Solved Fixing my corrupted Windows 7 admin account? (No backup available.)

[Jake0]

Detailed Explanation

A few days ago I started my computer and was taken directly to the Windows repair screen because my computer was apparently unable to start. After running the repair tool for a few minutes, Windows told me it had no solution, so I simply restarted the computer. After that it started fine and I thought everything was solved. But yesterday, after I logged in successfully, my mouse and keyboard suddenly stopped responding. I used the power button to manually restart my computer. I tried to log in again but I got the "User Profile Service failed" error message.

Now, every time I attempt to log in, I get the "User Profile Service failed" message immediately after entering my password. I logged in to the standard Guest profile and attempted to edit the registry according to the first method found here, but admin privileges are required to edit the registry, and every time I type my admin password into the administrator privileges prompt, nothing happens (it accepts the password but then does nothing). So it appears I cannot use my admin password to gain admin privileges.

Next, I booted in Safe Mode and attempted to log in to my admin account. It actually allowed me to log in using the admin password, but whenever I tried to click anything such as "Create an account", nothing happened. So it appears I can log in to the admin account with Safe Mode, but I can't do much else on that account.

I'm currently downloading Hiren's BootCD 15.2 because this discussion leads me to believe it might be able to copy files from my admin profile to a new profile without prompting me for admin privileges. Another problem is that I've gotten lazy so I haven't backed up files or programs in months, so I need to create a new admin account and somehow copy over all of my files and programs without accidentally losing them. I have a terabyte hard drive that's over half full of games and important documents, so I can NOT lose the data stored in my corrupted account.

Summary

I can't log in to my only admin account because it's corrupted. I can access it in Safe Mode but I can't do anything in Safe Mode (e.g. when I click "Create an account" nothing happens). I can't edit the registry from the Guest profile or do anything requiring admin privileges because the admin password doesn't seem to work. None of my files or programs are backed up. I need a method by which I can either repair my current admin account, or create a new admin account and copy over all of my files and programs.

System Information

Windows 7 Home Premium
64-bit
avast! Free Antivirus (Is it likely the free version of avast! let a virus slip by and corrupt my account? I've never had any problems with avast! in the past.)

I've been running my home-built PC for almost two years now with no major problems. It's pretty quiet for the most part but I may have noticed some slightly louder whirring and clicking while booting up since these problems began. Then again, I could just be imagining it. I filled out the exact specs when I created my forum account in case someone thinks the profile corruption could be caused by a hardware problem. When I have time I'll pop the case open and see if I notice any obvious internal damage.

 

[Brink]

Hello Jake, and welcome to Seven Forums.

While logged in to the built-in Administrator account, the tutorial below may be able to help with the user profile error for your account.

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorial...-failed-logon-user-profile-cannot-loaded.html

Hope this helps,
Shawn

 

[Jake0]

Is this built-in admin account separate from the admin account I've been using since installing Windows? If so, that could solve my problem. I'll try the tutorial when I get home later tonight.

 

[Brink]

Yep, the built-in Administrator is different than your normal administrator account.

It's elevated by default while your administrator account isn't.

 

[Jake0]

Thank you very much. That tutorial was extremely helpful. For anyone else with this problem, just follow the tutorial Brink posted and make sure to enable the built-in admin account by booting from a system repair disk and opening the command prompt (all of this is explained in the various tutorials linked to by the tutorial that Brink posted here). That seems to be the best method for opening a command prompt with admin privileges if you can't use your admin password, like I couldn't. I don't know if the Safe Mode command prompt works, because for some reason whenever I attempted to boot into Safe Mode with a command prompt, my computer just booted into regular Safe Mode, without a command prompt. Anyway, this problem has been solved!

 

[Brink]

Great news. I'm glad it was able to help.