How to
change “User Name” in Windows XP & Vista
See Below Special Win 7
Instructions
revised 4/27/2011
You cannot change a user account by just changing the name.
Just changing the name will make a cosmetic change only and not affect the
underlying files/folders in the profile.
1. From an account with administrative privileges, go to Control Panel>User
Accounts and create the “new_user_account” renamed the way you want it to be and
at least one extra Administrator account. Call the latter "Admin" or "Tech" or
what ever you like. You will need a total of 3 user accounts before proceeding
to step 2.
2. Log off and then Log onto the “new_user_account” [switch users] once so
the profile files/folders are created and then switch users again into “Admin”.
You can also shut down and restart to log onto the “new_user_account” or "Admin"
3. Now go to Control Panel>System>Advanced>User
Profiles>Settings
4. You will see where you can copy user accounts. [See below for Win 7] Select [highlight] the account that you want to duplicate [your old User Name] then click the Copy button. Use Browse to select your new account:
(C:\Documents and
Settings\<new_user_account> in XP)
or
(C:\Users\<new_user_account> in
Vista and Win7).
5. Log into the new correctly named account and make
sure all your stuff is there and that it works the way you want. When
you are satisfied, log out and switch user into “Admin” and then delete the
original old user account from Control Panel>User Accounts. You will now only
have 2 user accounts.
6. Switch back to your new user account. If both accounts are "Administrator" accounts the temporary "Admin" account can be removed. You MUST have at least ONE "Administrator" account at all times.
Special Instructions for Win 7 [Miserable $oft at work again !]
In Windows 7 the copy button will always be grayed out and inoperative - this is true for any edition of Win7. You need a special program called "Evil Fingers Enabler" to turn on the copy button and this file is downloadable from https://www.evilfingers.com/tools/enabler.zip There are other "Enabler" programs out there, but this is the only one that I found to work !
Down load and save the zip file to a known location and extract the file "Enabler.exe" and put that file someplace that you can find when the User Profiles >Settings screen in on your monitor.
To run the program [no install is required] you must right click on the file name and select "Run As Administrator" for it to work. You may have to run it twice before the button is enabled.
Other Reference Links For Win 7 Rename of C:\User\"name"\
Windows 7: Copy A Modified User Profile Over The Default Profile
http://www.irongeek.com/i.php?page=security/windows-7-copy-default-profile
How to change user name in windows 7 professional?
How can I change the user name? (C drive/User/Primary User)
last updated on 04/27/2011