How To Create A New Administrator Account - Problems!

[sugad]

Hello,

Am new to this so please bare with me. I recently purchased a second hand Mac Book pro which had the previous owners Username and login details as admin on the notebook. As he didnt have the osx load up disc anymore he advised me to use this site to change the admin features and make the notebook start up as new with welcome screen. (im presuming factory reset settings)

I applied the following when loading up the notebook (cmd + s) to get to the equivalent of a ms dos style page, after this he told me to type:

/sbin/mount -uw /

Followed by:

rm /var/db/.applesetupdone

However, when pressing enter the second time around it stated that the file was not found so I entered:

reboot

This then automatically put the notebook into restart and athe apple logo and loading icon flashed up, how ever it does not load, it stays on this page and does nothing more. My friend does not know how to rectify this as he said he got the info from a web site which isnt much help now im starting to panic!!

Is there anyway i can rectify this without a boot up disc? Have i just ruined my macbook pro within ten minutes of owning it?

Any help at all would be much appreciated!

Thanks,

 

[r0k]

Nobody should be selling you a second hand macbook that doesn't know the login details. I suggest you contact the guy that sold you the macbook and have him solve the problem for you. If it was me, no money would have changed hands until I was able to log in and use the machine as me with no restrictions.

If you are looking for help recovering from the situation now that you have done some things in terminal that make the machine non-bootable, Apple can provide limited assistance for free if you make a genius bar appointment. I think they'll spend up to 20 minutes before they ask you to start paying. This sounds a lot like a 5 minute problem since you only issued 2 terminal commands to get into this fix.

Of course I'm a little suspicious that the guy who sold you this Macbook may not have been the rightful owner and taking it to the Apple store might mean you have some explaining to do.

 

[basher]

You might want to consider buying a Lion USB stick from Apple. Since you don't have the Installation DVD this would fix that. Also it would give you a fresh start. This way you wouldn't have to worry about something being misconfigured or broken from the previous owner.

Like it was posted prior, Apple can provide limited FREE support.

 

[sugad]

Agree'd How ever.....

He did issue me with his username and password but stated to get factory re-set so that id be admin that is what i needed to do so the Mac would start up as if it was brand new with the welcome video etc etc.

I have been told i can take it cancom and will cost £55 to get it sorted for a five minute job but just wanted to see if there was any knowledge on the forums here that could assist me in this instead of paying out again on top of what ive already paid in the purchase of my mac book.

Feel gutted at present as it looks so pretty but just cant use it!!! AHH

 

[r0k]

He did issue me with his username and password but stated to get factory re-set so that id be admin that is what i needed to do so the Mac would start up as if it was brand new with the welcome video etc etc.

I have been told i can take it cancom and will cost £55 to get it sorted for a five minute job but just wanted to see if there was any knowledge on the forums here that could assist me in this instead of paying out again on top of what ive already paid in the purchase of my mac book.

Feel gutted at present as it looks so pretty but just cant use it!!! AHH

Ok repeat the steps from your first post but put applesetupdone back. I think it would go something like this...

/sbin/mount / -uw
/bin/touch /var/db/.applesetupdone
reboot

* the mount command mounts the file system as writeable so you can change it
* the touch command creates an empty .applesetupdone file in /var/db ( I hope it's good enough despite being empty and I'm not sure about the path to touch. It should be in /bin, but it might be in /usr/bin)
* the third command reboots

At least you will be able to once again use your Mac (as him).
You should then be able to create an admin account for yourself and log in as you to do stuff, leaving his account alone until you get this fully sorted out. Stay away from low level terminal stuff until you have a recovery method (such as a Lion recovery partition or usb stick).

Here are further steps I would take...
1 - Once you are able to log in as you, allow the OS to upgrade to a version that supports the app store (you can skip this step if you already have the app store).
2 - For $30, you can download install os x lion.app. THis will take f o r e v e r depending on your internet connection. Once it downlods, DO NOT RUN IT until you back up the app to an 8 gig usb stick. It contains installesd.dmg that you can later use to create bootable recovery usb sticks.
3 - Allow lion to install.
4 - If you really want to wipe and start over, now is your chance now that you have a lion recovery partition (assuming step 3 went as expected).

 

[sugad]

I have attempted this but it will not find the file or directory on the second step after pressing enter

I feel like crying!

here is what is stated:

:/root# /sbin/mount -uw
root_device on / (hfs, local, read only, journaled)
devfs on /dev (devfs, local, nobrowse)
:/root# /bin/touch /var/db/.applesetupdone
-sh: /bin/touch: No such file or directory

Im at a loss, it does it both ways it wont find the file or directory either way I try and ive tried to reboot several times with no avail even in safe mode.

 

[r0k]

I have attempted this but it will not find the file or directory on the second step after pressing enter

I feel like crying!

here is what is stated:

:/root# /sbin/mount -uw
root_device on / (hfs, local, read only, journaled)
devfs on /dev (devfs, local, nobrowse)
:/root# /bin/touch /var/db/.applesetupdone
-sh: /bin/touch: No such file or directory

Im at a loss, it does it both ways it wont find the file or directory either way I try and ive tried to reboot several times with no avail even in safe mode.

I'm not sure where touch lives. I thought it might live in bin... Well I guess not. Also try /usr/bin/touch.

Here's another way around the problem:

instead of looking for touch, try...
echo "ok" > /var/db/.applesetupdone

But wait... There's more...

Do this...

mount -uaw /
cd /var/db
echo '<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>' > .AppleSetupDone
echo '<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple Computer//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">' >> .AppleSetupDone
echo '<plist version="1.0">' >> .AppleSetupDone
echo '<dict/>' >> .AppleSetupDone
echo '</plist>' >> .AppleSetupDone

 

[sugad]

I applaud you for your efforts but just dropped it into my local Mac Man store cost £45 for the hour but at least il get it sorted. I should learn not to toy with things i do not understand!

Many thanks!