In a Windows environment, the use of the administrator account is required for installing new programs and for changing most operating system settings. If you are using your own computer, it is very likely that your account is already a system administrator. If not, you will need to log into your computer as an administrator to be able to perform operations that require this type of permission. Read on to find out how.
Steps
Method 1 of 2: Windows XP Home Edition
Step 1. Start your computer in safe mode
If you are using Windows XP Home Edition, you can only access the administrator account from the Safe Mode login screen. To put your computer into Safe Mode, restart it and hold down the F8 function key. From the menu that appeared, relating to the advanced Windows startup settings, select the item "Safe mode".
If you are the only user who uses the computer, it is very likely that your account already has administrative rights. You can check this by accessing the "Control Panel" and choosing the "User Accounts" item. Find your account and check for "Computer Administrator" in the description field
Step 2. Select the administrator account
When the Windows welcome screen appears, choose the user account call "Admin" or "Administrator". Click the relevant icon to log into the system with this user.
- In most cases the administrator account does not have an access password, so at the first login try to leave the "Password" field blank.
- If you set a login password for the administrator account during the Windows installation, type it when prompted to log in.
Step 3. Retrieve the login password
If you have forgotten your administrator account password, you can use a special program to recover and change your login credentials. Read this guide for more details on how to download and use OPHCrack in order to recover your computer's administrator account password.
Method 2 of 2: Windows XP Professional Edition
Step 1. Access the Windows welcome screen
To do this, select the "Start" menu and choose the "Log off user" or "Change user" option. You will then be taken back to the Windows start screen, from which you can choose which user to log in to the system with.
If you are the only user who uses the computer, it is very likely that your account already has administrative rights. You can check this by accessing the "Control Panel" and choosing the "User Accounts" item. Find your account and check that "Computer administrator" is present in the description field
Step 2. Open the Windows NT login window
To do this, from the Windows home screen press the hotkey combination Ctrl + Alt + Del twice.
Step 3. Enter the login credentials of the administrator account
If you have created a system administrator account, enter its username and password. Otherwise, enter the username "Administrator" and leave the "Password" field blank.
