Live CD Recovery : Lost Password

Lost Password

Here is how you can use the Live CD to change the administrative password on your machine if you have lost/forgot the current password. Please note that you can usually boot into RecoveryMode and run the passwd command directly.

  1. Boot the Ubuntu Live CD.
  2. Press Ctrl-Alt-F1

  3. sudo mount /dev/sda1 /mnt

  4. If you created a custom partition layout when installing Ubuntu you have to find your root partition using the fdisk utility. See the section Finding your root partition.

  5. sudo chroot /mnt

You can now use the passwd command to reset a password.

Note: In the mount command, /dev/sda1 will need to be replaced with the partition where the root of the file system resides.

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