Archive for July, 2013

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How to Reset Windows Home Server Password After Forgotten

July 11th, 2013 by Admin

If you’ve forgotten the administrator password on your Windows Home Server, you may get locked out of the server and lose access to all important documents and digital media files on the machine. In this situation you can unlock your forgotten Windows Home Server password easily using a bootable CD or USB drive.

PCUnlocker is a bootable password recovery utility which enables you to remove forgotten Windows admin/user password easily. It can run from either a boot CD or USB drive and let you reset Windows Home Server password in just a few mouse clicks!

How to Reset Windows Home Server Password After Forgotten?

  1. Download the PCUnlocker program from http://www.top-password.com. The download file is a zipped ISO image file. Double-click the zip file and the system will display all the contents in a new window. Just drag the pcunlocker.iso file from that window to your desktop or another location you can find easily.
  2. Burn the ISO image to an empty CD or DVD using ISO2Disc, BurnCDCC or ImgBurn program.
  3. Connect the CD you’ve burned to your locked computer that you want to reset Windows Home Server password on. Turn on the computer and change the boot order in BIOS. Make sure the CD/DVD drive is the first boot device.
  4. After booting from the CD, you’ll see the WinPE operating system start. Just about half a minute later, you’ll see the PCUnlocker program. It displays all your Windows user accounts.
  5. Choose a user account and click on “Reset Password” button. The program will remove your forgotten Windows password immediately.
  6. Click on Restart. Take out the CD from the computer. Now you can log back into your Windows Home Server using a blank/empty password.

Note: After removing your forgotten Windows Home Server password, you will lose all access to EFS encrypted files, personal certificates, and any stored passwords like those for network resources and website passwords. However, most users don’t have EFS encrypted files and the loss of stored passwords isn’t likely a big issue.

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2 Options to Find Windows 8 OEM Product Key Easily

July 10th, 2013 by Admin

How to find Windows 8 OEM product key? Even if you’ve formatted the hard drive or uninstall the OS, you can still retrieve your Windows 8 OEM product key from BIOS.

If you’ve purchased a computer which comes pre-installed with OEM Windows 8, you will no longer see a sticker on the back or top of the machine with product key printed on it. Now computer manufactures are embedding the Windows 8 product key in the BIOS of computer’s motherboard. In this tutorial we’ll show you two options for you to find Windows 8 OEM product key easily!

Option 1: Find Windows 8 OEM Product Key with RWEverything

Have your uninstalled Windows 8 or downgrade to Windows 7? That’s where RWEverything comes to rescue. This is a free utility that enables you to access all hardware information in your computer’s BIOS, including the Windows 8 OEM product key. Here are the steps:

  1. First of all, download the proper version of RWEverything and save it on your computer. The download file is a self-extracting ZIP archive.
  2. Extract the program from the zipped file, and double-click the RW.exe file to launch the program.
  3. click ACPI icon from the top toolbar, and then click on the MSDM tab. You’ll find your Windows 8 OEM product key in the Data row.

    find-windows-8-oem-key

Option 2: Find Windows 8 OEM Product Key with Product Key Finder

Besides being written in BIOS, Windows 8 OEM product key is also encrypted and stored in the Windows Registry. Product Key Finder is a simple program which can help you find Windows 8 OEM product key from Windows Registry.

I’ve tested both Product Key Finder and RWEverything on several Windows 8 pre-installed machines, and the product keys retrieved within these tool are correct. The biggest advantage of Product Key Finder is that it can also find Windows 8 product key from Non-OEM and Retail computers. Here are the steps of using Product Key Finder to recover Windows 8 OEM product key:

  1. Download and install Product Key Finder on your Windows 8 computer.
  2. After installing it, launch the program.
  3. Click on Start Recovery button, and then choose the “From current system” option from the pop-up menu.

  4. The program will display your Windows 8 OEM product key, as well as CD keys for Microsoft Office, SQL Server and many other software.

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How to Export Windows Registry without Using Third-Party Software

July 10th, 2013 by Admin

Windows Registry stores all the information, options and settings about the operating system. It is possible to open the registry and edit the registry settings through the built-in Registry Editor. In this tutorial we’ll show you how to export Windows Registry to a .reg file.

How to Export Windows Registry without Using Third-Party Software?

