I can't log in to my Mac Mini

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Level 1

21 points

I can't log in to my Mac Mini

I'm officially an idiot.

High Sierra. I'm only user. For some reason, I tried to change my user account's user name. In to system preferences > User & Groups. Right clicked my account in left panel, clicked "advanced" and started fiddle.

But became concerned as I thought I consequently had to change name of home folder too, which I did. Saved,

[Re-Titled by Moderator]

Then my account user name in left panel had been changed to "Standard". Right clicked as before, selected "Advanced" and now my user name, both versions in there, had changed to "-2". Changed again to the name I wanted, saved and thought it was OK.

But noooo, now I can't log in to system preferencs.

However, after rebooting, my old username account shows up at login screen and it works with the password. Exactly as before my stupidity. Thank God. But still no way to access system preferences.

How do I fix this?

Mac mini, macOS 12.6

Posted on May 17, 2023 3:43 AM

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Answer 1

BDAqua

Level 10

245,117 points

May 17, 2023 3:58 AM in response to Danne_V

See if you can create a new administrator account by restarting the Setup Assistant:

Boot into Single User Mode: Start/restart your Mac. As soon as you hear the startup tone, press and hold ⌘ + S until you see a black screen with white lettering. (If you end up back on the login screen after a flash of the black screen with white lettering, enter your password and it will return to the black screen.)
Check and repair the drive by typing /sbin/fsck -fy then ↩ enter - as directed by the on-screen text.
Mount the drive as read-write by typing /sbin/mount -uw / then ↩ enter.
Remove the Apple Setup Done file by typing rm /var/db/.AppleSetupDone then ↩ enter.
Reboot by typing reboot then ↩ enter.
Complete the setup process, creating a new admin account.

Be very careful to notice the spaces in those Terminal Commands.

Once you've done that the computer reboots and it's like the first time you used the machine, except all your data will still be there. Your old accounts are all safe. From there you just change all other account passwords in the account preferences!!

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