How to Remove a Profile Stored on a Computer
If you share your computer with other people, you may have more than one profile stored on the computer. Profiles are user accounts that allow each separate individual who uses the machine to set up their own custom settings and store files privately on the hard drive. If one of the computer users no longer needs access to it, you can eliminate their user profile by using the operating system's built-in tools.
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Instructions
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User Accounts Feature
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Open the "Start" menu on your computer and select "Control Panel" from the menu. The Control Panel window will open.
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Click on "User Accounts" or "User Accounts and Family Safety" to open the User Accounts features. Choose "Add or remove user accounts" or "Stored User Names and Passwords" to display the user profiles stored on the computer.
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3
Click on the profile that you want to remove from the system to be taken to a list of options for that profile. Select "Remove" from the available actions and a message will pop up warning you that the login information will be deleted. Click "OK" to confirm the action. The profile will be deleted from the computer.
Manually Delete Profile
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Log in to the computer with the username and password of a user who has full system access. Go to the "Start" menu and select "Computer" or "My Computer." Click on the "C" drive and open the "Users" folder. Delete the folder for the user profile that you want to delete.
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Go back to the "Start" menu and choose "Run." Type "regedit" into the Run box to pull up the computer's registry.
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Expand the "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE" folder, then select "Software" > "Microsoft" > "Windows" > "Current Version" > "Profile List." Select the name of the user profile that you want to delete by clicking on it. Look at the "Profile Image Path" listed with the key. This shows you where the profile is located on the hard drive. Return to the open registry editor and delete the profile name from the "Profile List" folder. Once you have deleted the key, close the registry.
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Open a text editor like Notepad, go to "File" and choose "Open." Navigate to the "Windows" folder on the "C:" drive. Double-click "system.ini" to open the file. Scroll down the document to "Password Lists" and find the name of the user profile that you want to remove. Write down the path to the password for the account, such as "C:/Passwords," then delete that line of the code. Save the file and close the text editor.
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Go to the folder that contains the password file and delete the file from the folder. Close the Explorer window. All instances of the user will now be deleted.
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Tips & Warnings
If you have only one user profile on the computer it cannot be removed.
