As far as I know, the following are facts regarding the Administrator password on Windows 2008 R2:
- By default the Administrator account is enabled and the password is blank, but you are forced to set a password at first logon after Windows installation
- Sysprep is supposed to set the Administrator password to blank, unless one is indicated in the unattend file.
On my 2008 R2 images I want to be prompted to set the Administrator password after the image is deployed (and after sysprep has been run on the source machine), but for some reason this is not happening. Instead it just comes up with a logon screen and expects the password that was used on the source machine.
I just want the same behavior as when 2008 R2 is installed from media, which is for the Administrator account to have a blank password, but where I am forced to set one at first boot. I have tried setting the password to blank on the source machine before running sysprep, but then it just automatically logs on the Administrator on the first boot, which I don't want.
What setting can I look for that may be causing this? On a previous image which I created using the same unattend file, this worked as I wanted it to, thus the reason I believe it's a setting on my source machine.
Thanks.