Active directory password change cannot find the file specified

Question

I'm running Windows SBS 2003, everything appears to be fine except when i try to reset a user's password i get the message

"Windows cannot complete the password change for [Username] because The system cannot find the file specified." The title of the message box says "Active Directory"

I've looked in the logs and cannot find any matching event when this error occurs.

This was a clean install of SBS, not an upgrade or migration from anything as my searches on Google indicate.

This error appears consistently, even after creating a new user directly in AD Users and Computers, or using the SBS Add user wizard.

EDIT: - How are you trying to change the password ? - I am using the AD Users and Computers Snapin.

Solution

This error can sometimes be solved by clearing the active directory userParameters property. To edit this you will need adsiedit, which is available in the support tools package, which if its not installed is located at \support\tools\supptools.msi of SBS disk 2

• Click on Start > Run and type adsiedit.msc
• Expand the Domain node
• Expand DC=
• Find and Right Click on the User object and click on Properties
• Check the box to "Show mandatory attributes"
• Click the box to "Show optional attributes"
• In the Attributes field, click on the userParameters attribute
• Click on the Edit button

• Click the Clear button and then click OK

  Be careful when using adsiedit as you are editing Active Directory

If this does not solve the issue, another thing you can try is to check that all FSMO roles are held by this server. They should be as its an SBS server, but its worth checking. If you are unsure you can always seize the roles.

Comments

[aeroshock]

How are you trying to reset the users password? CMD line (DSMOD)? From the ADUC snapin?

[Khalid Rahaman]

the userParameters attribue contains the following m: d PCtxCfgPresent㔵攱戰ぢCtxCfgFlags1〰て〲〹CtxShadow㄰〰〰〰*CtxMinEncryp‌​tionLevel㄰ I cleared it but the problem still exists

[Khalid Rahaman]

Also, all of the roles are assigned to this machine.