Hello, my grandparents received an IPad mini as a gift recently. As you may expect, they are not technology fans, and they didn't know how to sync their IPad to the computer. So they created a password, and then forgot it. Then they tried to unlock it and accidentally disabled it. I've tried to repair this by following the steps I read in the support section, but as they've never synchronized it with a computer this couldn't be done. Can anyone help me?
The support article states that you maybe able to unlock the iPad if you sync with a computer that have synced with previously in the past. It does not say that is the only way to unlock the device.
There are two other ways to restore the iPad - these are listed below the part of the support article that talks about using iTunes.
iOS: Forgot passcode or device disabled
Use Find My iPhone
If you enabled Find My iPhone, you can use it to erase your device.
- Go to icloud.com/#find to see if you enabled Find My iPhone.
- Click All Devices at the top of your browser window.
- Select your device and click "Erase [device]" to erase your device and its passcode.
- Use the Setup Assistant on your device to restore the most recent backup of your device.
Follow these steps if you never synced your device with iTunes, if you don't have Find My iPhone set up, or if you can't get to your own computer. You'll need to put your device in recovery mode, which will erase the device and its passcode. Then you'llrestore your device as new or from a backup.
- Disconnect all cables from your device.
- Turn off your device.
- Press and hold the Home button. While holding the Home button, connect your device to iTunes. If your device doesn't turn on automatically, turn it on.
- Continue holding the Home button until you see the Connect to iTunes screen.
- iTunes will alert you that it has detected a device in recovery mode.
- Click OK, then restore the device.
How can I unlock my iPad if I forgot the passcode?
iOS: Device disabled after entering wrong passcode
http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1212
How can I unlock my iPad if I forgot the passcode?
How to Reset a Forgotten Password for an iOS Device
http://www.wikihow.com/Reset-a-Forgotten-Password-for-an-iOS-Device
Using iPhone/iPad Recovery Mode
http://ipod.about.com/od/iphonetroubleshooting/a/Iphone-Recovery-Mode.htm
You may have to do this several times.
Saw this solution on another post about an iPad in a school environment. Might work on your iPad so you won't lose everything.
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‘iPad is disabled’ fix without resetting using iTunes
Today I met my match with an iPad that had a passcode entered too many times, resulting in it displaying the message ‘iPad is disabled – Connect to iTunes’. This was a student iPad and since they use Notability for most of their work there was a chance that her files were not all backed up to the cloud. I really wanted to just re-activate the iPad instead of totally resetting it back to our default image.
I reached out to my PLN on Twitter and had some help from a few people through retweets and a couple of clarification tweets. I love that so many are willing to help out so quickly. Through this I also learned that I look like Lt. Riker from Star Trek (thanks @FillineMachine).
Through some trial and error (and a little sheer luck), I was able to reactivate the iPad without loosing any data. Note, this will only work on the computer it last synced with. Here’s how:
1. Configurator is useless in reactivating a locked iPad. You will only be able to completely reformat the iPad using Configurator. If that’s ok with you, go for it – otherwise don’t waste your time trying to figure it out.
2. Open iTunes with the iPad disconnected.
3. Connect the iPad to the computer and wait for it to show up in the devices section in iTunes.
4. Click on the iPad name when it appears and you will be given the option to restore a backup or setup as a new iPad (since it is locked).
5. Click ‘Setup as new iPad’ and then click restore.
6. The iPad will start backing up before it does the full restore and sync. CANCEL THE BACKUP IMMEDIATELY. You do this by clicking the small x in the status window in iTunes.
7. When the backup cancels, it immediately starts syncing – cancel this as well using the same small x in the iTunes status window.
8. The first stage in the restore process unlocks the iPad, you are basically just canceling out the restore process as soon as it reactivates the iPad.
If done correctly, you will experience no data loss and the result will be a reactivated iPad. I have now tried this with about 5 iPads that were locked identically by students and each time it worked like a charm.
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Try it and good luck. You have nothing more to lose if it doesn't work for you.
Cheers, Tom 😉
IPad mini disabled
