[Solved] How to enter Recovery Mode?

[DrJ]

Gentlemen!

I needed to reset the root password on an RPi 4 running ArchLinux ARM as it is lost along with any other password. On Arch/x86 I edit the grub menu for this .. to enter bash at startup.
On Arch/ARM I do not have grub, i.e. that fails.

I can - of course - get hold of the sdcard holding the system and mount it on a different computer. I have already tried to append init=/sbin/bash in cmdline.txt on the boot partition ... but that results in a blank screen ... followd by "no cable connected" message from the monitor.

Any ideas to get some prompt to issue a "passwd" command with root permissions?

Cheers

[graysky]

If you have a 2nd uSD card, you can image that, and then use it to chroot into the partition to change the password. (use arch-chroot from arch-install-scripts).

[DrJ]

Thank you very much for your reply, @graysky ... I will give it a go and report ..
Cheers

[DrJ]

I tried that but had difficulties as I could not mount the target rootfs via usb and did not have a second sdcard slot ...
So my solution was to take the sdcard serving as a boot device (and holding the root fs) out of the RPi and to stick it into my larger pc and have it mounted there. I edited /etc/passwd to remove the x for a qualified user ... resulting in an empty password for it.
After having being back on the RPi first thing to do was - of course - to set the password for that user ... and noting it down this time.

Thanks for your attention and support ...
Cheers