How to Create a Password Reset Disk on USB Flash Drive in Windows 10
If you forget your Windows password, you can use a password reset disk to create a new one. It is recommend that you create a password reset disk when you create a password for your local account before you forget the password to avoid losing access to your files and information. It will be to late to create a password reset disk after you forgot your password.
This tutorial will show you how to create a password reset disk on a USB flash drive that you can use to reset your local account's password afterwards in Windows 10.
If you type in an incorrect password for your local account on the sign in screen and click/tap on OK, you will then have a Reset password option available to use the password reset disk (USB) to reset and create a new password with.
A password reset disk can only be created for local accounts, and not for Microsoft accounts.
When you create a password reset disk on a USB flash drive, it will create and add a userkey.psw file to root directory of the USB flash drive for the specific local user account. You can move the userkey.psw file to the root directory of another USB flash drive if you like, but you can only have one userkey.psw file on a USB flash drive.
The password reset disk can be used to reset your local account's password no matter how many times you reset it with the password reset disk.
Here's How:
1 Sign in to your local account on the PC.
2 Open the Control Panel (icons view), and click/tap on the User Accounts icon.
3 Connect a USB flash drive that you want to use as your password reset disk.
The USB flash drive will not be formatted during the creation of the password reset disk, so you can use one that already has data on it without worry.
4 Click/tap on the Create a password reset disk link on the left side. (see screenshot below)
You can also enter
rundll32.exe keymgr.dll,PRShowSaveWizardExW
into Run (Win+R) and click/tap on OK to open the Forgotten Password Wizard.
5 Click/tap on Next. (see screenshot below)
6 Select the USB flash drive you connected from step 3 above, and click/tap on Next. (see screenshot below)
7 Type in the current password for your local user account, and click/tap on Next. (see screenshot below)
8 If prompted to Replace Previous Disc for this local account, click/tap on Yes. (see screenshot below)
Any previous password reset disk for this local account will be now be invalid and cannot be used to reset the password for this local account.
9 If the USB flash drive already has a userkey.psw file in it's root directory, then click/tap on Yes to replace it. (see screenshot below)
10 When it's finished, click/tap on Next. (see screenshot below)
11 Click/tap on Finish. (see screenshot below)
12 Keep your password reset disk in a safe and secure location to have available to you as needed.
That's it,
Shawn Brink
Related Tutorials
- How to Add Password to Local Account in Windows 10
- How to Change Password of Local Account or Microsoft Account in Windows 10
- How to Reset Password of Local Account or Microsoft Account in Windows 10