Cannot log into HP server after SmartStart Installation of Windows 2008

After using the HP SmartStart 8.5 CD to clean  install Windows 2008 to a ML350 G5 server I discovered I couldn’t log into the completed OS installation.

As soon as the brief moment of panic and anxiety went away I thought that maybe the password I used for the administrator during setup might have been to long (20 Characers). After truncating each character in turn I found that the password the SmartStart disc used was shorted to 14 characters.

Reset all user passwords within an ou to the same password

A quick and easy way to reset all the passwords for users in a particular OU is to run the following command in a command prompt window on the domain controller. The below will reset all the passwords to “password”.  Change your OU references to your own settings.

C:\>dsquery user OU=tech,OU=australia,DC=waynestorey,DC=com | dsmod user -pwd password

If you have more than 100 users within that OU then use the following command changing the number after -limit to a number greater than the number of user objects

C:\>dsquery user -limit 100 OU=australia,OU=tech,DC=waynestorey,DC=com | dsmod user -pwd password