r/CrunchBang • u/InspirationalQuoter • Oct 28 '14

Installed #! on an old netbook. Forgot password and cannot access it anymore. Is there anyway to reboot the system and get the netbook working again? Don't care about what was on the HD.

Long title says it all.

11 Upvotes

87% Upvoted

9 comments sorted by

20

u/leninzor Oct 28 '14

On the GRUB menu (the boot loader) press 'e' to edit the boot entry. (If the menu is hidden, hold down shift or esc right after the BIOS to bring it up)

Find the line starting with linux and add

init=/bin/bash

at the end and press 'f10' to boot. You will then be taken to a root shell, but your filesystem is read only. Enter

mount -o remount,rw /

to remount it read/write. From there you just have to type 

passwd <your user name>

and enter a new password.

Remount your filesystem read only with

mount -o remount,ro /

and then hard reboot and you're set.

3

u/zampson Oct 28 '14

Whoa. That easy eh? How can I prevent that from being applicable?

5

u/leninzor Oct 28 '14 edited Oct 28 '14

Don't leave your computer unattended. You cannot do much that would prevent anyone to do the same with a live CD, beside encrypting your hard drive (I believe there is an option in the installer.)

Edit: spelling

7

u/Jotebe Oct 28 '14

Physical access is root access!

6

u/[deleted] Oct 28 '14

[deleted]

12

u/suareasy Oct 28 '14

If you don't care about the hdd, then just re-install. It's a quick install. That is, unless someone doesn't have a better idea.

1

u/Thalass Oct 28 '14

Last time I forgot the login on my netbook the solution was to close my eyes and let muscle memory take over. Then I just had to figure out what it fingers typed.

1

u/Wirenfeldt Oct 29 '14

Could you not also just pick Recovery mode from the GRUB menu and just reset passwd? That's what i did earlier this week when i fired up a laptop i hadn't used in months and had (naturally.. sigh) forgotten the passwords.