Topic: Hacking Linux Mandrake

[Grey Ninja]

Well, I have gotten myself in quite a bind.  My Windows partition crashed earlier tonight when I tried installing the new SB Live! drivers available on Creative Asia's website.  I now have corrupted system files, and I can't even boot in safe mode.  Windows XP doesn't crash often, but when it does, it does it with enough power to blow a hole in the side of your computer.  I cannot restore my ghost images or reinstall the OS at the moment as my discs are over at a friends house, from when her hard drive failed, and I was trying to get it back up and running.  I will try to get them back off of her after the weekend.  Until then, I am stuck with plan B.

My Linux Mandrake partition mainly goes unused, as I am horrible at maintaining it.  I basically installed it a while back, got my favorite browser running on it, attempted to install a media player, got bored, wanted to play some America's Army, and went back to Windows.  I have since then forgotten my root password.  It's totally unlike me, as I only have a limited number of passwords I actually use.  I have no idea why none of them work now, which is why I am here begging for help on how I can possibly get my password back.

I have thought of 2 solutions.
1)  Re-install Linux  (Takes a while, and I am kind of pressed for time this weekend as it is.  Nevertheless, it is no doubt what I will be doing.)
2)  Write a shell script to recover the password by brute force.  (I am lousy at writing shell scripts, and I am sure it would take all day to run it anyway.  Easier just to re-install).

If anyone knows any tricks to recover it, I would be most grateful.  I am going to bed about now though.  This day has gone on far too long as it is.

PS:  If any moderators think this is illegal, or my reasons are untrue, feel free to delete this topic.  I AM telling the truth though, sad as it may seem, and I don't THINK I am asking for anything illegal.  (But If I am, again, feel free to make this vanish.)

[Grey Ninja]

WOO HOO!!!!!

I finally figured out that I did in fact install a media player with Mandrake.  Thank. god. I can finally listen to music.  I have internet and music, and no way of installing other programs, but hey, what else do you need?    (Well, maybe a shockwave plugin so that it will stop hassling to download it, but whatever)

[aoi tsuki]

Try this http://www.computing.net/linux/wwwboard/forum/17633.html. i'm assuming you've thought of it already. i lost my password in RedHat years ago and recovered it, but i haven't used Linux in some time and i can't recall how i got it back exactly.

Oh, and think you've had it hard? After trying multiple USB adapters to get wiresless net access, i installed a USB card to try and fix the issue, which somehow killed my Audigy. i got a Live as a replacement (thanks for the heads up on the Asian drivers). A day after that i tried installing a 120 GB hard drive, and my power supply explodes. New power supply, XP OEM won't install on my machine (it installs on two others). Add to that my CDR which is giving me problems. If something else goes wrong with my box, i'm axing it.

[Grey Ninja]

Thanks a lot man.  I will give that a try when I get home today.

And I guess I have no computer story that sounds worse than your experience.  About the worst thing with my computer was the Kyro based video card I bought a while back.  It wouldn't run ANY of my favorite programs, not even 3DMark (properly).  I swore and cursed at the blasted thing for a few months, then overclocked it until it died.  I cheered when it died, and put my good old TNT in instead.  It was about half the speed of the Kyro, but at least the drivers were capable of running things.

Oh, and BTW, it was the patch that I installed, and not the full driver set.  Once I manage to reformat my Windows partition, I will try again from a fresh install with the full driver set.  I will let you know how it works out.

[manunited4eva22]

Can't say mine is worse, but I had a liquid nitrogen bottle explode in my case...no one was hurt, but a crappy pc was destroyed (it was a Celeron 300A OCed to 856Mhz)

[Grey Ninja]

Oh man, I wish I would have been able to see that.  That's some serious bragging rights right there.    Well worth the cost of the Liquid Nitrogen and the CPU.

[Grey Ninja]

Just to let you know, I spent the night trying to reconstruct a Norton Ghost boot disk, as mine is at a friend's, and I of course cannot install Norton Ghost on Linux.  I was eventually successful, and restored my image of a fresh install of Windows XP.  

I promptly downloaded the full driver pack for the Soundblaster Live! from the Creative Asia site, and I am now successfully running the new drivers.  They seem to work just fine for me now, and the sound quality seems quite nice.  (Especially after hearing my nasty Linux drivers).