I recently took in an orphaned Imac someone left out on the street and am trying to get to the point where I can wipe out the original contents of the disk and do a clean install. I've already invested in a new keyboard, mouse, put in 512 MB RAM, and bought a used DVD drive on ebay (it was without one when I found it)-- so I'm already out 180 dollars on it. Compared to a Pentium 350 processor -- it is blazingly fast and still could be very useful addition to my PC network. So far I've fallen for the MAC, and find its interface far superior to Windows. Here is my problem, the Imac is running OS 9.2.2, and it immediately goes into a login screen the previous user must have set up. I have no permissions to do anything and cannot even run a CD, the only thing I can do is access the internet through my central router. My friend lent me some MAC disks, but they dont seem bootable, so I cant install anything. I'm now waiting for an original OS9 bootable disk I bought on Ebay, another 40 bucks. What is the procedure for wiping out the original contents of the disk and doing a clean install? Is there some sort of security thing on Macs that Windows dooesn't have? I've come onto a screen that asks me for a password to change the owner and the only option I get is to shutdown if there is no password. Also I've come across a blue screen with only two buttons, one is a right arrow and the other looks like a refresh arrow - what is this screen for? Any help is much appreciated. Thanx in Advance!
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that screen is the boot disk select screen put you cd in and hit the reload "o" button try that
good luck
if youve got a cd that is bootable, when it comes up you will also see on the desktop the hard drive that you cant get into. while running off of the cd, open the hard drive, go to the system/preferences folder, and delete the multi-user.prefs file (named something like that, i forget) by dragging it into the trash. at that point you should be able to reboot your machine off of its internal hard drive and have access to everything.
hope this helps,\
Bill
I just woke up, but here is what i am thinking.
either mutliple users or firmware password on the machine.
if its multiple users , you can simply hold down the shift key when rebooting and this will turn off extension, go to yr system folder find "multiple users" and throw it away, its crap anyways. reboot and it should work ok.
only other thing i can think of a firmware screen password, does it look like code when it boots , or is there a GUI as such, the nly other screen, and u mention 2 buttons, is what you get when holding down the option key it will present you with a bootable option (which you dont have) and u cannot progress any further.
if this doesnt work, then wait for yr boot disk from ebay- you need it.
if u have a nice adsl connection , i am happy to give u my ip to download OS8 which will get u around this problem (if its not firmware password) but u still need to burn it to make the disk, altho a PC is fine for this
good luck anwyays.
Hello thanx for all the ideas....first off I got to that strange blue screen with the two arrow icon buttons (and HD icon) after pressing option,command,p,r. After hitting the reload arrow, nothing happens with the OS disk my friend gave me, so I assume it must be some sort of upgrade. Second, I tried to boot with the extensions turned off, shift key held down (bootup is completely GUI by the way). I get this dialogue that says - Before I can get to the finder i must enter the Multiple Users owners password - Here the only option is to enter the password or to shutdown. I'm hoping this is something in the OS and not in firmware. I can to to Open Firmware by option, command, o,f and get to a bunch of unix commands - however I can't get to any users preference file from here. I will have to wait for the boot CD to arrive and see if booting from CD will allow me to wipe out this old installation. Again thanx for all the help!
you will need abootable cd then to get in... if the disc youve got doesnt boot, then perhaps it was burned improperly. you may need to "obtain" a good disk image from somewhere. if thats a problem, pm me and i may be able to help.
bill
If there was a Firmware password, the option boot screen would show a padlock, and the HDD icon would be greyed out.
Here is one thing to try. When you get to the log in screen, type a single key into the password field, then enter. Do this three times, and it should open a password reminder. Sometimes people simply put their password there. This has saved me more than once.
If this doesn't help, you will need a known boot CD. The last iMac I got from ebay had OS 9.2 in the drive. As I have it already, I would be happy to part with it.
Rick
Are you holding down the 'c' key when you try to boot from a CD? If not the Mac will happily start from the HDD on its own. It will only start from a CD if there is no OS on the HDD or if you set it as default in "Startup Disk" Control Panel or if you hold a boot key, like 'c'.
whats the word here... did you get in?
whats the word here... did you get in?