I have two old macs that I need to get running. They were obtained through a surplus program so we have no idea who the original user was or any of the original installation disks. When I start the machines it says: "Please enter the password for the Hard Drive". Does anyone know of a way around this? I've tried every 'dummy' password I can think of and get nowhere!

First. Did you have the original installation disks? Probably not, I bet. If not, what models are these? When Apple was still in the Power PC beige era Macs had model numbers like 5400/180. I have a pile of system disks for Macs. The easiest fix is to get the right system disk and then start up from the disk -- not the operating system installed on the hard drive. Once things are running, just do a clean install which erases everything and reinstall the operating system. Of course, the downside is it erases everything include any application programs.

What are you using these old Macs for?
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Oh, re-reading your post I see you don't have the system disks. Well, again, what are the model numbers?



[This message has been edited by Bart Freese (edited 5/4/2007).]

Bart,

I have a Power Macintosh G3 and a Power Macintosh 7200. They are going to be used to run some old machinery (which we tried to configure to PCs but failed at...). Thanks!

I'll dig out the shoe box and see what I've got for system disks. You might be able to start off the disk, find the password program, and give it the "boot".