Installing Monterey on Imac with password on harddisk

pernille289 wrote:

When I reset the Imac, and installed El Capitan afterwards, via the internet, Is was asked to make a harddisk password, and made one. I tried to repeat the process, but it was not possible to go through with the process, without making a password.

We still have no idea what this password could be. Obviously you can log into your Mac if you can check the user accounts access level. As for a password during the install process, the only two possibilities left are a Filevault password which is usually tied directly to the macOS user account so the admin user password should work. The only other possibility is a firmware password lock which would present itself as a padlock on the screen while booting. @Owl-53 provided a link to an Apple article regarding that possibility.

I think you need to take a picture or screenshot of the screen when this occurs. Perhaps that will help us.

Plus at what point during the install process does this password prompt occur?

Are you running the installer while booted into macOS El Capitan?

Did to Set a Firmware Password on the Disk ?

Set a firmware password on your Mac

Have you forgotten the User Account Password after installing El Capitan ?

Intel Computer

Shutdown the computer 

Restart computer and immediately hold the two keyboard combo Command  r 

If using a Bluetooth Keyboard with Rechargeable Battery - Cable the Keyboard to computer for this unique purpose. Bluetooth Kernel may not load soon enough to execute the 2 keyboard commands 

Top Tool Bar >> Utilities >> Terminal

Type resetpassword as one word and no spaces

Press Return key

Follow the prompts and remember the New Password

@HWTech 😎

Not sure if this is relevant but . . .

User Byline iMac 27″, macOS 15.4

Quaifies for Sequoia

• iMac (Retina 5K, 27-inch, 2020)
• iMac (Retina 5K, 27-inch, 2019)

Last Resort 🤞

Thanks to a respected contributor @leroydouglas

if in doubt about admin from your logged in user account,  from Terminal.app copy and paste —

dscacheutil -q group -a name admin

The only two passwords I know of are the macOS admin user account password and a Filevault password if you turned on Filevault to encrypt the drive. Normally macOS does some behind the scenes "magic" so you only need to use your macOS admin login password to unlock Filevault & to log into your user account.

Installing a macOS upgrade should just install if you are going from an old OS to a newer OS especially if you are running the Monterey installer while booted to the internal macOS boot drive normally even if Filevault is enabled.

Is your macOS user account one with "admin" privileges? If not, then that is the problem and the question becomes how did it lose its admin privileges?

If you are upgrading the OS by booting into Internet Recovery Mode (Command + Option + R), or from a bootable macOS Monterey USB stick, then if Filevault is enabled on the internal drive you may first need to launch Disk Utility to unlock & mount the internal drive before you can install Monterey to it.

pernille289 wrote:

The account should have admin privileges.

You need to confirm it by checking the Users & Groups System Settings. Your macOS user account is either an "admin" or it is a "standard" account.

and I had to set a password for the harddisks, I tried it again, so see if it was possible not to set one, but it was not.

Exactly what "password for the harddisks"? Please explain how you did this since I don't know what you mean by it.

@HWTech 👍

Only for Continuity Purposes 🤞

I need to reset my Imac from 2015, with M… - Apple Community