How to bypass the Welcome screen?

All of a sudden, my computer is showing the welcome screen at boot up - it
used to just boot up to the desktop so that I could turn it on and come back
and it would be ready to go. Now I have to wait to click my account on the
Welcome screen. When I went into control panel, I saw that I could turn it
off, but it informed me that by doing so I would then have to type in a
log-on name.... How can I get back to the simple boot-up?

"Ted Curtin" <tjcurtin1@verizon.net> wrote in message
news:Ot8cgNK0IHA.4476@TK2MSFTNGP06.phx.gbl...
> All of a sudden, my computer is showing the welcome screen at boot up - it
> used to just boot up to the desktop so that I could turn it on and come back
> and it would be ready to go. Now I have to wait to click my account on the
> Welcome screen. When I went into control panel, I saw that I could turn it
> off, but it informed me that by doing so I would then have to type in a log-on
> name.... How can I get back to the simple boot-up?
>


Keeping in mind that configuring your computer to logon a user account
automatically significantly reduces the system's security, here are two options.

1. Download and install TweakUI from Microsoft. TweakUI is available here.

Microsoft PowerToys for Windows XP
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/d...powertoys.mspx

Direct Download of TweakUI
http://download.microsoft.com/downlo...ertoySetup.exe

Once the program is installed, go to Start -> All Programs ->
Powertoys for Windows XP -> TweakUI.
Click the + sign next to Logon in the left hand column.
Click on Autologon.
In the right hand pane, put a check mark in the box next to
"Logon automatically at system startup".
Enter the name of your user account in the User Name box.
Hit the Set Password button and enter your password twice.
Note: You should skip this step if your account has a blank
password.
Click OK to close TweakUI.
Restart your computer to see if you get the desired results.

2. Go to Start -> Run.
Copy and paste the following into the Open box:

control userpasswords2

Click OK.
In the "Users for this computer" box, click on the account you
want to have logged on automatically.
Uncheck "Users must enter a user name and password to use this
computer".
Click OK.
In the box that pops up, make sure the account you clicked on
earlier is entered next to User Name.
Enter your password twice.
Note: You can leave the password box blank if the account does
not have a password.
Click OK.
Reboot to see if you get the desired results.

For more info take a look here,

Courtesy of Ramesh Srinivasan, MS-MVP
Configure Windows XP to Automatically Login
http://windowsxp.mvps.org/Autologon.htm

Good luck

Nepatsfan