How do I reset my windows password without the need for a USB flash drive?

Question

I am trying to log into my window's PC and I keep getting incorrect password. When I attempt to reset my password I get the following message "No Drive - This feature requires removable media, such as a USB flash drive. Please connect a USB flash drive and then try again". Many help articles around this same issue instruct users to perform a hard reset their PC and factory settings. My question is - How do I reset my password without performing a hard reset of the PC or the need to use an external flash drive?

Thanks

Lisha

Answer 1

If you’re seeing the message about needing removable media, that means you’re trying to use the “password reset disk” feature, which only works if you created a USB-based password reset previously. If you haven’t, Windows won’t let you reset the password this way.

You can try getting to a command prompt at the login screen by using Windows recovery options. Restart your PC and boot into the Windows Recovery Environment by pressing F11 (or Shift + Restart from the login screen if possible). Go to Troubleshoot → Advanced Options → Command Prompt. In the Command Prompt, you can replace the Ease of Access executable with Command Prompt using:

copy c:\windows\system32\utilman.exe c:\
copy /y c:\windows\system32\cmd.exe c:\windows\system32\utilman.exe

Then restart your PC. At the login screen, click the Ease of Access button to open a Command Prompt with system privileges. From there, reset your user password using the same net user command:

net user YourUsername NewPassword

After logging in, it’s crucial to restore the original utilman.exe to avoid system issues:

copy /y c:\utilman.exe c:\windows\system32\utilman.exe

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hth

Marcin