hello i have xp media centre edition SP3.

basically i have been logging into windows using the "hidden" admin account. i went to add another account and it said i could only add administrator account, so i added it and my current account (the "hidden" admin one. that i have used for the past 2 years) has disappeared (i got it back by doing a system restore)

is there any way to create another hidden account and make the current one visible? or maybe create new account and move all settings data over to new account.

Is this what the window looks like?

NewAccount.jpg

Is that what you mean by Administrator? If so, all that is saying is you can create an account with Administrator privileges or a Limited account that does not have Administrator privileges.

The previous window is where you name the account.

NewAccount2.jpg

The name must be one that does not already exist.

no, the limited account option is greyed out (pic below). and if i create an admin account i can no longer log in as my current user it disappears except when i go into safe mode. which is why i think im using the Hidden admin account because the hidden account doesnt show in safe mode like it should.

Have you enabled the hidden Administrator account? Easiest way is as follows:

Open a Command Prompt
Enter net user administrator /active:yes

Once you do that, try starting in Safe mode then login as Administrator. See if you can then create another Administrator and Limited account.

Ignore this post. It refers to Windows 7, not XP, sorry.

XP prefers that you have an admin account other than the Admin account & through add/remove users it won't let you create any other account besides an administrator if you don't have a second after which it'll hide the Admin. However with MCE you should be able to create a user using computer management (see how). That particular article is for 2003 & 2008 but it's the same in xp. Note that this isn't available in XP home. I know that this applies to XP pro but I'm not sure about MCE.

hello. thank you for the advice, but my hard drive died a week ago, luckily i had a backup of my data so i ended up re-installing xp and remebering not to use the hidden admin account. so problem solved.

I apologise for ther late reply. but i couldnt afford a new hard drive untill yesterday.

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