Sometimes a situation may arise when you need to remove your Windows login password. This may be necessary when the user has forgotten the Windows password and needs to remove the Windows password or when other emergency situations arise. We often receive questions: how to remove the password when logging into Windows, how to remove the password in Window, how to reset the Windows password on a laptop or computer. There are several ways to remove the password when logging into Windows. An easy way to reset your Windows password is to remove your Windows login password using a program. In this article we will tell you how to quickly and easily remove a login password for Windows 10, 8.1, 8, 7 using a program that is distributed free of charge and can be freely downloaded on the program developer’s website.
Password reset program for Windows
As mentioned above, you can reset your Windows login password in different ways, including by loading the installation disk and using the command line, but they are quite complicated for the average user. It is easier to use a bootable CD/DVD disk or flash drive, which were created using special programs, to reset an account password in Windows. There are several programs for removing passwords on Windows, but almost all of them are paid and their cost is quite high. To solve the problem of resetting your Windows login password, the Free Windows Password Recovery - Lazesoft Recover My Password Home Edition program compares favorably with other programs, which can be freely downloaded from the program developer’s website and used by home users. The program is easy to install and has a convenient and intuitive interface. There is no Russian language in the program; for those who have not studied much English, its use will not cause problems. Using the program, you can reset the password in Windows 2000, XP, Vista, 7, Windows 8, Windows 8.1, Windows 10. The program supports 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Windows. In addition to resetting the password, using the program you can perform other manipulations with administrator and user accounts on the computer. The program was tested by the authors of the article to reset the administrator password on a computer running Windows 10, Windows 8.1, and Windows 7. In all cases, the passwords were successfully removed and access to the computer was opened.
How to use a program to reset your Windows login password
First you need to download the program from the official website and install it on the computer on which a bootable CD/DVD disk or bootable USB drive will be created. If you are creating a CD/DVD disc, your computer or laptop must have a CD/DVD drive. There is no need for a disc burning program; Lazesoft Recover My Password Home Edition burns discs with its built-in tools. After downloading the program, you need to install it on your computer. Installing the program is standard and will not cause any difficulties if the user has at least once installed any program on the computer before. The program contains a reference manual in English.
Let's launch the program. Next, the program asks you to select the Windows version of the target computer (the computer on which the login password will be removed). When testing the program, we did not select the Windows version and left this setting unchanged, as in the picture below (Do not specify the operating system version of the target computer). With this setup, we were able to remove login passwords for Windows 10, 8.1, 7 64-bit without any problems. Perhaps the choice of operating system is important for other manipulations with accounts that the program allows you to do. Click NEXT and move on.
Next, we choose on what media we will create the boot disk. If we create a boot disk on a CD/DVD disc, select CD/DVD, as in the figure below. The program itself will determine the disc writing speed. You can manually reduce the speed so that the disc is recorded at a higher quality.
If you are creating a bootable USB drive, select USB Flash, as in the picture below. The program will select the drive letter that is displayed in the system for the removable media (H in the picture, yours may be different). If you have several removable media connected to your computer, you need to select the one on which the bootable USB media will be created.
You can also create a disk image by selecting ISO Image, which you can then burn to a disk on another computer using a disk burning program or use to create a multiboot flash drive. Next, click Start and get a ready-made bootable CD or DVD, depending on the disc used (196 MB is removed from the CD without any problems) or a bootable USB flash drive.
After this, you need to set the BOOT section in the BIOS of your computer or laptop to boot from a CD/DVD drive or USB. In some laptops and computers, you can call up the Boot Devace Option with a separate key (which you need to look at in the instructions for your computer or laptop). We select the required device and boot the computer or laptop from the boot disk we created.
New laptops and computers may have problems booting from a disk or flash drive due to the secure boot option in the BIOS, which prevents the computer from booting from other devices. To solve this problem, you need to disable secure boot in the BIOS and enable Legacy Support. After this, the laptop or computer can be booted from other devices. When the password is reset, you can return the original settings in the BIOS.
