Password recovery after migration?

[rlw]

Hello,

I've been using PCHelpWare for more than 2 years now, and despite a handful of small issues, it's been a godsend (reduced my carbon footprint drastically, I rarely drive to a client's site anymore!).

I'm in the process of migrating from an old XP laptop to a new dual-core 64-bit Windows 7 laptop. I copied the PCHelpWare directory tree from the XP box to the Win7 box (I installed it under C:\Program Files (x86)), and fired it up.

I changed the port forwarding on my router to forward port 5500 to the new laptop, then had a customer try to connect to me. The viewer window flashed up for a second, then disappeared. There was a password error message on the Connection dialog box, and I noticed the password field was empty.

I did a search in the registry for PCHelpWare, but couldn't find anything (other than RecentlyUsed and Preferences entries).

Two questions:

Why didn't the password get transferred over when I copied the entire directory tree?

Is there any way to recover the password from either the server code or the viewer code? It's been a couple of years since I set it up, and I evidently never made any notes about the password.

Thanks in advance for any help,

RLW

[YY]

Why didn't the password get transferred over when I copied the entire directory tree?

I had investigated this issue. What I found is that the encryption of password at the viewer side involved the user & machine names. That's said, if you have two users on the same pc, they both try to create and save an exact same connection with the same password. You will discover that, the encrypted password inside the .phw file are not the same.

I don't know why the developer using this approach, maybe this can prevent the the saved connection file illegally run by other user, or even copied & run on other computer.

Is there any way to recover the password from either the server code or the viewer code? It's been a couple of years since I set it up, and I evidently never made any notes about the password.

The password is encrypted with MD5, and looks like there is still no way to return its original info. with calaculation method from the hash.
But there are several service that can TRY to decrypt a MD5 hash, and in many case they can make a successful decryption. I don't know the theory, but it is worth to try, you just need to provide the MD5 hash of the password saved at the server (helpdesk.txt)

The services I had used are:
http://www.md5decrypter.co.uk/
http://md5decrypter.com/
http://www.rednoize.com/
http://www.gdataonline.com/


Good Luck!

[rlw]

@YY,

Thanks -- that did the trick -- the first MD5 decrypter site returned my password in about 10 seconds.

Next question - when I run PCHelpWare_viewer.exe, the password field is empty after I load the viewer configuration. How do I get it to remember my (newly recovered -- THANKS!) password?

EDIT: I tried loading the .phw file, typing in the password, and clicking save. I then closed PHW_viewer, opened again, loaded the .phw file, and the password field is still blank.

Thanks again,

RLW

[YY]

Hi! rlw,

Glad to know that the MD5 decrypter is able to solve your problem.

I had heard a lot of issues regarding the PHW password saving like your case, but so far I'm not able to find out a logic why/when this happens (or not happen).

In you case, does this relate to the Win-7 OS permission/security setting?

Can you try coping the PHW files to a non system folder, running the viewer there to see if then you can save the password properly?
Also the password must be 7 characters or less, otherwise it will not be saved.

[rlw]

@YY,

The password is exactly 7 characters. I verified it by having my daughter connect to me, after I typed in the correct password. I'll try moving it to a non-protected folder (or maybe I'll just fiddle with the PCHelpWare folder/.PHW file permissions).

I'll let you know how it goes.

Thanks for all your help in this. I use PCHelpWare all the time, and would really hate to not be able to use it on the new laptop.

RLW

[YY]

I'll try moving it to a non-protected folder (or maybe I'll just fiddle with the PCHelpWare folder/.PHW file permissions).

If still not able to save the password after movinng PHW to a non system folder, try also switching the compatibility mode of PcHelpWare_viewer.exe to WinXP, and see any difference.

I use PCHelpWare all the time, and would really hate to not be able to use it on the new laptop.

Just like you I had used PcHelpWare for 2-3 years for supporting my friends/families. It is a very nice tool and I will be happy to see that it can keep on properly running on the new OS, as eventually I need to switch to Win-7 too.

I have tried the PcHelpWare_viewer.exe running on Vista-32, in a folder under Program Files. The operation of saving the connection is normal, yet I don't have a chance to test it on Win-7.