How to recover password Cisco Nexus N9K – Recovery password

To recover the password on Cisco Nexus 9000, you need to restart the switch.

During the boot process, you need to escape with Ctrl+C

Detected CISCO MIFPGA
Version 2.16.1240. Copyright (C) 2013 American Megatrends, Inc. 
Board type 2
IOFPGA @ 0xc8000000
SLOT_ID @ 0xf
Aborting config file read and autoboot 
No autoboot or failed autoboot. falling to loader 


 Loader Version 7.34

loader > help 
? Print the command list
boot Boot image
bootmode Display/Change current boot mode
dir List file contents on a device
eobc Booting image from active sup via EOBC channel
help Print the command list or the specific command usage
ip Setting IP address or gateway address
reboot Reboot the system
serial Serial console setting
set Set network configuration
show Show loader configuration

Enter in recovery mode with the following command cmdline recoverymode=1 and boot the image.

loader > cmdline recoverymode=1 

loader > dir 

bootflash:: 

 lost+found
 .patch
 .rpmstore
[...]
 nxos.7.0.3.I5.2.bin
 .swtam

loader > boot nxos.7.0.3.I5.2.bin 
Booting nxos.7.0.3.I5.2.bin 
Trying diskboot 
 Filesystem type is ext2fs, partition type 0x83
Image valid


Image Signature verification was Successful.

Boot Time: 4/10/2017 8:33:0
Installing klm_card_index
done
INIT: version 2.88 booting
Installing ata_piix module ... done.
Unsquashing rootfs ...
Installing isan procfs ... done.
Installing SSE module with card index 21025 ... done.
Creating SSE device node 248 ... done.
Loading I2C driver ... done.
Installing CCTRL driver for card_type 19 without NEED_GEM ... done.
Loading IGB driver ... done.
[...]

In configuration mode, change the admin password and load the image.

A copy of each such license is available at
http://www.opensource.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.php and
http://opensource.org/licenses/gpl-3.0.html and
http://www.opensource.org/licenses/lgpl-2.1.php and
http://www.gnu.org/licenses/old-licenses/library.txt.
switch(boot)# config ter
Enter configuration commands, one per line. End with CNTL/Z.
switch(boot)(config)# admin-password ?
 <WORD> Password for user admin (Max Size - 64)
switch(boot)(config)# admin-password C1sco1234
WARNING! Enabling local authentication for login through console due to password recovery
switch(boot)(config)# exit

switch(boot)# load-nxos 
Unsquashing rootfs ...
Creating /dev/mcelog
Starting mcelog daemon
Overwriting dme stub lib
INIT: Switching to runlevel: 3
INIT: Sending processes the TERM signal
File /etc/shared/localtime exists.
INIT: (boot)# 
Running S93thirdparty-script...

Populating conf files for hybrid sysmgr ...
Starting hybrid sysmgr ...
[...]

Your device is UP with the new password.