Oh No, Where'd My Account Go?

[TevinTwo]

Help!

Yesterday I installed ssh so I could remote into my server and when I went to my computer today my local user account is gone! I had two of them so I was able to log into my secondary one and I see all my missing user account files in the C directory. When I went to Control Panel to the "User Accounts" area it is not there either, all I see are my ssh accounts. Where did it go? How do I get it back? The files on that user account use up 75% of my computer space so I can't just copy the files to a new account; I would have to move and delete constantly.


Also when I went to restart, the computer said that other users were logged in, so it still exists somewhere because I never logged out; I just locked the machine.

Help!

 

[Lance1]

Hi TevinTwo and welcome to WSF. A system restore should fix this for you.

 

[TevinTwo]

Hi TevinTwo and welcome to WSF. A system restore should fix this for you.

Hello, I've tried system restore but it said I don't have any restore points.

 

[Lance1]

I see all my missing user account files in the C directory.

On the main root or at C:\Users?

 

[TevinTwo]

I see all my missing user account files in the C directory.

On the main root or at C:\Users?

In C:\Users

 

[paul1149]

Those files should be backed up anyway, right? If so, back them up to another drive, then you'll be free to experiment with the install. Have you done a full reboot yet?

 

[Lance1]

I see all my missing user account files in the C directory.

On the main root or at C:\Users?

In C:\Users

When you say that "I see all my missing user account files" Do you mean that you see then in the user profile folder?

 

[Ztruker]

Before doing any of the following, create a System Restore point.

Since your files are still there, it sounds like your user profile has lost it's connection with where it's data is stored. If you are comfortable with using regedit, try this by booting to Safe Mode by pressing F8 during boot. Login as Administrator, no password.

The key is a registry hack that redirects Windows back to the ProfileImagePath of the original profile.


Press Windows key + R, type regedit and press Enter or click OK.

Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\ProfileList


Once there, you will see the SID's listed for all of the profiles on the machine. Within the Key for each SID there is an entry called "ProfileImagePath" that will look like


%SystemDrive%\Documents and Settings\UserName...


Scroll through the SID's until you find the one with the screwy name, like


%SystemDrive%\Documents and Settings\youruserid.2


This is just an example, could be something else weird.


Just edit the Key to remove the ".2", and it will point the user back to their old profile...


Got this from TechRepublic.com but it's no longer there.