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Old User Account Still Showing Up

My wife got a new laptop and I'm using her old one at work.  While still on Windows 7, I deleted her account and set up a new one in my name as administrator.  I then upgraded to Windows 10.  Every time I restart the laptop, Windows 10 wants to default to her old account and shows it on the login screen.  My account is listed in the lower left corner of the login screen as an additional account.  I have to select my account instead of hers, enter my password and login as usual.  Her name/old account is NOT listed under user accounts or family accounts, etc.  I have not found any way to completely delete her account or any other evidence of her name on this laptop.

How can I get, what seems to be a ghost account off this laptop?  Thanks in advance for any suggestions!

Hi Steve,

Thank you for posting in Microsoft Community. I understand that you are unable to delete an account in Windows 10.

I will certainly assist you with it.

Are you using a local account or a Microsoft Account?

You must be signed in as an administrator to be able to delete a user account.

Be sure to always have at least one enabled administrator account on the PC to avoid not being able to perform actions that require administrator rights.

All you have to do is create an admin account. Restart the computer and try to delete the old account that shows up from user accounts or family accounts.

Enable the built in admin account and check.

type cmd in the search bar.

Right click the cmd.exe above the search block and run as administrator
In the command window type net user administrator /active:yes

Check whether you are able to find the account in the list.

Hope this helps. Get back to us for further queries. We are happy to help!

Thanks & Regards
Joy

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Thanks for the response.  I am using a Microsoft account and I am signed in as administrator.  In the User Accounts settings, I am the only user listed (except the additional built-in administrator account).  My wife's name does not appear as a user anywhere except on the sign in screen when I turn on or reboot the computer.  Even though I deleted her account and removed all her files, I do find some traces left of her name when I search the registry.  Out of an abundance of caution, I have not deleted any of these registry entries.  However, I do suspect that there is some registry entry that may be left over and is causing her account to still appear as the default account on the sign in screen.  Could this be where the problem lies?  Thanks again for any help on this annoying issue.

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Hi,

My apologies for the delayed response.

I suggest you to follow below steps to delete the user account and check if it resolves the issue.
1. Right click on Start button and select Computer Management.
2. Navigate down through “Local Users and Groups” and then Users, and then locate the username in the list that

    you’d like to get rid of.
3. Right click and choose Delete.

Note: Above action cannot be reversed, so make sure you only delete the accounts that you really  don’t want anymore.

 
If the issue remains unresolved, please get back to us and we would be happy to help.

Thank you.

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Thanks again for the reply.  "Local Users and Group"s is not listed in the Computer Management console.  Apparently "lusrmgr" is not available on this edition of Windows 10 (build 10565).  "lusrmgr.msc" just refers me to the User Accounts tool in the Control Panel and, as I stated above, I am the only user listed there.

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Was there aver a response to this? It clearly says there is no user in the settings yet the response given is the same...delete the user.

I have the same issue and would a resolution

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There was never any further responses to the issue.  I ended up doing a "Reset" - that fixed it.

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Last updated April 6, 2024 Views 24,866 Applies to: