Admin account password and boot issues

[whiskyd]

Help....

I was using my laptop all day when it stopped accepting my screensaver password...and now it won't let me logon to the system when I boot it. I haven't changed my password and it was working earlier. I am running Windows 2000. I saw on the forum similar issues and burned a copy of Hiren's Boot Cd ...but my laptop doesn't boot off a CD -- and I am not sure how to tell it to. I can not reinstall my operating system. I bought the laptop from my last company went it went under and it didn't come with the disks ( of course) ... Some I am sort of at a loss for what to do. Any thoughts that don't include hurling either it or myself out the Window ?

[whiskyd]

Today I got on to my laptop once -- log enough to reset the generic admin password. When I tired to change my own admin password -- using the same password I had just logged on with -- the response was that the old password was incorrect. To temporarily circumvent the problem, I have disabled the requirement to use a password to logon. I am starting to think this is not a software issue but a hardware one (perhaps my keyboard). Thoughts? Still weighing throwing myself and / or the laptop out the Window but that seems a bit extreme.