  1. Press Windows + R key combination to bring up the Run box.
  2. Type regedit and press Enter.

    run-box

  3. In the Registry Editor, navigate to the registry key that you want to export. For example, If you want to export the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE branch, right-click on the SOFTWARE node, then select Export.

    export-windows-registry

  4. In the Export Registry File dialog box, choose a location to save your .reg file.

    export-registry-file

  5. That’s it. You have successfully exported your Windows registry.

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How to Recover Outlook 2013 / 2010 / 2007 / 2003 PST File Password

July 10th, 2013 by Admin

If you’ve used Outlook for any length of time, you’ve likely heard of PST files. PST stands for Personal Storage File, is the file format for the data files that Outlook uses to store all of your Outlook data, including your emails, contacts, calendar, and more. It is a very sensitive file so most of the user keep it password protected to avoid any unauthorized access.

However, there is a situation that when you open your Outlook after coming from long vacation, you can’t remember your Outlook PST file password. How can you recover or crack the password? Luckily there is a simply program that can help you retain back the password instantly.

Outlook Password Recovery is the best PST password recovery program which enables you to recover Outlook 2013 / 2010 / 2007 / 2003 PST file password instantly, no matter how long and complex your password is!

How to Recover Outlook 2013 / 2010 / 2007 / 2003 PST File Password?

Before getting started to recover your forgotten Outlook PST password, you need to locate your .pst file. In Windows 7 or Vista, the PST file is stored in c:\Users\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Outlook. In Windows XP, it is c:\Documents and Settings\Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook. If you still unable to find the .pst file, please check out this article: Introduction to Outlook Personal Folders File (.pst).

  1. Download the setup package of Outlook Password Recovery program and save it on your computer.
  2. Double-click on the setup file to install it. After installing, start the program.
  3. Click on Unlock PST File button. The program will require you to locate your Outlook .PST file.
  4. After locating your .PST file, click on Open. The program will display your Outlook PST file password immediately.

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Beginner: How to Unzip A File in Windows 8/7/Vista/XP

July 9th, 2013 by Admin

A .zip file may contain one or multiple files or folders that have been compressed. All versions of Windows 8/7/Vista/XP natively supports .zip file format, so you can extract all files from a .zip file without using any third-party software. In this article we’ll show you how to unzip a .zip file in Windows 8, 7, Vista and XP.

How to Unzip A File in Windows 8/7/Vista/XP?

Here we’ll take the PCUnlocker program for example. PCUnlocker is the most popular Windows password recovery software, which comes as a bootable ISO image file and it is distributed as a .zip format.

  1. Once you’ve downloaded the software, right-click on the PCUnlockerEnt.zip file. Select the Extract All from the context menu.

    extract-all

  2. It will bring up a self-extraction program that is built into all versions of Windows. Just keep the setting as what it is, simply click the Extract button.

    select-dest-folder

  3. After a while, the unzipped files will appear in a new window. From the picture shown as follow, we can see two files: ReadMe.txt and pcunlocker.iso. By default, Windows will not display the file extensions. To fix it, please refer to this article: How to Show File Extensions in Windows 8/7/Vista/XP.

    output-folder

  4. If you browse to the location of the PCUnlockerEnt.zip file, you’ll find that there is a newly created folder called PCUnlockerEnt, which contains all extracted files.

    overview

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How to Reset Lost Admin Password for Windows Server Core

July 8th, 2013 by Admin

Windows Server Core does not include the traditional full graphical user interface (GUI), which provides you with the minimum set of tools to run Windows. You are provided with only a command prompt to manage the server. Once you have configured the server, you may don’t need to log on the server core for a long time. But what if you forgot the administrator password? How to recover or reset the password without rebuilding your server core from scratch?

It seems like a quite difficult task. But if you have a powerful Windows password recovery software, you can reset lost Windows Server Core password in minutes. PCUnlocker is a simple yet effective Live CD that could be used to reset lost admin password for Windows Server 2012 / 2008 / 2003 Core.

How to Reset Lost Admin Password for Windows Server Core?

  1. Download the zipped ISO image of PCUnlocker and save it on another PC you can log on. After the download is complete, extract the pcunlocker.iso file from the ZIP archive.
  2. Burn the ISO image file to a blank CD using any disc burning software, such as BurnCDCC, ImgBurn etc. If you don’t have a blank CD or CD burner at your hand, you can opt to burn the ISO image to a USB flash drive using ISO2Disc program.
  3. Pop the Live CD in the CD drive of your Windows Server Core machine that you want to reset lost admin password for. When the computer is booting, you will need to press the correct key to get into the Boot Menu. It is usually F12 or Del key. Once in the Boot Menu, select the CD/DVD Drive that you just created and press Enter.
  4. The computer will load the WinPE operating system from the Live CD. After a while, you’ll see the PCUnlocker program. It will read the Security Accounts Manager (SAM) files in Windows Server Core and show you a list of local user accounts. If your server is a domain controller, you can click on Reset Active Directory Password option to view the Active Directory user accounts on your machine.

