Retreiving WinNT Serial Number

[Zealing]

I know that it is possible to recover the Windows 95 serial numbers by doing a file find in certain Windows files such as user.exe, but is it possible to recover a Windows NT Workstation key in a similiar way. If so, what do I need to search for and what file do I need to Search? Thanks.

[sdrawkcab]

Originally posted by Zealing:
<STRONG>I know that it is possible to recover the Windows 95 serial numbers by doing a file find in certain Windows files such as user.exe, but is it possible to recover a Windows NT Workstation key in a similiar way. If so, what do I need to search for and what file do I need to Search? Thanks.</STRONG>

Not positive if this relates to NT, I'm at home and NT box is at work for the week, but here's a couple tips for 95/98/ME... It should be stored in plain text in the registry, and also displayed in the System Properties dialog box. Right-click MyComputer and the serial number is displayed there. Open REGEDIT and check HKLM/Software/Microsoft/Windows/CurrentVersion and see the ProductKey string.

[Zealing]

Cheers for the reply. I know it can be recovered from a working machine, but the problem I have is this. The machine boots to NT, but someone has deleted the explorer.exe file, so I don't get a GUI interface load up so I can't do much at all. I have tried to copy explorer.exe from another N box onto floppy and then run this file from the task manager, but that just caused DR Watson to spit it. The owner of the machine is happy for me to install a new 10GB drive (Its only a 1.3GB in there at the moment) and to do a re-install. He has an original NT CD, but wasn't supplied the serial number when he purchased the machine 2nd hand. The 1.3GB drive is also using NTFS so Im going to have to pull it out of the machine its in, put it in my PC so I can read the disk. The only way to get the number back is if I can extract it from an NT system file, if it exists in any. Either that or I just install NT onto the new hard disk using a dodgy serial number Which I am trying to avoid if at all possible.

[MPalecek]

You can get into a shell by opening Progman.exe if you can get to the task manager. I just tried it on a W2K machine and was able to get into regedit no problem.

[cookin chef]

Originally posted by Malties:
<STRONG>You can get into a shell by opening Progman.exe if you can get to the task manager. I just tried it on a W2K machine and was able to get into regedit no problem.</STRONG>

Yes Malties, you are correct with that. But with win2k, you cannot either search for nor change the proper product key code while using regedit because it is encrypted. There may be another way to get it, but I'm not aware of any. Someone else in the forums may know though.