I installed a language from control pannel; windows asked for win CD,
I put the CD in and the system installed the language. However, it
made me do system reboot. After rebooting, windows took me to the user
login screen, which is unusal since I never had a password or a login.
Now I cannot login AT ALL. when I click on the arrow buttom, it gives
me the following error:
"The system cannot log you on due to the following error: The
specified domain either does not exist or could not be contacted.
Please try again or consult your system administrator."
I am not connected to a network or domain and I am the adminstrator of
the PC. I pressed ctrl+alt+del twice to get me to the other login
screen to see if there was a domain, but there wan't any. When I click
on "more option" nothing shows up.
you can find screenshot of the two screen here
http://www.thefilehut.com/userfiles/TK19/VPC1.jpg
http://www.thefilehut.com/userfiles/TK19/VPC2.jpg
I did reinstall windows, that did not solve it. thanks for any help
The last thing I want is to reinstall windows from scratch, don't want that! |
Request for Question Clarification by
sublime1-ga
on
19 Sep 2006 23:06 PDT
iamcanadian...
The first picture shows an account name of Tdog, which may be
an account with administrative priveleges, but it is not THE
administrator account, as such, which would show with the
word administrator. Since your normal logon isn't presenting
you with this option, try hitting F8 as you're booting into
Windows, and choose Safe Mode from the menu.
When you reach the logon screen for safe mode, you should
be presented with an option to log on to either the Tdog
or the administrator account. Choose administrator, and,
if you created a password for the administrator account
when you first installed Windows, use that. Otherwise,
leave it blank and click the arrow.
Hopefully that will give you access to Windows. At that
point you may want to create an new user as an alternate
to the Tdog account, and see if you can log on to that
account successfully. If so, it may be that the TCP/IP
settings for the Tdog account have somehow become
corrupted.
Let me know where this takes you...
sublime1-ga
|
Clarification of Question by
iamcanadian-ga
on
20 Sep 2006 06:12 PDT
thanks for the follow-up.
I forgot to mention in my question that I actually tried that. I tried
save mode, restarting windows with the last known working config, and
others. All what it does is add an admin account which has the same
problem, same error.
thanks
|
Request for Question Clarification by
keystroke-ga
on
20 Sep 2006 15:41 PDT
Hello,
I have come across this problem many times in Windows XP and I have to
admit it does seem like a bug. Even with machines that are in a
Windows 2003 domain that are sat next to the Domain Controllers and
even the BDC have issues.
When you receive the "The specified domain either does not exist or
could not be contacted." error message this is telling you that you
are using the correct set of CACHED credentials but when the machine
tries to authenticate them against its SAM user accounts it fails.
This is usually due to a SAM corruption. The SAM is the location where
all local usernames and passwords are stored.
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/fq99-056.mspx
You might have a slightly problematic machine.
You may be best off giving your laptop to a PC engineer to look at.
Alternatively you should look at this document
http://www.petri.co.il/forgot_administrator_password.htm
and you may be able to reset the passwords, however with a possibly
broken SAM database you could be trying to flog a dead horse.
Speak to Microsoft as you should have at least 2 support incidents
with them with Windows XP (do not open a paid call with them, if you
bought the software OEM speak to the people you got the PC from as
they provide support).
Let me know if this helps.
--Keystroke-ga
|
Clarification of Question by
iamcanadian-ga
on
20 Sep 2006 22:02 PDT
I haven't forgotten the password, there was none to begine with, no
password, no account.
only if I can do a system restore, however, I can't login. do you
think I can do a system restore if I install a butable linux CD?
or do you have another idea?
|
Request for Question Clarification by
cynthia-ga
on
21 Sep 2006 02:52 PDT
Thanks for the clarification. This is really a dilema.
Try this:
I Forgot My Administrator Password!
http://pubs.logicalexpressions.com/pub0009/LPMArticle.asp?ID=305
Let me know if this works.
|
Request for Question Clarification by
cynthia-ga
on
21 Sep 2006 02:54 PDT
Since you never set a password, when you are trying this procedure, I
suggest you set one when you get to that stage (#11 & #12 in the
list). That way you'll have something to type in when the login screen
appears.
|
Clarification of Question by
iamcanadian-ga
on
21 Sep 2006 04:41 PDT
Hello,
I did like what as directed, I was able to successfully change my
password, I continued though the repair. However, I still have that
same error, even when I enter the "new password".
