Log into Your Account Unattendedly

The utility of a multiple account system is undeniable when more users need to employ a single computer without sharing the settings between them. And, with Vista, one can also restrict access to entire partitions, so data is available only to a specific account. However, some users prefer multiple accounts, even if they are the sole masters of the machine. The reasons vary from enabling a limited account for remote access, to simply using an additional desktop just for testing purposes.

If you want to protect the access to your account with a password to prevent unauthorized online access, typing the countersign can be quite a nuisance. Making this procedure automatic creates a crack that can be taken advantage of by anyone with remote access to your registry, because it is stored unencrypted. This action can also be speculated by malware or anyone with experience on how Windows works.

One way out is Safe AutoLogon, an automated solution that encrypts the account password, at the same time typing it in your stead. The 256-bit AES/Triple DES encryption used for storing the countersign won't keep your data safe from physical access to your computer, but, in case of spyware or other sort of malware infection, the information is free from the risk of harm.

A single computer license is $10 and, before spilling the money, you can test it for a period of 30 days without any restriction applied. Installing the application provides two ways of getting it on the system: Advanced Install (which allows customization) and One-Click Install (which takes you straight to installing the app in the default C:/Program Files location, automatically accepting the license agreement). As there are no other elements installed during the process and only Safe AutoLogon itself, you can confidently proceed with One-Click Install.

Although the Safe AutoLogon does not address the beginner user, the main application window does not require any computer knowledge, as it offers a simple screen requiring you to enable automatic log on to the user account you want. Just type in the username, password and name of the computer (this will already be available). As soon as you press the OK button, the program will start doing its job and, at the next logon, it'll remember your username and password and access the account automatically.

On the other hand, the Settings panel is a tad more complicated. The three tabs present allow you to make a general configuration for Safe AutoLogon, manage the security of the application and enable a Password Server in order to log on into your account (but this is mostly for the enterprise environment where a large number of computers has to connect to a server in order to retrieve the logon password).

As far as the general settings go, you can easily apply a delay time before the automatic logon occurs and check out the logs. Configuring the security option allows you to enable immediate locking of the desktop at logon, a setting that comes in handy if you do not handle all the accounts on the system and need to protect the default account and force the user to switch to another. Of course, in this case, you will have to type in the password manually in order to unlock the computer.

In order to prevent access to the configuration panel of the application, Safe AutoLogon offers the possibility to restrict changes to all groups, save the one you have total control over. You can choose from the Active Directory groups or the local user groups the one that can make modifications to the settings of the piece of software.

The third tab in the Settings panel refers to Password Servers, a section dedicated to administrators, designed to facilitate the changing of the passwords on multiple workstations. For this to work, you will need the Safe AutoLogon Password Server utility, which saves the time necessary to manage Safe AutoLogon on remote client computers.

In case you decide to modify the account password, but somehow forget to type it in Safe AutoLogon, the program will not give you any trouble at all. Being unable to log with the old password, the app will simply bring you to the user-account screen, letting you choose the one you need and typing the countersign manually.

However, there is no protection against resetting the original password using a password-reset disk. Using a USB stored key is an unhindered operation, permitting you to replace the old password with a new one.

Safe AutoLogon is extremely simple to use and employing it in tandem with the server utility benefits administrators a lot. A regular user can utilize this utility in a multi-account environment where only one is employed frequently, in order to avoid typing in the password at every logon. AES encryption protects one's parole from being read by malware code.

The Good The application can be employed by any type of user with absolutely no problem, offering the possibility to avoid typing in the assigned password each time they log on.

You can set a delay time, if you need to allow some services to run before you log on. The protection of the Settings panel can be enforced by allowing the users of a specific group alone to change the configuration of the application.

Administrators can use the Safe AutoLogon Password Server utility to change the countersigns of all the computers in the network.

The Bad Its current design compels the user to log to the default account automatically and it sometimes happens to tap into a different account. There is no option to enable the display of all user accounts on the system while the delay time is on.

The Truth