Lost Root/Admin Password
- Power down and pull the SD card out from your Pi and put it into your computer.
- Open the file 'cmdline.txt' and add 'init=/bin/sh' to the end. This will cause the machine to boot to single user mode.
- Put the SD card back in the Pi and boot.
- When the prompt comes up, type 'su' to log in as root (no password needed).
- Type "passwd pi" and then follow the prompts to enter a new password.
- Shut the machine down, then pull the card again and put the cmdline.txt file back the way it was by removing the 'init=/bin/sh' bit.
The cmdline.txt should look something like this:
dwc_otg.lpm_enable=0 console=ttyAMA0,115200 console=tty1 root=/dev/mmcblk0p2 rootfstype=ext4 elevator=deadline rootwait init=/bin/sh
This file should contain a line of text that resembles the line below.
dwc_otg.lpm_enable=0 console=ttyAMA0,115200 console=tty1 root=/dev/mmcblk0p2 rootfstype=ext4 elevator=deadline fsck.repair=yes rootwait
You must modify this file so that the Raspberry Pi starts on the bin/sh script, which will allow you to change the password of your Raspberry Pi without knowing it!
To do this, simply add the line below to the end of the file and save it.
init=/bin/sh