> Accessing a Mac without its password
My late mother’s iMac, from around 2003, won’t start up without her password, which I don’t know. How can I get it going again?
Provided that a Mac doesn’t have a firmware password set, and has neither a T2 or M1 chip, it’s possible to start it up from an external disk if that disk has a suitable copy of macOS installed. However, the most recent version of Mac OS X that iMac is likely to be able to run is 10.5.8 Leopard, which Apple stopped supporting 10 years ago.
Depending on what you want to do with that Mac, you may need a specialist Mac repair shop. If you want to recover documents from your mother’s Home folder, that would be more difficult, but provided she didn’t use a very secure password, it can be done. Although more expensive, you may find that Apple can help. You’ll need to provide evidence of the Mac’s ownership and endorsement of her executors.
If you don’t want to recover any files from that Mac, it’s now so old that it has little value or use, and is best sent for recycling. Before doing so, it’s worth physically destroying the hard drive inside it, which prevents anyone else accessing her private information. Some Macs can be tricky to gain access to their internals, but once you have, extract the hard drive and smash it with a hammer before adding it to the recycling.