THanks
|
Request for Question Clarification by
keystroke-ga
on
21 Sep 2006 06:03 PDT
Hello iamcanadian,
Alternatively you should look at this document
http://www.petri.co.il/forgot_administrator_password.htm
and you may be able to reset the passwords, however with a possibly
broken SAM database you could be trying to flog a dead horse.
Speak to Microsoft as you should have at least 2 support incidents
with them with Windows XP (do not open a paid call with them, if you
bought the software OEM speak to the people you got the PC from as
they provide support).
--keystroke-ga
|
Request for Question Clarification by
keystroke-ga
on
21 Sep 2006 06:04 PDT
iamcanadian,
Try the above option and see if that works..
let me know how it turns out.
--keystroke-ga
|
Clarification of Question by
iamcanadian-ga
on
21 Sep 2006 10:17 PDT
Hello,
that did not work.
I don't think the problem is with the password, I don't even think
that it even goes beyond that step where it verifies the password. as
soon as I click the the arrow, I hear a beep sound coming from my PC,
not sound card, and it shows me that error.
Thank you for continuing support
|
Request for Question Clarification by
gregaw-ga
on
21 Sep 2006 10:33 PDT
Domain Controller... hum...
Like you said, normally you can hit ctrl+alt+del twice to get me to
the other login screen and change what you are logging into. Usually
either a domain controller or the local machine.
You can specify where you want to login without the little box to pick
it from. Get to the actual login screen by pressing ctrl+alt+del
twice and type this in the user name field:
<computername>\administrator
Example: workstation1\administrator
On my pc, where I can see the field to choose where to login to, as
soon as you type the backslash it grays-out that field. So if your
machine is trying to login to a domain this should over ride it and
force it to login to the local machine. You must know the exact name
of your computer for this to work.
On a down note, safe mode doesn't usually allow you to login to a
domain, so I doubt if this will do anything for you, but its worth a
try.
Good Luck!
|
Request for Question Clarification by
keystroke-ga
on
21 Sep 2006 13:05 PDT
Hi again!
It is not an uncontactable domain controller that is the problem here,
it is the fact that the password cannot be authenticated against a
local or remote account. As stated in the question the user is not
using a domain so there is no DC or BDC to worry about.
I would strongly suggest that you try the website
http://www.petri.co.il/forgot_administrator_password.htm
mainly
http://home.eunet.no/~pnordahl/ntpasswd/
This software will give you access to the local SAM, once you have
access to the local SAM you are able to edit the local database. If
you can edit the local database you can overwrite it with a password
you know is going to be accepted. If the SAM is corrupt however the
software should fail.
This is why it is in your interest to at least try it as it could fix
the user database.
--Keystroke-ga
|
Request for Question Clarification by
cynthia-ga
on
21 Sep 2006 13:27 PDT
That beep is mostlikely a BIOS error code.
bios error beep codes
://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=bios+error+beep+codes
What I would try next is VirtualDr's XP Help forum, be sure to include
a link here so people can see what you've tried, or you can recap.
Virtual Dr OS Help Forum entry page:
http://discussions.virtualdr.com/forumdisplay.php?forumid=42
VirtualDr Home Page, pokae around, this is a fantastic site:
http://www.virtualdr.com/
Not to direct you off the GA site, but hey, whatever works! VirtualDr
has never failed to help me with a problem.
|
Clarification of Question by
iamcanadian-ga
on
21 Sep 2006 13:39 PDT
Hello,
I tried this:
http://home.eunet.no/~pnordahl/ntpasswd/
it did not work. It claimed to have recovered the sam files.
I tried gregaw-ga suggestion, it did not work
OK, I'm about to throw in the towel :(, any more suggestions?
Thanks for all the help.
I'll look into virtual Dr.
|
Request for Question Clarification by
keystroke-ga
on
21 Sep 2006 15:16 PDT
Hey iamcanadian,
A repair install may be in order. You should ideally take your PC to a
local repair shop for them to run a repair on it. This is different to
a reinstall!
Best wishes,
--keystroke-ga
|
