I've lost my desktop!

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Hi, I've just acquired a friend's mac, having used a pc for years and am a bit confused....
I used it for about a week, still logged in under his name. Since I knew his password, I was able to go into 'system preferences' and 'accounts' and change both Name and Password to my own. Now however, when I log in with these, it hasn't simply changed the name of the account but created a new one ie all the personal desktop and internet settings are back to default. This in itself is not a problem, but now I can no longer access the original account with all the changes I had made and files I had on the desktop, since there is no option to do that on the log-in screen. I can find my account and my desktop settings under 'users' in the harddrive, so they're not gone, but it appears as a folder rather than a little house (i know, i sound so clueless!)

How can I log in as me and get all my stuff back?! Any nudges in the right direction much appreciated!

I'm now trying to back up some of my stuff on to my external harddrive and keep being told that it cannot be modified..isnt this kind of the point of harddrives?! Does anyone have any idea why this might be and whether it's related to the first issue? V grateful if someone could help - not how i imagined spending saturday night !!
 
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Go to System Preferences/Accounts and change login options in there.

As for the second issue, yes it probably is related to the first as it's probably because you don't have administrator rights in that user account. Just change it as I said above and you should be OK.
 
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Yeh, I thought that would work, but i don't seem to be able to change any of the login details...I fear it might be a bit more complicated...? As for the external drive prob, that's a good thought, although i can save to my little usb drive no problem - its just not big enough for backup
 
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Did you click on the lock in the bottom left corner to make changes?

What format is the Hard drive in? If it is NTFS you'll need to reformat it with disk utility (Be aware that this will wipe the drive clean so you'll need to back anything on it up first).
 
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thanks for your quick reply...i did, i've been trying everything i can think of. Basically, the files are still there, they're just in a folder with my name on it under 'users' in the hard drive. I guess I could put them in the shared folder, make myself a new admin login account and transfer them..? It would mean I'd forgo all the settings i had for the internet and whatnot but i guess they can be done again... I've no idea what format the external drive is in (not v computer smart!) but it's reading fine so hope I don't have to wipe the whole thing.... :-/
 
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two users, one name...how do i get in?

Hi

I posted with this issue a little while back and still haven't quite sorted it,although now I understand a bit more about it (thanks shfle)

I inherited a friend's macbook. There was only one (admin) user, his name, obviously. After a week or so, decided i should change the login name to my own. I did this, able to do so since i knew his password. Unknown to me, by naively literally just changing the name, i have created a new admin account in my name, with all preferences back to default and no sign of my downloaded music and other files.

I'd like to be able to get into the original account, but this doesn't seem possible - is it? It now no longer has a name and therefore no option to login.

I then thought, failing getting back into this account, i could transfer these files (which i can find under a folder in 'users') into the shared folder, retrieve them, redo all my own internet settings etc, and delete the original account but iTunes won't let my play the music files. It says they aren't compatible with this version, although it's exactly the same one i had from the start...

Can anyone sort this out? Thanks in advance!
 
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NOTE: Merged crossposts
 

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