Windows Admin Center asking for login and password after fresh installation

Question

I just installed a copy of Windows Server 2019 to mess with and did the required installation of Windows Admin Center on a separate (desktop computer) which is not connected to the network. On launching WAC, it asks me for login details. Not sure what to put in there?

Answer 1

Hello Kevin,

The Windows Admin Center (WAC) “gateway” runs as a service on the PC where you installed it. Out-of-the-box it trusts only the local Administrators group (or a domain account that’s in that group), so the first time you launch it, your browser will ask which Windows account should be used to authenticate to the gateway.

For further details, please visit this link of Microsoft Learn.

If you never set a local administrator password

On Windows Server 2019 the built-in Administrator account may be disabled when you chose the “recommended” security options. You can either:

• Enable it and set a password from Server Manager ➜ Local Users and Groups ➜ Users,
• Or create a new local admin (net user WACAdmin <StrongPassword> /add && net localgroup administrators WACAdmin /add).

Let me know if anything is still unclear—happy to help further.

Best regards,

Finn Dang