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General discussion

Disable Auto Login from Terminal

by roadbone Feb 17, 2011 3:56AM PST

I believe there is a permission error with my admin account. I am stuck at the "Grey Screen of Death" when I try to restart my Mac. I can't reboot in Safe mode so I've booted with Install Disc and ran Disk Repair and Permission Repairs...Still unable to restart and still frozen at Grey Screen with gears turning. I can access terminal by booting from Snow Leopard Install disc so was wondering if there is a way to disable Auto Login from Terminal? Hopefully, this will bypass the "corrupt" user that is set to Auto Login during startup.

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2 Posts

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Your best bet would be to perform an

by mrmacfixit Forum moderator Feb 17, 2011 4:03AM PST

Archive and Install as there is obviously something wrong with the OS.

The boot, as you describe it, does not get anywhere near the Auto Login procedure so I doubt messing around with the Terminal app will help you.

Boot from the install disk and carry out an Archive and Install.

P

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I'd agree

by Jimmy Greystone Feb 17, 2011 9:18AM PST

I'd agree. You haven't gotten to the point where it's trying to load a user account, so one of two things is likely wrong here. Either you have a corrupted OS, or you have a HDD on its way out. A corrupted OS is much easier to deal with grand scheme of things, so do a reinstall of the OS first. If that still doesn't fix it, then it's time to take it to a repair shop, because the HDD is likely on its way out.

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