Cracking Windows 8

Well, not exactly…

you see, I had a problem…

Ok already, yes it was a self created problem.

not really something I could do anything about.  Here is the problem scenario.

You have a windows 8 computer

No password, no password recovery disk

You are hosed…or rather I was.  The computer?  Brand new hi-power dell running windows 8.  Ok, I did all the old school tricks to try to get to the command prompt.  I wanted to run:

But every time I tried to get past the logon screen, I was stymied.  Finally I booted into the bios.  Why?  Because it was set to boot from the Hard Drive first.  Why was this important?  Because I had a brand new Windows 8 install disk that would allow me to get to the command window without the challenge.  Being in install mode and all.

So after going into the bios and moving ol’ dvd rom to the top, I was able to boot off the install dvd.

Got to the “install windows” screen.  In the lower left corner in really small writing is a repair windows link.  Click on it and a few new options show up.  You can “Refresh” among other things.  But I went to Advanced.  Clicked on the Command Prompt option.  Once there it was a pretty simple couple of steps to :

a) re-enable the local admin account

b) reset the local admin password

Log back in as admin and finish fixing the system.

Seems like it would have been easy from the beginning.  To bad I fussed around with old school options before I figured this one out.

 

Hope this saved you some time…