For one reason or another, you may find yourself in a situation where you aren't able to sign into Windows. Sometimes you just forget your password or PIN, it happens even to the best of us! Maybe you had an old laptop lying around that your parents hadn't used in a long time and they gave it to you, but can't remember their login information.
If you have BitLocker installed on your drive, you will need to clean install Windows. You can learn more about how to do that here!
Important heads up: Resetting Windows will remove all apps and potentially all files from your PC. We recommend backing up any important documents first.
To access the recovery environment from the login screen, follow these steps:
1. Hold Shift on the keyboard, and click the Power icon on the right side of the screen.
2. Click Restart, while still holding Shift on the keyboard
3. The computer will restart, let go of Shift when the Choose an option appears. Click on Troubleshoot
4. Click Reset this PC
5. Here you will be presented with two options to proceed:
Keep my files: This option is the safest of the two as it doesn’t remove your documents or pictures. This allows Windows to attempt a reinstall the core system files which has been known to correct a variety of corruption issues, from Windows updates to installing apps, anything that can touch a system file can cause corruption. This will remove apps such as Office, games, and other apps that were installed after setting up Windows.
Remove everything: This option is used when a completely clean slate is needed. This removes all files and apps, and once complete will take you through the initial setup of a primary account on the computer. This is best when all other software steps have been tried and is generally the last resort before checking/changing the hardware in the system.
Click on the option you would like to proceed.
6. Choose whether to install Windows from the cloud or locally from your computer.
Cloud download will download Windows from the internet, this option may take some time to finish.
Local reinstall is quicker and allows you to reset Windows without an internet connection. If the local reinstall option does not work we recommend trying the cloud download option.
7. If you previously chose to remove everything you will be prompted whether to just remove your files to fully clean the drive.
Just remove my files is the quickest as it is only concerned about removing the files on the system, however it may be possible for sensitive data to be recovered later.
Fully clean the drive will overwrite the data on your drive multiple times to make it difficult to recover. This process may take quite some time to complete. This is recommended when selling your computer and you have sensitive information you do not want others to recover.
8. Confirm that all of the options you have selected previously is correct. Once you are ready you can click Reset to start resetting Windows! Once you click Reset it is not possible to cancel or reverse this process.
Once you click Reset the computer will restart and begin to remove any apps on the computer. If you choose the keep my files option, you will be greeted by your normal login screen. If you choose the option to remove everything, you will be taken through the first-time setup and account creation process.
