BIOS/Setup Admin Password

I put an admin on my computer for some reason, I have no idea why, and now I want to use my XP install disk to repair my OS, but I need to enter the admin password.

I have tried the backdoor passwords, and a program called PC CMOS Cleaner 2.0, which I burned onto a CD-R with ImgBurn, and it will not boot to recover/reset the password.

I do not want to do anything hardware related like taking out the motherboard battery or anything like that, any suggestions of what I am to do?

Could you post further details regarding your machine make and spec.

When you say admin password are you referring to the Windows password for the Administrator account??

Richard S.

During boot, I press F2 (Setup), and navigate to the security section, and it has admin password SET, I only use this user account, and the guest account is turned on encase of a problem.

Dell Demension C521

Phoenix Award WorkstationBIOS v6.00PG

Windows XP Professional (5.1 Build 2600)

Why don't you want to take out the motherboard battery. Thats just what I was about to tell you to do before I read your post.

It will probably work since its going to reset everything. All you would have to do is unplug your pc, hold down the power button for about 5 seconds, then unscrew the side panel. The battery should be in plain site and all you do is push the release with a pin or screwdriver. Pops back in like a watch battery. Leave the battery out for about 5 minutes.

The battery should be in plain site

I've popped open the side panels of PCs quite a few times and have never seen what looks like some kind of removable battery. I've seen transistors and resistors and cables and drives and fans and ram sticks and video/audio/ethernet cards and heck of a lot of soldering, but hey. :blink: For all we know Shane might think that central looking thing with all the wires sticking out on all 4 equal sides might be the battery. Bye bye CPU.

Exactly.

I've downloaded and burned onto a disk, NT Password and Registry Editor

I can get to resetting the password for administrator (blank password), then it tells me something about to save changes, i press enter and it says nothing saved, end of scripts

Removing the battery is dead simple. It literally is just a watch battery, you might have to move a few cables around(not unhook, just push aside) to see it.

I would be more worried about using software to edit the bios and bricking the motherboard than I would be worried about messing something up by taking out the battery.

I downloaded a picture of what the inside of a computer looks like. If you blow up the picture you can see where I circled the battery in red with paint.

post-1352-0-33733600-1304829979_thumb.jpg

Your pc may not look exactly the same but it should be pretty close.

I've popped open the side panels of PCs quite a few times and have never seen what looks like some kind of removable battery. I've seen transistors and resistors and cables and drives and fans and ram sticks and video/audio/ethernet cards and heck of a lot of soldering, but hey. :blink: For all we know Shane might think that central looking thing with all the wires sticking out on all 4 equal sides might be the battery. Bye bye CPU.

Every pc has a battery back up for the bios. Its almost always just a round watch battery.

Go to any site that sells motherboards and has blown up pictures of them(newegg for instance) and look at any motherboard and you will see it clearly on every board.

Removing the battery as rridgely suggests should work.

A bit more info and other ways

http://www.askvg.com/how-to-reset-remove-bypass-a-bios-or-cmos-password/

Also what is wrong with the computer that you need to repair it?

I think everyone's jumping the gun here the password problem is with Windows XP setup disc and not the BIOS.

I found the following article which maybe of some relevance - http://www.password-changer.com/techquest-last-config.htm

Richard S.

We are just going on the title the poster gave his thread Richard.

Perhaps he will confirm which it is next time he posts.

You know, the computer works fine, im just going to leave this alone, i've learned a lesson here too, never set an admin password and lock yourself out of system setup.

Thanks all, ill be fine.