After we have configured booting from our media, we boot the computer from the disk we created. When loading, a choice appears, in our case we select Live CD, when loading from a flash drive we select USB.
The program begins to load, we see the loading process on the screen.
After loading, it starts from the Windows disk and we see this picture. The Reset Windows Password task is selected, click NEXT
The program asks us if we are using it for non-commercial purposes and tells us that for commercial use we must purchase a license. Click Yes (use for non-commercial purposes).
A window like this appears, the program searches for accounts on the computer.
There is one administrator account on this computer, Account Name 1. This window will display all existing accounts on the computer. Select the account for which you want to reset the password and click Next.
A window appears displaying the password reset.
After the password is reset, we are taken to a menu where we can open a file manager or reset the password on another computer account.
To exit the program, click the Start button, then Shut Down Computer
The program asks for exit confirmation, click OK. The computer turns off.
After exiting the program, remove the boot disk or flash drive from the computer and configure the BIOS to boot from the computer’s hard drive. That's it, the login password has been removed, the computer boots and does not require a password to log into the user account.
A forgotten password can cause a lot of trouble for the owner of a personal computer. In Windows 10, the situation is made easier for those users who use a Microsoft account, because you can easily recover your password online, and then connect your computer to the Internet and log in with the new password. And those who do not trust Microsoft innovations and use a local account the old fashioned way will be forced to recover their password using a much more labor-intensive method, described in our last article, unless they have a password recovery flash drive. The presence of such a flash drive allows you to recover a password in a matter of seconds without affecting the user’s encrypted files.
A simple and quick procedure will help you avoid forgotten password problems in the future. Store the created media in a safe place. Remember the storage location of the created flash drive so that you can always reset the password.
- First, insert removable media into your computer, which will be used as a reset flash drive. There is no need to format the media; one small file will be written to it.
- In the Windows Start or Search menu, find the “Create a password reset disk” application and open it. You can also press Ctrl+Alt+Del on your keyboard, then “Change Password” and “Create a Password Reset Disk.” In addition, this item is available in the Control Panel (accounts section).
- The Forgotten Password Wizard will open. If this does not happen, check if the removable disk is inserted, restart the computer, turn it off, and then turn it on. Try opening the wizard again. Read the wizard's greeting and click "Next".
- Select the media on which the reset file will be written, click “Next”.
- At this point, enter your current account password. Leave the field blank if there is no password currently. The created floppy disk will not be tied to the current password and will continue to be valid even if the password is changed.
- If a reset floppy has already been created, the system will warn you that after creating a new floppy, the old one will stop working. To continue, you need to agree with this.
- If it happens that your flash drive already contains reset data, the wizard will ask if you want to overwrite this data. Those. One media can only contain password reset data for one account.
- The operation will take a few seconds. Click Next to complete the wizard.
- The last step is to read the wizard’s message and click “Finish”.
Resetting your password using a prepared flash drive
The procedure for resetting a password if you have a working reset floppy disk is an extremely trivial matter.
- Insert the reset flash drive into the USB port.
- If you enter your password incorrectly, click on the “Reset Password” link below the input field.
- The Password Reset Wizard will open. Specify the media on which the reset file is stored, enter a new password and a hint for it.
- Sign in to your account with your new password.
Something terrible happened - you somehow managed to forget the password for your Windows 10 account. What to do now? Of course, you can do it the old fashioned way - reinstall the operating system. Or you can try removing password protection using a USB drive. You can learn how to create a flash drive to reset a Windows 10 password on a computer, laptop, or tablet from this instruction.
Creating a flash drive to reset Windows 10 password using the official method
Windows provides built-in tools for creating a USB drive, which you can later use if your login password has been forgotten or lost. However, there are several disadvantages to this method that make it less practical. The first drawback is that you can create such a drive only by logging into Windows. It turns out that users should take care of preparing a USB flash drive in advance for future use. Second, a device prepared for password reset can help in the case of a local account. It will not be able to remove or replace the password from your Microsoft account.
