UNSOLVED
XP Recovery Console Administration password unknown.
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?
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?
