Unable to unlock a locked computer

[_Bat_]

This is really strange... I locked my XP machine before leaving work last night. I left it on so it could complete some downloads. I come in this morning and the 'user name' and 'password' fields are completely blank and greyed out, I can't type anything into them.

The computer has not crashed, I can press enter and cause it to display an incorrect username/password combination error and I can move the box around.

This is not at all important, just more of a pain then anything because I can't get in to see exactly what I was doing when I left. Just wondering if any of you have seen this before, google didn't really throw up any useful info.

Cheers

[plexer]

Do another ctrl + alt + delete on it?

Has anyone vnced it? sometimes I find vnced machines can't be unlocked until you vnc them again and send another ctrl + alt + del

Ben

[_Bat_]

Nope, no VNC software installed.

Tried CTRL + ALT + DEL, didn't do anything .

Ah well, I just forced it off now. I was just wondering if it was a common problem in case I come across it again at some point. I should follow my own advice sometimes... "have you tried turning it off and on again" .

[robert.mabbutt]

I use to leave my office pc locked over night due to a ranger problem and haven't come accross this issue.

Roberto

[plexer]

How about a shutdown -r -f -m \\computer_name from another xp workstation instead of forcing it to power off?

Ben

[Pottsey]

One of my home PC's started doing this a few days ago.

[crc-ict]

I had a computer doing this yesterday.

And what makes it doubly bizarre is a that it is an XP Home machine, which has no mechanism for the user to be able to lock it!

Very weird - are we seeing the effects of another 'high quality' MS update, or maybe the payload of a new virus??

[_Bat_]

Just out of curiousity... how many of these machines have IE7 installed?

Not saying it is this, but IE7 already has some annoying problems that I discovered today. Maybe this is another one.

[Pottsey]

Don’t have IE 7 on my PC with the problem. What I did notice on my PC it seems to be something to do with leaveing it for a while and the screen saver kicks in with the password option to unlock. Then if someone press’s the power button to turn off you get the problem in the first post.

[_Bat_]

Tis very odd indeed...

Left computer on again over night as a test, could unlock this time, but all I could see was the background, no icons or anything else. In the end I forced it to log off and logged back on again.

[john]

@Bat the one you have posted about last the no box at all I have had, and its when I've left video encoding software open either encoding or not, or a capture device such as TV card open on my XP box, it can cause this and basically it needs a reboot before it lives again.

[netadmin]

None of our XP machines have done that.

I have had a problem with the Windows 2003 server not being able to be unlocked if a remote desktop session connection is not ended properly. This happens fairly often for us.

[tarquel]

Very weird - are we seeing the effects of another 'high quality' MS update, or maybe the payload of a new virus??

Dont know about the virus thing, but it could be a hotfix... I've had it happen on occasion and I'm still in the dark with it.

Cheers
Nath

[FN-GM]

Sorry to bring this back from the dead but i didn't see a point in opening a new thread.

We are having the same problem on a few random machines arround the school. It has happened when no applications are open & when word, IE 7 and a few other things where open.

If anyone has a fix i would appreciate it.

[Gatt]

Only encountered this with VNC - great for winding people up with but a right royal PITA!