Hand-me-down computer/administrator

My very old IMAC suddenly died one day. As luck would have it a coworker/friend of my son's said he had an IMAC he would sell to him for a very reasonable price. (He and wife both use laptops now.) We bought the computer but it turns out the coworker got it from another party, no idea who, what etc. He doesn't know the administrator name/password. I can't update the software. Last update was in 2009, which is probably when the coworker obtained it. He hardly ever used it, never bothered to try to update software etc. I don't think I have a start-up disk to create a new administrator. Lost all my stuff on the old computer.... tons of itunes music, pics, documents, etc. I just want to use my "new" computer, update the software, etc. Is there anything I can do?

One way is to use target disk mode.
You may want to try to copy over as many files you can. You old computer needs to have a firewire port. You need to have a firewire cable. Start up your old machine in firewire mode.
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1661
http://lowendmac.com/misc/06/0710.html
There are also software recovery tools you may use to recover your data.  Let us new more in a new post, if you want to recover your data.

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    Message Edited by betcsu on 08-03-2009 06:19 PM

    thats not what im trying to do. 
    i sinply want to add my new/used computer to the network using a usb wireless adapter.
    i do not have the installation cd and the new/used computer doiesnt have ethernet for me to use the web baed utlity.
    is there a d/l of the installation cd somewhere?  i can not believe i acnt find the dumb cd!  i used it just last month when i re-formatted the kids computer and now i cant find it to add this computer. UGH!  is there anything i can do to get this new/old computer on the net for my daughter.  SHES_DRIVING_ME_BONKERS! 

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