domain – I do stuff sometimes.

I have some machines in my lab at home that, due to heavy testing and other stuff, reboots often.
Some of my applications are dependent on the user beeing logged on to function properly – so instead of manually logging on each time my server boots, I fiddled around in registry to make the domain user log on automatically.

This, of course, is not recomended in any production environment, but for lab purposes, I find this trick very useful.

1. First, open regedit on the machine you want to fiddle with.
2. Navigate to HKLMSoftwareMicrosoftWindows NTCurrentVersionwinlogon
3. Make a backup of winlogon.
4. Change the following values (you may need to add some of them if they’re not present).

AutoAdminLogon = 1 (String Value Key) (0 means off, 1 means automatic)
DefaultUserName = Username (String Value Key)
DefaultPassword = Password (String Value Key)
DefaultDomainName = yourdomain.com (String Value Key) (Only needed if this computer has joined a domain)

4. Reboot

The user should now log on automatically.
As you see, the password is displayed in clear text, so beware.

– F