If you are used to thinking ahead, or you have already learned from bitter experience and are now planning to create a USB drive that will help you reset your password in the future, you need to do the following:
The final result should be a userkey.psw file on your drive. It contains all the data needed to reset your password. Interestingly, this file, if necessary, can be moved to any other drive and used in case of an unpleasant situation. To use a flash drive with it, you need to connect it to the computer, enter the wrong password on the login screen and click on the item that appears to begin the reset.
Using Online NT Password & Registry Editor to reset Windows 10 password
If you have forgotten or lost your password, and you did not have time to create a drive to reset it before this unpleasant incident, then it makes sense to use third-party tools. In this case, the Online NT Password & Registry Editor utility. Like similar tools, it can reset passwords for user accounts, although only local ones. She can't reset her Microsoft account password. But it can help you bypass a blocked entry and get into the system.
Before using Online NT Password & Registry Editor, you need to burn it to a USB flash drive. To do this, you still have to get a computer somewhere. Next, do the following:
If something went wrong, you can download the archive marked CD, extract the ISO image from it and use the WinSetupFromUSB program. Please note that in your case, when setting up this utility, you need to check the box next to SysLinux bootsector/Linux distribution using.
So, you managed to create a USB flash drive to reset your password. What to do next? Here's what:
- Connect the USB drive to the computer on which you need to reset the password or somehow gain access to the system.
- Turn on your computer and boot the USB flash drive by selecting it in the Boot Menu. You can read about how to call this menu in the instructions for your PC.
- Many different messages should appear on the screen. Don't get lost. That's how it should be. Press Enter to move to the next step.
- Now the utility should detect the system partition of the hard drive and display a little information about it. All you need to do is indicate its number and move on.
- After checking the partition for the presence of all necessary files, a list of possible actions will appear on the screen. Since you are interested in resetting your password, you need to select the first option.
- In the next step, you must also select the first item.
- You will see a table with a list of user accounts. In the very first column you can see the so-called RID number of each account. See what number is assigned to the entry you need and enter it below. If you are trying to access a computer with a Microsoft account, you must select the hidden account Administrator.
- Now you are offered a list of actions with the selected user record. In the case of a local account, you need to enter the number 1. If at the previous stage you selected a hidden administrator account, you need to enter the number 2.
- As a result, a message should appear on the screen indicating a successful password reset, or a successful attempt to activate the administrator account.
- Next, you just have to press Enter, then enter q, and then - y to finalize the changes.
- This completes the work with the flash drive for downloading Online NT Password & Registry Editor. Pull it out and press it Ctrl+Alt+Del to restart your computer.
Good afternoon Today I will tell you, how to make a USB flash drive to reset your password. It's no secret that your Windows login password can be easily forgotten or lost. What to do in such a situation? It is precisely for such cases that you need a flash drive to reset your Windows password. Below we will look at two options for creating such a USB flash drive, the first is simple, the second is more complex, but more effective than the first.
First way. Creating a flash drive for password reset using Windows OS tools.
I will say right away that this method has some disadvantages. It is suitable if you create a flash drive in advance, that is, in advance. I also want to note that this method involves resetting the local account password. This means that if you use a Microsoft account, then you can safely skip the first method and go to the second.
So let's get over it. This method is suitable for Windows 7, 8 and 10.
Let's go to Control Panel - User Accounts,
On the left we find the item “Create a password reset disk” and click on it. If you are using a non-local account, then this item will not be available.
The Forgotten Password Wizard will open. Now just follow what is written and in literally three steps the flash drive will be ready. At the end of the operation, a special file called userkey.psw will be written to your flash drive, which will help you reset your operating system password.
Now there's just a little bit left to do. All you have to do is plug the flash drive into your computer and enter the wrong password when logging into Windows (since you don’t know it, it won’t be correct). In this field, a password reset button will appear at the bottom, clicking on which will open the password recovery wizard, just follow the instructions. In principle, nothing complicated.
