Password Problem

[solopathfinder]

A very elderly relative took it upon himself to upgrade his win7 to win10. Everything seemed to go smoothly, he said, until he got to the log-in screen. It asked for a password. His win7 did not have a password and just hitting the ENTER key didn't get him to the desktop. At the log-in screen, however, it listed his account at cox.net as well as another name at outlook.com, something he doesn't use. My sister and I suspect he created this outlook.com account when he either reserved or just updated without really understanding what he was doing and assume this is the password win10 is looking for.

He had no idea what the password might be. My sister took his password notebook and entered every password in there, one after the other. Finally, at one of the crazy passwords she got a "welcome" screen, but it stated there was an error and directed her to live.com, which is I assume due to the multiple incorrect attempts. However, we're unable to recover the account. It was set up just for the upgrade, so there is no history, no contacts, no emails, nothing. According to Microsoft, there's not enough information to validate ownership. But now that we know what the password is, it's not accepted due to the multiple trials.

At this point he has a bricked laptop. Is there anything I can tell them (I'm in a different State) to try or is their only recourse to try to return this laptop to its win7 factory default settings and start afresh?

 

[remostalin]

Follow those steps
https://4sysops.com/archives/reset-a-windows-10-password/

 

[solopathfinder]

Appreciate the link, but besides the fact that the procedure for creating a new local account is beyond what a 90-year-old man can handle, I'm not sure this will even work for him; this procedure is for a windows 10 password reset, and it *appears* that his problem is more in line with being unable to log into the phantom Microsoft account he created specifically for this upgrade. At least, that's the impression we've gotten, as he's directed to live.com to recover his account. My sister fills out the recovery form but has gotten back two rejections already. Bottom line: He can't log into his new Windows 10 or even go back to his old Windows 7.

 

[Guillon]

Hi, I am experiencing the identical problem your are describing "solopathfinder"....

cannot understand why.. someone has any suggestion?!

 

[solopathfinder]

Wish I had an answer for you, Guillon. Ultimately, my sister had to bring the laptop to a computer repair place. They apparently were able to bypass the password but stated something was "wrong" with the win 10 installation and they were going to reinstall win 10. Living several states away from them, I couldn't get my hands on the laptop to play with it and determine what the problem was myself. Wish I had a more definitive answer for you.

 

[Guillon]

As far as my old Windows Version did not have a password, i am start to wonder whether an automatic password may be established by default when installed Windows 10...

Did your previous windows have a password, solopathfinder?

 

[solopathfinder]

I upgraded my Dell tablet to win 10 yesterday. My tablet did, indeed, have a password. And when I upgraded, it accepted my password again readily. It was an astonishingly smooth-as-silk upgrade.

My dad's laptop did NOT have a Windows log-on password. However, since two user accounts showed up on his log-in screen (where previously in Win 7 he only had the one), I'm thinking that when he reserved his copy he might have also opened up a Windows Live account, thinking he *had* to in order to register for the upgrade. So when win 10 started up, it was looking for his Live password. Not remembering that password meant several incorrect guesses and therein lied the problem. He couldn't get the account back.

As I said, my father's laptop did have to be taken to a repair shop since I couldn't get my hands on it to play around with it, so I'm afraid I have no advice other than maybe start a new thread in this forum so you might get new eyes on your problem and other things to try.