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All replies
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Helpful answers
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Dec 12, 2014 12:24 PM in response to Jeffnkelleby Kappy,★HelpfulForgot Your Account Password
For Lion, Mountain Lion, or Mavericks
Boot to the Recovery HD:
Restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the COMMAND and R keys until the menu screen appears. Alternatively, restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the OPTION key until the boot manager screen appears. Select the Recovery HD and click on the downward pointing arrow button.
When the menubar appears select Terminal from the Utilities menu.
Enter resetpassword at the prompt and press RETURN. Follow
instructions in the dialog window that will appear.
Or see:
Reset a Mac OS X 10.7 Lion Password
OS X Mountain Lion- Reset a login password,
OS X Mavericks- Solve password problems,
OS X Lion- Apple ID can be used to reset your user account password.
For Snow Leopard and earlier with installer DVD
Mac OS X 10.6- If you forget your administrator password,
OS X- Changing or resetting an account password (Snow Leopard and earlier).
For Snow Leopard and earlier without installer DVD
How to reset your Mac OS X password without an installer disc | MacYourself
Reset OS X Password Without an OS X CD — Tech News and Analysis
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Dec 12, 2014 12:30 PM in response to Jeffnkelleby Drew Reece,Do you have the disks that installed this current OS or the original installer disks?
You can reboot from the installer & try using a 'reset password tool'. That will allow her to login to the account. it will not reset here keychain password, so unless she can remember that the access to the saved passwords will be gone (many people don't use this feature anyway).
The reset password tool is different on older OS's so it could help to know what version of the OS is running. The page suggests it is a menu item on OS's below 10.3…
OS X: Changing or resetting an account password (Snow Leopard and earlier) - Apple Support
(see the 'Resetting a password without an additional account' section)
Boot into the install disk as that help page states.
(or do what Kappy said )
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Dec 12, 2014 12:44 PM in response to Jeffnkelleby Jeffnkelle,She doesn't have the OS X discs either
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Dec 12, 2014 12:59 PM in response to Jeffnkelleby Drew Reece,★HelpfulJeffnkelle wrote:
She doesn't have the OS X discs either
Read the last link Kappy posted. It may allow you to create a new admin account on that Mac, which could allow you to change her password.
It may help to know what OS you are running, try clicking the text in the login window - some of it cycles & tells you the OS X version.
If you are just looking for important files & have another Mac (or PC with Firewire) & the right cable you can try target disk mode…
How to use and troubleshoot FireWire target disk mode - Apple Support
TDM will mount the internal disk on another computer - you can dig in & see documents in the /Users/her-account-name on the disk that mounts.
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Dec 12, 2014 1:21 PM in response to Kappyby Jeffnkelle,I tried this from Kappy: How to reset your Mac OS X password without an installer disc | MacYourself
And now I'm stuck in the single system user or something like that. It didn't work, but now I can't get back out to the login screen.
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Dec 12, 2014 1:26 PM in response to Jeffnkelleby Drew Reece,Which version on that page did you try? It has instructions for several OS versions. Do you know what OS you have installed?
The OS should reboot after the reboot command is issued, did that happen? If not force power off by holding the power button & then restart.
Is it stuck rebooting into single user mode?
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Dec 12, 2014 1:50 PM in response to Drew Reeceby Jeffnkelle,We used Kappy's last suggestion as you suggested. It worked, but in setting up a new administrator it lost all the old files. But she is into the computer. Not sure why the files got lost.
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Dec 12, 2014 2:01 PM in response to Jeffnkelleby Drew Reece,Her files should not be lost by that approach - you simply have made a new user account. Each user account has it's own files & cannot see other users files.
Open System Prefernces > Users (this may be called accounts - you still haven't told us what OS you are using).
Select her account & look for the option to reset her account password.
Log out & log back in as her user. It should still have her files.