Manually change Rackspace root password for Cloud Server

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If you lose your password to your machine, and aren’t able to reset the password for your VM thru the mycloud control panel, then it’s possible to do this manually by putting the server into rescue mode and chrooting. Here is how ;

1. Put server into rescue mode. Noting the root password autogenerated for the rescue mode.

Screen Shot 2016-01-21 at 11.14.26 AM
2. Login to server via web console or ssh
3. Mount the ‘old’ original disk (usually partition xvdb1).

 mount /dev/xvdb1 /mnt

4. Chroot to the ‘old’ original disk

  
chroot /mnt

5. Change the root passwd

 passwd

7. Take the server out of rescue mode.
8. You should now be able to login to the server using the new root password. (done in the same way as putting it into rescue mode)