Hi all,

This is first time I met unix in my life. I purchased old Scanning Elecron Microscope which came with 486/33MHz PC running Unix System V, ver. 3.6. The one simple user name/passw is known so I can boot and login. But can not shutdown! It asks root or su passw. I'm very sensitive not to destroy any configuration. As advised on this foum I found /etc/passwd file but inside is only 'x' in places of passwords - means they are in shadow file. I found it however I was not allowed even to look in to it.
My idea is such - to boot from floppy, take this shadow file and then try to use JtR cracker. Or take out HDD, put on another Unix machine and copy or look in to shadow file then.
Can somebody advise - would it work to go this way?
- would all configuration and startup information survive if I would access HDD booted not from it?
- can somebody recomend where to download light bootable floppy version of suitable for me Unix?

You will need bootable media that was used to install the os or that came with the os. The problem you will have is that your file system may not be readable by any other os. Attaching the HD to another box might be worth a try though. If you get access to shadow file, you will be able to read and write to it. Just remove the encrypted password. Or copy the encrypted password from the account whose password you know. If you give JtR, say, 500 passwords, it can quickly break a few most of the time. But if your root password is a good one, it can take many weeks.

Can't the guy who sold you the system tell you the password?

The seller is just a surplus dealer. He does not know what the unix is. Also he dont know (dont tell) the real prev user.

So I dont have any bootable media, and to hook HDD on another box looks the best option. Do you think a current Linux'es would be able to talk to Sys5 UNIX file system?

I'm still not sure if UNIX uses some encrypted files or general? Means If I would have same OS loaded on another box would I be able to read files from new hooked HDD?

Remove the hard drive with the root file system on it and mount it using another system, and then edit the password file.

When you have physical access to a hard drive, you can, generally speaking, always change the root password.

So, first you need to find out what type of filesystem you have. If the filesystem is one supported by the Linux kernal, you can simply boot from a Linux kernal and then mount the disk partition with the password file, and then edit it.

That is how I would do it.

Unix SVR3 came out from AT&T about 20 years ago and the last major release was 3.2.
You need to know which company marketed your unix, the version, and the medium.
Please post the output from unix commands:

uname -a

cat /etc/copyright

Any useful messages before you get before the login prompt (if not the same as above) ?


PS. What size is your floppy drive? Is is this a server with a SCSI disc?

yes it appeared to be more complicated. The HDD is scsi.
I found Adaptec scsi adapter, connected my traget HDD and booted another machine with puppy linux CD. The HDD was found at boot and there what I could see with dmesg :

# dmesg
scsi0 : Adaptec AIC7XXX EISA/VLB/PCI SCSI HBA DRIVER, Rev 7.0
<Adaptec 2940 SCSI adapter>
aic7870: Single Channel A, SCSI Id=7, 16/253 SCBs
scsi 0:0:0:0: Direct-Access MAXTOR LXT-340S 6.73 PQ: 0 ANSI: 1 CCS
target0:0:0: Beginning Domain Validation
target0:0:0: Ending Domain Validation
SCSI device sda: 665154 512-byte hdwr sectors (341 MB)
sda: Write Protect is off
sda: Mode Sense: 57 00 00 08
SCSI device sda: write cache: disabled, read cache: enabled, doesn't support DPO or FUA
SCSI device sda: 665154 512-byte hdwr sectors (341 MB)
sda: Write Protect is off
sda: Mode Sense: 57 00 00 08
SCSI device sda: write cache: disabled, read cache: enabled, doesn't support DPO or FUA
sda: unknown partition table
sd 0:0:0:0: Attached scsi disk sda

The disk was not listed on desktop for ones available to mount. I guess prelast message "sda: unknown partition table" was the reason. This was on my new linux box.

On the native machine during boot message pops up:

UHC UNIX System V Rel. 4.0 Version 3.6

then many messages about loaded modules

The uname -a returns:
fib1 4.0 3.6 i386 386/AT (fib1 - is user )

/etc/copyright - does not exist

With this original box flopies are formated at 1.44M and also I managed to make tar backups of some data. But my puppy linux could not mount them either.

Any ideas how to move on?

UHC was UHC Corp out of Houston, TX. They were selling a rebadged version of SVR4 for i386. i.e. USL's Destiny product which later became the basis for SCO UNIXware.
Any SCO UNIXware platform should be able to mount and read the filesystem.