I forgot my old Windows XP password. Sure, it went end of life 4 years ago, but I like to live dangerously. Really, I just wanted to get my old XP VM running so that I could use it in the labs for Practical Malware Analysis.

This is an old technique, and since Windows XP is almost two decades old, it still works. Boot from a live Linux CD and temporarily replace SETHC.EXE with CMD.EXE.

Then boot back into Windows. Hit SHIFT five times and use net user to change the password.

You’ve successfully changed your password to hunter2. Now you can log in to Windows XP and Microsoft will remind you this is a bad idea.