No, you have to specifically say you want to encrypt folders.

I thought not, since I've never had anything encrypted without specifically asking for it to be. Hopefully that should do the trick. Thanks!

I'd still be paranoid and backup the disk, just in case there's something encrypted, with the password stored in an email or something.

Definitely this, though I've used it loads with no trouble.

If it's XP, could you try and log in as the local administrator account and just see if he left that password blank? Always worth a try as the account it sets up for you when you install it isn't the built-in administrator one.

I second this post!

And I second this! Loads of XP machines have no Admin password. Press Ctrl+Alt+Delete twice on the login screen to bring up the old-school login interface, then try "Administrator" with no password. If this fails, then try the NT Password Reset tool.

Ohhh, good idea.

It's funny that this cropped up, because that's exactly what I was doing at work at the time.

 

I was also trying to stop students from setting a password on their account on our crap netbooks. Do you think you can stop it in XP Home? No you sodding can't.

 

I'm resorting to bunging Pro on them instead :'-(