Monday, March 3, 2014

How to Reset Lost Admin Password of A Windows 7 VM Running in VMware

I have a Windows 7 VMware image whose admin password is forgotten. How can I reset or recover the password? Or do I need to rebuild a new machine?
If you ever lost your Windows 7 password, that could be a very heart wrenching feeling. Don't Panic! This process works for both physical machines as well as Virtual VMware Images. I'll take you through the steps to reset VMware password:

Step 1: First, download the PCUnlocker program from here and save it on your host machine. The download file is a self-extracting archive which contains an ISO image: pcunlocker.iso.

Step 2: Shut down your Windows 7 VM and attach the PCUnlocker ISO image to the virtual CD/DVD drive.

Step 3: Now you need to change the boot order in BIOS. To make it easier to access the BIOS setup screen, edit the virtual machine's configuration (.vmx) and add or edit one of these options:

bios.forceSetupOnce = "TRUE"

Step 4: When your VM instance boots, you will be in the BIOS. Change the BIOS settings so that your VM Image first boots from the CDROM. Save your changes and exit.

Step 5: During booting, PCUnlocker will start automatically and you'll see a list of system user account. Select the user you want to clear the password and clear (delete) that password.

Step 6: Click on "Restart" button to quit this program and then shut down your VM instance.

Step 7: Edit the *.vmx file again and change: bios.forceSetupOnce = "TRUE" to bios.forceSetupOnce = "FALSE". Save your changes.

Step 8: Restart your VM instance and you can then log back into Windows 7 without a password!

No comments:

Post a Comment