Still not sure where posts should go, but this forum seems generic enough.

A friend of a friend was killed by a drunk driver on the 4th, and his family has asked me to help them get into his PC so they can close out his affairs. It's an XP Home box, password protected. It's been quite awhile since I've even touched a "home" edition, but I seem to remember the admin account is disabled by default, and even if it wasn't, I'll assume for now it too would be password protected.

Anyone have ideas on how to get in? Once I'm in resetting his password should be easy enough. Worst case I can pull the drive and copy the data, import email and such to another box, but logging into his account seems the better option for his family.

If you need only to access files stored on the HDD just put it into a different PC and you can get the files. As Paul said you may need to take ownership of the files but it should work. It works with Domain member XP pro, so I think it works with Home too.

If you need some personal data and if you can log-on the system with a different user, just try to install Cain&Abel and take security hashes. Assuming that a rather easy password has been set (beeing a home computer), with a dictionary attack on the hases you can crack the password with time.

N.B. The XP File and Settings Transfer Wizard won't touch executables, just settings and data files. MS thinks they're protecting licenses, or at least not being a party to violations.

Yes, I'm talking to myself.  Very few others understand me as well as I do.  I think.  I could be wrong.