Renaming or Disabling Admininstrator Account

[senathon]

I would like to rename the Administrator Account Unattend to another name for example: Tom

or I would like to create though unattend a User Account for Tom with Administrator rights, so when the computer boots up the first time, Tom is the account active, then the Administrator account is disable.

The idea is Tom is an administrator account instead of Administrator.

Edited November 4, 2009 by senathon

[MrJinje]

You want to use something like this in your Oobe System Pass (autounattend.xml) during Windows-Shell-Setup. But basically Adminsitrator is already disabled by default, this will create Tom Account (which is already Administrator). Can add password or leave blank.

<UserAccounts>
   <LocalAccounts>
	  <LocalAccount wcm:action="add">
		 <Password>
			<Value></Value>
			<PlainText>true</PlainText>
		 </Password>
		 <DisplayName>Tom</DisplayName>
		 <Group>Administrators</Group>
		 <Name>Tom</Name>
	  </LocalAccount>
   </LocalAccounts>
</UserAccounts>

If you want to encrypt your password you would need to install teh W7 WAIK and use WSIM (aka Windows System Image Manager)

[MAVERICKS CHOICE]

Yes basically Vista or W7 doesn't allow anyone to be"superadmin" like we did in XP.

[senathon]

Yes basically Vista or W7 doesn't allow anyone to be"superadmin" like we did in XP.

Dang, that is what I was trying to do.

IF I setup "TOM" acount in /oobe, is it possible that TOM to have the same or very similar settings.

This configuration is for laptops to be used by admins, but the admins name (ex. TOM) is used instead of administrator.

I would like to do this with either unattend or a script(either I can run manually or runonce)

Any help is highly apprecated.

[MrJinje]

Yes basically Vista or W7 doesn't allow anyone to be"superadmin" like we did in XP.

Dang, that is what I was trying to do.

IF I setup "TOM" acount in /oobe, is it possible that TOM to have the same or very similar settings.

This configuration is for laptops to be used by admins, but the admins name (ex. TOM) is used instead of administrator.

I would like to do this with either unattend or a script(either I can run manually or runonce)

Any help is highly apprecated.

No such thing as super admin account in windows - Is a myth started by comparison of Administrator account to linux root user - aka - Super User - aka SU. All accounts within the local Administrators group are equally powerfull. If "TOM" account gets hacked by malware, you are just as screwed as if Administrator gets hacked.

To enable the Administrator account in W7 is snap. Just run this line of code

Net user administrator /active:yes

Only real difference in W7 is that the account is set disabled, just like when Creating a new account in AD. Old Hat.

Some people say things about UAC and super-admin blah blah blah, but I haven't ran into any issues using MrJinje Account with a disabled Administrator on my machine yet.

[MAVERICKS CHOICE]

@MrJinje

Does that piece of code only required to be run once?

[MrJinje]

@MrJinje

Does that piece of code only required to be run once?

Ayup, only need be run once.

For future readers this can also can be done from GUI.

Open Computer Management > Local Users and Groups > Users > Administrator > Properties and uncheck the "Account is Disabled" check box.

Just a thought, but probably could run the NET USER snip from the SetupComplete.cmd and couple that with AutoLogin to avoid having to create a user account at all.

[steve17]

Be aware that the Administrator account has no password by default.

Personally I wouldn't mess around with the Administrator account because I assume (probably at my peril) that Microsoft knows what they are doing better than I know what they are doing. At least by a slim margin.

The Administrator account seems to be Win7's ace in the hole. You can log on to this disabled account from safe mode when all other admin accounts are disabled.