Use the Administrator Account

When I installed Windows, I had to choose an Administrator password and then create a separate user account for myself. Can I delete the superfluous account and simply use the Administrator account as my primary login?

You can, but only in Windows XP Professional and Media Center Edition. (Note: in MCE, the Administrator account is named "Media Center" by default.) In Windows XP Home, the Administrator account is restricted and can be used only when you start your PC in Safe Mode.

To log in as the Administrator, go to Start --> Log Off, and click the Log Off button. Once you see the Welcome screen, press Ctrl-Alt-Del twice to show the old-fashioned "Log On to Windows" dialog box. Type Administrator for the username, enter the Administrator password below, and click OK.

Once you've logged on as the Administrator, you can delete the superfluous user account from the User Accounts control panel. Of course, you'll lose all the settings from that account, so it may not be worth it if you've been using the account for some time.

To show the Administrator account on the Welcome screen, open the Registry Editor (go to Start --> Run and type regedit ), navigate to
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\WindowsNT\Cu rrentVersion\
Winlogon\SpecialAccounts\UserList , select Edit --> New --> DWORD Value, and type Administrator for the name of the new value. Double-click the new Administrator value in the right pane and type 1 in the "Value data" field. When you're done, close the Registry Editor and
restart Windows for the change to take effect.

Note: Don't know the Administrator password? Provided you're logged in as a user with administrator privileges (not the same as the Administrator account), you can choose a new password for the Administrator account in the alternate User Accounts window (go to Start --> Run and type control userpasswords2 ). Just highlight any user in the list other than Administrator, and then click the Reset Password button .
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