  5. Choose your administrator account and click on Reset Password. The program will reset your lost admin password immediately, as well as unlocking your administrator account if it is already disabled, locked out or expired.
  6. Click on Restart button and remove the Live CD. The computer will then boot normally to the Windows login screen. Just leave the password box as blank and you can log back into Windows Server Core immediately.

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Forgot Windows Password for Windows Server VM in Microsoft Hyper-V

July 8th, 2013 by Admin

I installed Windows Server 2008 R2 with Hyper-V. I left the machine standing for a couple of days. After a week I got back to the machine I couldn’t remember the password. Is there a way to recover or reset the administrator password on a Hyper-V virtualized 2008 AD server?

Forgot Windows password for Hyper-V virtualized server? How to reset local / domain administrator password on a virtual machine running in Microsoft Hyper-V? There is a simple way to reset your lost Hyper-V server password without data loss. Just boot your Hyper-V virtual machine from PCUnlocker ISO image which contains a password reset utility, and it enables you to reset both local administrator password and domain administrator password easily!

How to Reset Windows Password for Hyper-V Server?

  1. Download the zipped ISO image of PCUnlocker and save it on your host operating system. Unzipped the download file and you’ll find a bootable ISO image file: pcunlocker.iso.
  2. Open your virtual machine from Hyper-V Manager. Click on the File menu and select Settings….

    hyper-v-vm

  3. In the Settings of the VM, select the DVD Drive under IDE Controller 1 tab. In the right panel, specify the DVD drive to use the ISO image file (pcunlocker.iso) you just downloaded.

  4. Go to the BIOS tab in the left panel, move CD to the top of all available boot devices.

  5. Click Apply to save your changes.
  6. Power on your virtual machine. This time it will boot from the PCUnlocker ISO image.
  7. After a while, you’ll see the PCUnlocker program which displays a list of local user accounts existing on your Hyper-V server. If you need to reset domain admin/user password, you need to click on the Reset Active Directory Password option. It will then display Active Directory user accounts.

  8. Choose a user account and click on Reset Password button. The program will unlock/reset your Windows password in no time.

Now you’ve successfully reset your lost Windows password for Hyper-V server. Unmount the PCUnlocker ISO image from the virtual machine’s DVD drive and restart the virtual machine. You can then log back into your Hyper-V server without a password! This method works with all versions of Windows virtual machine running in Microsoft Hyper-V, including Windows 8/7/Vista/XP and Windows Server 2012/2008/2003/2000.

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Posted in Others, Tips & Tricks, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows Vista, Windows XP

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Can’t Remember Password to Login Windows XP on Old Laptop

July 5th, 2013 by Admin

I have an old Windows XP laptop that’s not been used for 5 years, problem is I had a password set up on it and can’t remember what it was, I’ve tried many different passwords that it could possibly be without any luck, is there anyway I can reset or bypass the login password? I have some important documents and pictures on there that I really don’t want to lose with a brand new Windows install.

Forgot Windows XP password on your old laptop? Is there any way to unlock a password protected laptop without data loss? Fortunately, with the help of PCUnlocker Live CD, you can reset lost Windows XP password for your user account, allowing you access back into the operating system.

PCUnlocker Live CD boots up before Windows does, thus allowing it to access the SAM database of your Windows XP installation and reset your lost admin/user password. This makes sense because without your password you are completely locked out of your old computer. Follow this tutorial and you can reset Windows XP password easily!

How to Reset Windows XP Password on Your Old Laptop?

  1. First download the zipped ISO image of PCUnlocker Live CD. After you’ve downloaded it, decompress the ZIP archive and you’ll have a bootable ISO image file: pcunlocker. Burn it on to a blank CD using ISO2Disc, ImgBurn or other CD burning program.
  2. Insert the boot CD into your old Windows XP laptop and restart the computer. Go into the boot menu when the computer starts up (press the F12, Esc, or other key to enter the boot menu) and choose to boot from the CD.
  3. Just one or two minutes later you’ll see the PCUnlocker program. It displays a list of Windows local accounts of your old Windows XP laptop.
  4. Select the user account whose password you want to reset and click on Reset Password button. The program will remove your forgotten Windows XP password and unlock the user account when it is disabled, locked out or expired.
  5. Click on Restart button and remove the boot CD. The laptop will restart and it will automatically login to your Windows XP system without requiring you to enter a password.

Can’t remember Windows XP password for your old laptop? Using PCUnlocker Live CD you can get past Windows XP login screen easily. Quickly unlock your old laptop by resetting your lost or forgotten Windows XP password.

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