server replacement

[Kooler]

the server (which runs on Free BSD) is now locked up and no one seems to be able to come up with the pass.
is it possible to take out to DVD-Rs all the files in the hard drive through Knoppix for example and reinstall it again.
vague perhaps.
any suggestion appreciated
thanks in advance
koo

[KyKo]

I've never dealt with BSD but couldn't you simply boot up a live CD... then chroot into your BSD install and change the password?

[Kooler]

this is actually the core problem here.
the drive inwhich FreeBSD runs, simply cannot be mounted
i use USB-knoppix for the issue, the kernel version is 2.6.19. i guess ufs format IS supported.
fdisk output is as following......

....
Disk /dev/hdb: 730 MB 730791936 bytes
32 heads. 63sectors/track, 708 cylinders
Units = Cylinders of 2016 * 512 = 1032192 bytes

device boot start end blocks Id System
/dev/hdb1 * 1 708 713632 a5 FreeBSD

..........

any idea?
apreciated
koo

[anomie]

the server (which runs on Free BSD) is now locked up and no one seems to be able to come up with the pass.

The easy way to fix:

At boot time, when the loader is counting down to continue booting, press any key to interrupt it. Then type boot -s to proceed to single-user mode. Note that if you get to the FreeBSD menu at boot time (instead of the boot prompt), you can simply choose the menu option that gets you to single-user mode.

The system will continue booting and then ask you to enter a shell or hit enter to use /bin/sh. Just hit enter.

Then you'll need to:
# mount -a
# passwd

Then change root's password. (This won't work if single-user mode is 'insecure'. See next section if that is the case.)

-------------------------

The slightly longer way:

If single-user mode has been password protected (controlled in /etc/ttys), then things get slightly more complicated. You should be able to boot with the FreeBSD installation media and get to an emergency shell to mount your / filesystem and change the password.

Failing all that, you could probably do this with a live cd. FreeSBIE surely has UFS support built in.

FreeSBIE - Free System Burned In Economy

-------------------------

P.S. Don't screw around with knoppix to try to fix this. That is going to make things more difficult than necessary.