Login failure

I experienced a login failure at the end of October. Applecare restored by telling me to switch off iMac, unplug, press power button for 5 seconds, reconnect, start and press alt, cmd, p & r keys all at once. This worked.

I had another failure last week but this time my User login dialogue had disappeared. Nobody seems to know how or why this happened and I had to set up a new User. When I tried to use my old password this was denied as being already in use so I had to use a new password.

The folder for my old User name is still there although all its contents have been transferred to the new User file.

I am concerned that this may recur. Can anyone advise please?

Are you making Time Machine backups? SuperDuper? Carbon Copy Cloner? I think you get the idea. You might want to try restoring from backup before creating another user. It's possible something is corrupting your user identity and may reoccur.

My recommendation is if it happens again, reinstall Snow Leopard and use your Time Machine backup to restore your applications and data. You should suffer no data loss that way and it might clear up whatever is causing that to happen.

Yes Time Machine backups. I'll try reinstalling. Thanks.

chscag said:

Are you making Time Machine backups? SuperDuper? Carbon Copy Cloner? I think you get the idea. You might want to try restoring from backup before creating another user. It's possible something is corrupting your user identity and may reoccur.

My recommendation is if it happens again, reinstall Snow Leopard and use your Time Machine backup to restore your applications and data. You should suffer no data loss that way and it might clear up whatever is causing that to happen.

Click to expand...

There is a problem. I've checked the Time Machine and tried to access backups taken before the 'event'. Permission is refused and there doesn't even seem to be an option to access using the old password. I fear that, if I reinstall and set up using the old password and user name, I will be locked out of the most recent backups.

I suppose I could use the new user name and password and then set up a second user name with the old password, something I'm unable to do at present.

chscag said:

Are you making Time Machine backups? SuperDuper? Carbon Copy Cloner? I think you get the idea. You might want to try restoring from backup before creating another user. It's possible something is corrupting your user identity and may reoccur.

My recommendation is if it happens again, reinstall Snow Leopard and use your Time Machine backup to restore your applications and data. You should suffer no data loss that way and it might clear up whatever is causing that to happen.

Click to expand...

Do I install or do the more drastic 'erase and install'?

That may be the best option at this point. Erasing, reinstalling, and using your Time Machine backup should get you going again without any data loss.