3524xl switch (password recovery)

[boomshakem]

password recovery! is there any reason I wouldn't want to boot while live on the LAN. Assuming everone has gone home ofcourse.

I'm an OU memeber in a forrest with two cisco switches and I don't have the password for the the 3524xl. The password recovery process has you disconnect the power switch and reconnect while holding the mode button for two seconds? ? ?

Any reason why I shouldn't? ??

[gmaindol]

u can do it as per u r wish..as long as u can take a downtime... u need to restart and go into rommon so that you can alter the files and restart the switch and get in the CLI to change the password again.. i am not sure what exactly you want to ask ..let me know if this does not answer that

-gopesh

Cisco TAC

[thisisshanky]

Passwd recovery definitely requires downtime. Unless you have a saved config of the switch somewhere and the password is not an enable secret (Type 5 encryption). If the password has been encrypted using Type 7 on the config you can download an utility to decrypt the type 7 encrypted string. Passwords are not encrypted by default, unless "service password-encryption" is given from the global config mode.

If you do not have the configs backed up, the only other way is to boot the switch bypassing the configs and retrieving the configs back before changing the old forgotten password. This definitely asks for downtime.