I'm working on a computer for SOMEONE and they purchased it at Sams, it's a Vista machine. Sams created a user account called sams and they wanted rid of it. So I created a new ADMIN account with this persons name. Then I deleted every trace of the old sams account. But when I try to install a PROGRAMS, it puts in sams under the name box during the installation! How do I get rid of this?How exactly did you delete every trace of the Sams account ? ?
It's obviously STILL there.
You may be looking at a format and a clean install of Vista...
I find it pretty arrogant that a vendor would create an Admin account on a machine they are selling to someone...You're right, I must not have deleted everything. But I removed it from the typical places, then did a search of the c: drive for "sams" and didn't come up with anything.

MAYBE there's a trace somewhere in the registry?

Yeah it sucks the sams would do that, I think the computer was pretty cheap though. And it's a nice computer.HKEY_uSERS_.DEFAULT_SOFTWARE_MICROSOFT_ WINDOWSMEDIA_WMSDK_GENERAL

This key still listed the computer name as sams. Changed it and rebooted, but still the same thing.Does this help?....

http://vistasupport.mvps.org/change_registered_owner_name.htm

You could also open regedit and do a search for "Sams" and change any applicable entries.