Reset Administrator Password on a Mac / Apple Mac

Have tried this on a Tiger OS X

• Reboot
• Hold down Apple+S when you hear the chime
• When you see the Aplle on screen, hit the power button once

You should see the text prompt now

Type:

• mount -uw /
• passwd
• reboot

That’s it.
You should be able to log into the administrator user account with the new password you set now.

You keychain will probably be useless no unless you remember the password for that. I had connectivity issues, the airport would not connect to my wireless networks.

Once I deleted the login keychain, the network issues went away.

To delete the login keychain:

• Open Applications/Utilities/Keychain Access
• Click the Login keychain
• Choose Edit -> Delete

root user password recovery / resetting on Debian/GNU based linux systems

I have had need for this more often than I would like of late, it is a nice and quick way to reset the root password if you can’t remember, or the person who had it isn’t around any more. You need access to the actual console of course, physical access or a remote KVM. I’ve used this on both Debian boxes and Ubuntu boxes recently.

1. rebooot the machine
2. interrupt the boot sequence at the GRUB bootloader / LILO screen (I haven’t seen LILO on Deban / Ubuntu in quite a while)
3. edit the boot line with “kernel” information (select and press e to edit)
4. add init=/bin/bash to the end of the line
5. hit enter and then press ‘b’ to boot
6. when the boot sequence has finished, type the following:

mount -o remount,rw /
passwd root
(enter the new password for the ‘root’ user)
shutdown -r now (to reboot and login as root with the new password)