Windows Auto Login And Lock

Do you sometimes power on your computer and leave immediately afterwards for other activities, like making coffee or breakfast, taking a shower or going into a meeting? There are two possible scenarios here. If you have not configured auto login, you will see the the logon screen where all user accounts of the Windows operating system are shown when you return. When you are back, you need to log in and wait until the desktop has been loaded. Not an optimized way of logging in.

The second option is to configure Windows to perform the login automatically. The benefit here is that the desktop loads completely so that there is not a waiting period after coming back to the computer desk. The operating system may lock the computer eventually if it is configured this way, but there is a period where the computer is accessible by anyone.

Windows Auto Logon & Lock offers all the benefits of the second method without the security implications. The free software configures the Windows operating system to auto log in users and lock the desktop afterwards automatically as well.

The benefit of this option is that the desktop is fully loaded, but the system stays protected at the same time.

Benefits

• Faster boot time. The additional post-logon start up items are also started after Windows boots. Which means when you press the power button on your PC and come back after a few minutes, its COMPLETELY booted up. No need to wait for additional software to load after you logon.
• Automatically resume downloads etc. when your PC reboots due to a power failure or crash. On XP you could do this by installing the application as a system service. In Vista and 7, Session 0 Isolation makes using a system service a pain, not to mention it's insecure. Just put your applications in the regular Windows Start Up folder and they will be launched after the auto logon.
• It password protects Safe Mode as well. Existing auto logon methods leave Safe Mode unprotected.
• It locks the desktop before Explorer is started. Other methods auto-lock using an autorun/start up entry which leave the PC logged on and unlocked until the autorun entries are executed (which can even take several minutes).

Windows Auto Login And Lock Configuration

• Run "Lock.exe" from the archive to test if the application runs without errors. If all is well your desktop should lock. Logon again and Windows Explorer should be open. You might want to create a System Restore Point before proceeding just to be safe.
• Copy the files "Lock.exe" and "LockCMD.exe" to your Windows directory. (Ex: C:\Windows)
• Run "lockcmd.reg" from the archive and click Yes in the dialog box. You must run this while logged on to the account which you want to enable auto logon for.
• Click Start and type "netplwiz.exe" (Without the quotes) and press Enter.
• Uncheck the box "Users must enter a user name and password to use this computer" and click OK. Enter the Username and Password of the account you want to enable auto logon for.
• Reboot your PC to test it.

Windows Auto Login And Lock Download And Compatibility

The program has been tested by the developers on 32-bit and 64-bit editions of Windows Vista and Windows 7. The program is available for download at the developer website.

Update: The developer website is no longer available. We have uploaded the latest version of Auto Logon & Lock to our own server. You can download it from the following link: Auto-Logon-Lock-v1.0.zip

Note that we do not support the software and take no responsibilities for it either.

You can use a different script for that alternatively if you want. Mike McQuaid has published a guide that explains how to log on automatically and lock the workstation afterwards.

It requires you to run a script using the operating system's Group Policy. Note that not all versions of Windows come with Group Policy support.