So I was typing on my wife’s MacBook Pro 2012 on High Sierra, and it just restarted and gave me the “prohibitory” sign. Couldn’t get it to boot back into the OS. I tried repairing the drive from a recovery partition. I don’t believe it’s a hard drive issue, as Apple ran hardware diagnostics and there were no issues. They told me her account was locked. I tried using terminal commands to unlock it, which got me to a login screen with her account. I entered her password and it just hangs forever - left it trying to login all night. Anything I can do? I’m at a loss.
Stuck trying to login after reinstall. HELP
- Thread starter saladino
- Start date
DeltaMac
Tech
I would suggest booting to a macOS (High Sierra) bootable installer.
Reinstall your macOS system.
(You could also upgrade to the later version Mojave, if you are ready for that)
This will NOT erase the drive, and you won't lose any of (your wife's) files or apps that may have been added. It simply reloads the existing system.
If you do not have a bootable external installer, I can offer suggestions for how to do that. It's fairly simple to do, but you do need to download the High Sierra installer, and you need something to create a bootable drive. An 8GB USB flash drive is ideal, or you can use a partition on an external hard drive.
Reinstall your macOS system.
(You could also upgrade to the later version Mojave, if you are ready for that)
This will NOT erase the drive, and you won't lose any of (your wife's) files or apps that may have been added. It simply reloads the existing system.
If you do not have a bootable external installer, I can offer suggestions for how to do that. It's fairly simple to do, but you do need to download the High Sierra installer, and you need something to create a bootable drive. An 8GB USB flash drive is ideal, or you can use a partition on an external hard drive.
Apple has a few recommendations: https://support.apple.com/guide/mac-help/reset-your-mac-login-password-mh35902/mac
Or .....
Try this: (from: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/250589906)
Or .....
Try this: (from: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/250589906)
- Reboot your Mac while holding down the Command key and R. Keep holding the key combination until the loading bar appears.
- Once in the Recovery Mode, select Terminal from the Utilities menu.
- Type “resetpassword” in the Terminal window and hit enter.
- A welcoming graphical window will appear, allowing you to reset your admin password in a familiar way.
- Select the storage device that contains the operating system (hard drive)
- Select the admin account.
- Click on the Change Password button.
- Enter a new password as well as a new password hint.
- Save and restart from the main menu.
- Log in with your new admin password.