XP Recovery Console Administration password unknown.

Question

Machine: Dell Dimension 2350, XP Home.

At work here we get computers from various places, Dell being a large supplier, but we immediately save the base image that is on the system using a disk imaging program, and then install our own base images of whatever operating system we will be working with.

However, we also need to use the factory base image for testing, and this is where the problem starts. After deleting the first small partition and setting up various other operating systems, I am unable to boot back into the base factory XP image because of a HAL.DLL error.

I read that this is because the boot.ini file is looking in the wrong place for XP, which makes sense as it is now the first partition instead of the second partition.

Problem, I can't get into the XP recovery console. The machine was *never* logged into, no administrator password was set, etc, and I cannot figure out what the default Administrator password might be. I have tried a blank password, admin, administrator, and a few other choice things to no avail.

Is there a preset Administrator password on these machines? If so how do I go about getting this information so I can get in and fix the boot.ini and be able to use the original factory image?

Mary G · Answer

The trick for the blank password is to place the cursor in the password box and press Enter. Then the blank password is accepted.

gryjhnhpe · Answer

If XP OS is still installed you can also do this & use "User Accounts" to set Administrator Password.

To have Administrator account always displayed on Welcome Screen use Registry Editor to go to
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\SpecialAccounts\UserList

If there isn't any Administrator item , create DWORD Administrator
set Value to 1
This will show Administrator account on Welcome Screen & User Accounts where you can set Administrator Password & Hint , *** BUT for XP Home you must use Safe Mode for Logon as Administrator but not to just set Administrator Password*** even though account is shown on normal login.

- - - - ----- - -

You can also do this for Auto Login to Recovery Console,

don't know if you have to 1st install Recovery Console on Computer as I already had when I set "SecurityLevel" 1

SecurityLevel DWORD value data is set to 1 in the following registry key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Setup\RecoveryConsole

DELL 2600 Laptop
XP SP1
Home Edition
256 Mb RAM 18GB Hard Drive
Dial up Modem 56Kb

Khaytsus · Answer

I can't boot the factory image at all, it stops at the HAL.DLL is corrupt or unreadable error that I've read about in various places.. Basically it's because the boot.ini is pointing towards XP being on the second partition, and it's now on the first.

So I can't boot into the system at all under the image I'm having trouble with. So I can't do anything in Windows in the factory image. The best I can do is boot from an XP cd and load up the recovery console, but I have tried a lot of different passwords to no avail.

gryjhnhpe · Answer

Have you tried the blank Trick of Reply above & also the user logon password if they had one. DELL 2600 LaptopXP SP1Home Edition256 Mb RAM 18GB Hard DriveDial up Modem 56Kb

Mary G · Answer

HAL is hardware detection where XP checks to see if you are installing on the same machine. Sometimes it gets confused. See if this will help: http://support.microsoft.com/search/preview.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;Q299340

You should research your problem further using the MS Knowledge Base.

Denny Denham · Answer

Khaytsus,

The default administrator password should be null (blank) but in system which were set up using sysprep that sometimes is not the case. You should be able to access Recovery Console using the method given here.

Khaytsus · Answer

Ookay, taking a chance of looking like a jerk let me make this clear, even though I've said it a few times already.

I CAN NOT boot the image. Period. It stops at HAL.DLL is corrupt or missing. So I can't do any silly GUI stuff, I can't install anything TO the image, etc.

Image was never logged into, so no passwords have ever been set. If there is an administrator password, it wasn't set by me, it had to be set by Dell making the images for the system.

I CAN get to a recovery console from the XP cd, but I can NOT login to it because whatever password I'm using is not correct.

I tried to re-do the recovery console with /cmdcons but it apparently only works with winnt32 which will NOT run in DOS mode.

If I'm missing something, please tell me.. And if I'm being obtuse, tell me specifically (but not necessarily in great detail) rather than just providing a link to something I've probably already read or someone above has already posted. It'll stop wasting my time and anyone trying to help.

That said, let me restate my problem:

I can not boot an XP Home image. I have tried to get into the recovery console to fix the boot.ini since it is now on the first partition instead of the second partition and can't load the HAL.DLL because of this (or at least I hope that's the problem). When I try to get into the recovery console I cannot "log in" to the windows installation because I do not know the administrator password. The password HAD to be set by Dell because I have never once logged into the image at all, in fact the license agreement has never even been accepted yet. I have tried several passwords.. admin, administrator, (blank), dell, dell2350, etc, all to no avail.

If anyone knows the default administrator password, or a way to reset it, or a way to fix the recovery console if it is broken (see link in a post above for MS admitting the recovery console might be broke) from CD or some other method that does NOT require booting INTO the system I can't boot into, please let me know.

Khaytsus · Answer

I have now fixed the problem.

I installed XP Home to c:\winnew, booted into the system into winnew, edited boot.ini and fixed the reference to partition 2 on the original image. Then I rebooted to the original image, deleted winnew and its reference in boot.ini, and now the original factory base image boots correctly and seems to run just fine.

gpanders · Answer

Recovery Console can be fixed if you repair it before your system breaks down. If you are interested send me an email to gpanderson@iquest.net

Microsoft Knowledge base aritcle 308402 explains the problem with Recovery Console and offers a few solutions. Nothing in the knowledge base article fixed the problem on my system.

The hotfix referenced in the article does not appear to be available on Microsoft's public web site. The article tells you to, "Contact Microsoft Product Support Services to obtain and install the Q308402 hotfix. For a complete list of Microsoft Product Support Services phone numbers and information about support costs, visit the following Microsoft Web site:"

Knowledge base article 308402 http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;308402

tampinc · Answer

No need to get the hotfix from Micro$oft support if you can log into the Windows GUI. I fixed the Q308402 problem without it - got in touch with Micro$oft for the hotfix and waited a week without anything happening - so a bit of investigation yielded a simple enough solution.

The answer is to copy the SPCMDCONS.EXE file off disk 6 in the boot disk set into the C:\CMDCONS directory. I'm running XP PRo (sp2) so I downloaded the XP Pro sp2 boot images from Microsoft's support site i.e. open WindowsXP-KB310994-SP2-Pro-BootDisk-ENU.exe with WinZip and extract the .img files.

Because my Inspiron doesn't have a floppy drive I had to download a virtual floppy device driver (vfd.sys) to open the boot disk images to get to the file I needed on the last image.

This works on XP Pro, and will most likely work on XP Home too.

Cheers

Windows General

XP Recovery Console Administration password unknown.

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