Administrator Not Able to Unlock a "Locked" PC

[kcnychief]

Really weird situation -

There is a PC where local/domain admins can't log off specific user accounts. They can log off other users, even other local/domain admins, but there are two domain user accounts that can't be logged off, no matter what. All you get when you try is this message:

This computer is in use and has been locked.
Only domain\username or an administrator can unlock this computer.
Press Ctrl + Alt + Del to unlock this computer.

The only thing I can find which may/may not apply is this -

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/242917

Nothing else makes any sense. It almost seems as if these two accounts have put themselves into a sandbox, and others can't touch them.

Any thoughts/ideas?

 

[madmatt]

Did you try the resolution? How likely is it that the screen saver is corrupt or missing?

 

[kcnychief]

I haven't tried it yet, the PC is at work and I am now home. Thing is though, looking at the resolution it makes reference to HKEY_USERS which would effect ALL users on the PC. This only seems to effect a relationship between all accounts and those two in particular - unless I am looking at it right it won't apply.

I'll still give it a shot tomorrow, but I'm not too excited about it.

 

[madmatt]

HKEY_USERS is not HKEY_CURRENT_USER. HKEY_USERS is also where settings for pre-logon exist.

 

[kcnychief]

Right, but what I meant by my previous post was that HKEY_USERS would effect all accounts, not just 1 or 2.

Anyways - I was thinking about this while eating and I think the fix above may actually be viable. The problem that exists is when the machine locks due to inactivity, hence the 15 minute period (that is our defined timeout) goes by, and the machine locks with the screen saver policy also kicking in. During my testing with other accounts and such, I was doing manual locks (Windows Key + L) and then unlocking by authenticating. This may not have been the best way since essentially, it wasn't going through the timings and locking.

This makes more sense now, I'll give it a shot tomorrow and see how that goes.

 

[kcnychief]

Bah.

Called the user asking him to stay logged on yesterday - woman comes in and the problem didn't re-create itself. I'm wondering if anything sneaky was done if it was un-done out of fear of getting in trouble for violoating corporate policy 😛