Second way. Using the Online NT Password & Registry Editor tool
I can say that this is quite a powerful tool for resetting passwords and more. I used this utility for a long time, and even now it has not lost its relevance. The main thing is to update on time.
The free Online NT Password & Registry Editor can reset local account passwords for Windows 2000, Me, XP, Vista, 7, 8, 8.1 and 10. The image of this utility can be easily written to either a disk or a flash drive. Moreover, if you use a Microsoft account, then using Online NT Password & Registry Editor you can bypass the protection and gain full access to your PC.
Let's look at how to create a bootable USB flash drive to reset system passwords. Let's go to the official website of the developer Online NT Password & Registry Editor http://pogostick.net/~pnh/ntpasswd/bootdisk.html, then go down until we see the Download section. We are interested in the latest release for USB, and we will need to download it. You can burn an ISO image for CDs.
We have downloaded the archive, now let’s unzip its contents onto a flash drive. The flash drive should preferably be empty. If it is bootable, then format it. I already wrote.
Next, launch the command line (Start - enter cmd in the search) and enter the command f:syslinux.exe -ma f:
Where f is the letter of the flash drive. You can find out the letter of your flash drive by going to “Computer”. If you get an error, enter the same command only without the –ma parameter.
If suddenly this method does not work, then you can download the Online NT Password & Registry Editor image for disk using the WinSetupFromUSB program and write it to a USB flash drive. I wrote about how to use this program.
So our flash drive is ready, so we can start. Connect the USB drive to the computer. Now we need to boot from the flash drive; to do this, when you turn on the computer, call up the Boot menu and select the required drive. Or you can set the BIOS to boot from a flash drive.
The initial screen will appear and you will be prompted to select options. As practice shows, you can simply press the Enter button. However, there are situations that make it necessary to use one of the listed commands.
Next we see a list of partitions on which Windows is installed. At this stage, you need to indicate the number of such a section. There are also various options here, but the average user may not need to use them.
Afterwards, select the user data and passwords option again. This is the section for editing user data and password,
Next, the program will display a list of users, where you can see who is the admin and who is just a guest. You can also see whether a particular user is blocked. Please note that on the left side of the list there is a RID column, which is unique to each user. You need to select the desired user by entering their RID and pressing Enter,
In fact, nothing bad happened - at least if you followed my recommendations and from the very beginning linked your system to a Microsoft “network” account, that is, to your email inbox. We put our feet in our hands, our nerves in our fists and go to the page account.live.com/password/reset.
You will need to indicate the address to which your copy of Windows is linked and answer a couple of simple questions, after which your old password will be reset and you can set a new one - a notification about this will be sent to the email address you specified during registration.
Reset Windows 10 password for local account
It is much more difficult if you need to reset the Windows 10 password for a local account that is in no way connected to the Internet. Microsoft itself recommends creating a special bootable password reset flash drive for this case - to do this, type in the search field at the bottom of the screen the command Create a password reset floppy disk and run the found program.
It seems simple, but there are some unpleasant surprises: a flash drive for this procedure must be created IN ADVANCE, and on the very computer that you want to access, since the program will require you to enter a password to log into Windows. It turns out that the key to the apartment is securely locked inside the apartment, and you are still helplessly stomping around outside.
Video - Reset Windows 10 password
Resetting your password using recovery flash drives
But there remains one more, workaround way to reset your password in Windows 10 - you probably guessed which one: we need a universal bootable flash drive with the Windows PE operating system and a set of special utility programs for maintaining and restoring your computer. You can download images and instructions for making such flash drives on the Internet using the request “Live USB”.
By the way, it is this program that is most often included in “multi-boot USB” programs created by enthusiasts. On the official website you will find an “image” of a bootable flash drive and instructions for making it (unfortunately, only in English). For more information on how to do this, read the chapter “Getting Started. Loading the computer."