you have to select your graphic settings. Just select option 1 and press Enter to use the default settings.

    parted-magic

  3. Once you are presented with the Parted Magic desktop, go to the left bottom corner of the screen and choose System Tools -> Change Windows Password.

    change-windows-password

  4. A new small window will open. It lists all Windows partitions detected on your local hard drive. Click on the correct drive and it will start the chntpw utility in the console.

    select-windows-installation

  5. You will now be presented with the chntpw Main Interactive Menu. Type 1 and press Enter.

    chntpw

  6. This will list out all of the Windows users on the system. Type the name of your desired user and press Enter.

    enter-username

  7. You will now be given the option to blank out the password, as well as several other ways to promote or unlock the user account. Type 1 and press Enter, it will remove the existing password.

    user-edit-menu

  8. If you don’t want to reset other user password, type ! and press Enter.

    quit-edit-menu

  9. Type q and hit Enter at this point to quit the User Edit Menu.

    quit-chntpw

  10. You will then be asked to write the registry hive to disk. Type y to confirm and save your changes.

    write-hive-files

  11. Now you can reboot, and you can log into your Windows account with a blank password. Once you’re logged in, you can go to the Control Panel to change your password to something else — something you can remember.

How to Reset Lost Windows Password with Hiren’s BootCD

June 14th, 2013 by Admin

If you forgot your Windows password you will not be able to log in to Windows. So what to do in this case? Is there a free password cracking software to reset lost Windows password? Answer is yes. In this tutorial we’ll guide you through step-by-step procedure of resetting lost Windows password using a free Linux-based boot utility – Hiren’s BootCD.

Hiren’s BootCD is an ultimate solution to almost all your computer problems. It comes loaded with hell lot of tools. Each of them is powerful and can be really very helpful if used with caution. You can solve nearly all your PC problems like virus infection, hdd failure, data recovery, Hard disk partitioning, password recovery using this CD.

Note: Hiren’s BootCD a customized Linux distribution that you need to go through so many steps on Command Prompt to reset your forgotten Windows password. If you aren’t tech savvy, I recommend you use the Reset Windows Password utility which comes with GUI graphical interface.

How to Reset Lost Windows Password with Hiren’s BootCD?

To get started, download Hiren’s BootCD from here. Once the download is complete, unzip the download file and you’ll find two useful files: Hiren’s.BootCD.15.2.iso and BurnCDCC.exe. Simply burn the ISO image of Hiren’s BootCD to an empty CD using BurnCDCC program.

Boot your locked PC using Hiren’s BootCD that you’ve created. Make sure you have your BIOS set to boot from CD/DVD. Once you boot from the Hiren’s BootCD, you’ll see a list of powerful system repair and maintenance tools. Choose the Offline NT/2000/XP/Vista/7 Password Changer and press Enter.

offline-nt-password-changer

The screen will display a list of Linux Kernel Boot options. Simply press Enter to continue.

boot-options

Now the step to choose the correct drive where the Windows is installed. If you have more than one operating system then choose the correct drive and hit Enter. Here I will type “1” and press Enter, because the /dev/sda1 is the system partition on my hard drive. Next press Enter to confirm that your registry directory is WINDOWS/system32/config.

select-partition

When it asks you which part of registry to load, type “1” and press Enter. When the “chntpw Main Interactive Menu” is shown, type “1” and press Enter to choose the “Edit user data and passwords” option.

edit-user-passwords

Now the screen will display a list of local user accounts existing on your registry file. For example, if you want to edit Windows administrator password, type “Administrator” and press Enter.

clear-windows-password

The program will display a list of account properties for your user account. To clear or blank your user account password, type “1” and press Enter. You’ll receive a message that says “Password cleared!”

After successfully resetting your forgotten Windows password, type “!” to close the User Editor Tool.

Now type “q” and hit Enter to close the Offline Password Editor and Registry tool.

Now type “y” and hit Enter to confirm the password change.

Now it will ask you whether you want to use it again or not. Just type “n” and hit Enter.

exit-boot-cd

Remove your Hiren’s BootCD and press ALT + Ctrl + Del to restart your system. You can then log on your computer with a blank/empty Windows password.