Ticket Options

Question Profile

Question Details

TICKET ARCHIVE -> Reinstalling OS

Mel1 - Mar 2, 2008 - 1:59 pm

Hi all. Daughter has a brand new MacBook. Husband used it first so he must've set himself as the administrator - but he promptly forgot his password and login details.

So, daughter used the install disc to reset password so she could be the administrator. She was able to boot from the CD by holding the C key, but the password didn't reset or she somehow messed it up.

So, now I'm trying to sort out their mess by booting from the installation CD. However, the problem is, it won't boot from the installation disc. I press down the C key, but it just boots from the hard drive. I press down the D key, but that doesn't work either and it just boots as normal from the hard drive.

When I try to reinstall direct from the disc, it asks me for the administrator password - which nobody knows.

HELP !!!!!!!!!!

Serenak - Mar 2, 2008 - 4:59 pm

Hello Melanie and thanks for choosing to use macosx.com

Well a pretty pickle they have got you into hey?

It sounds very much to me like they have managed to set a firmware password... this is a very serious and low level thing and basically it is designed to stop people tampering with the Mac - it is usually used in computer labs or where a Mac may be exposed to an unknown set of people and so it prevents such things as starting from CDs/DVDs, external Hard Drives, USB sticks etc.

There is only one real chance and it involves removing some RAM from the mac and restarting and resetting the PRAM

"After removing / adding more RAM than before, Turn on the computer and immediately reset PRAM by holding the Command-Option-P-R key combination. Press the keys until you've heard two successive startup sounds.
Open Firmware password protection should be now disabled. Shut down the computer and return it to its original RAM configuration"

YOu should then be able to restart the Mac from the Installer Disk

I got this from the macosx archives and it has helped out in this situation before...

Good luck.

Mel1 - Mar 4, 2008 - 10:10 am

Hi, thanks for your reply. Yes, it seems that somehow a firmware password was set. In the end, I had to take the MacBook to a Genius Bar, where the genuis managed to sort everything out. He was amazed that my daughter had managed to set a firmware password because he said it's not an easy thing to do! Fortunately she remembered the password she'd used, so he disabled it. I didn't want to remove the RAm in case it invalidated my warranty (although the genius said it wouldn't). Many thanks for your help.

Best Regards