User account gone from wlcome screen

Hi Brink, BFK and other user profile guru types....

I recently spilt coffee on my keyboard and as it was working after the initial drain, I went and left it attached and the PC powered up. Since then thy keyboard went haywire and has been replaced.

Now my user profile has disapeared from the welcome screen.

The data folder is still there and the entry in "HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Profile list" is still there but with the "Central Profile" key.

I created a new user account with the same name and pointed it's registry entry "ProfileImagePath" to that of the old account, which works in safe mode but when trying to boot in normal mode it says logging on for a second then switches straight to logging off!

Also I took a screenshot from the control panel:



The account unknown is obviously the profile i'm trying to restore and the "Ryan" is the profile I've created to try and do this with.

Looking for guidance here as there is an encrypted folder (just one) under my original profile which I dont really want to loose. Any Ideas how to get this account unknown back in action (i'm afraid I dont know how it was caused as I spilt the coffee and left my machine unattended to break itself).

The only other thing I changed was enabling a welcome screen screen saver....

Hi Ryan ! Have you tried the SFC /SCANNOW Command - System File Checker ?

I haven't due to the fact that it undoes custom boot screens and logon screens and stuff but I suppose they are easily replaced. Trying it now! I suppose I should delete (or at least rename) the newly created profile with the same name? Although I suppose it will be OK because of the .computername suffix? still I dont know if the Welcome screen will display two users with the same name?

I guess everything of your user account is there, but sometimes they not visible due to some security settings related cause.
If SFC did not work, probably it is an issue related to security settings of the authenticated users . You may have a look at How do I restore security settings to a known working state? .

Hello Ryan,

You might see if this may be able to help. :)

Fix a corrupted user profile

Bugger,

SFC has sucessfully removed the Account Unknown and replaced it with nothing! I still cant logon to the new Ryan with the ProfileImagePath set to that of the old Ryan it just logs me straight back out.

I guess i've lost the stuff in that encrypted folder now!

I wish I had enough storage to backup and do a clean install, I will have to create a new partition a stagger the moving and resizing into several stages. I've not had to re-install in about 2 years.

Yet to try moving the ntuser files from the new ryan's real profile path to the old ryans profile folder. that might fix the logon issue!

Busy burning dinner at the moment, will be trying later this evening, thanks for the pointers guys but I think I'm gonna wipe it, there has been something wrong with my userprofiles for a while now and I think a re-install is going to be the only way to make sure it's right.

No problem. At least that way you'll start fresh with a more stable installation.