Cannot access mysql

[inkthing]

Hi, Everything is set up fine and secure - and the passwords all match... but in phpmyadmin I receive the error:

#1045 - Access denied for user 'root'@'localhost' (using password: YES)
phpMyAdmin tried to connect to the MySQL server, and the server rejected the connection. You should check the host, username and password in your configuration and make sure that they correspond to the information given by the administrator of the MySQL server.

And in status mySql is listed deactivated. Any ideas how to activate and access? It isn't a password issue I don't think - but may perhaps be due to having previously had other instances of mySql running via Mampp and Tomcat..? If so, does anyone have any clue how can I make the xampp mysql the default - or else get xampp to be able to access those other databases?

Thanks for your help...

[dferriman]

Sounds like you have another version of MySQL on your machine. If you have MAMP or any other program like Xampp or just have MySQL on the machine you will have to get rid of it for Xampp to run MySQL. If you are not sure go to your terminal (applications/utilities) and type mysql -v if it comes back with a version number like so: MySQL 5.0 or the like, you will need to remove it. Enter the following commands in terminal one at a time:
sudo rm /usr/local/mysql
sudo rm -rf /usr/local/mysql*
sudo rm -rf /Library/StartupItems/MySQLCOM
sudo rm -rf /Library/PreferencePanes/My*
sudo rm -rf /Library/Receipts/mysql*
sudo rm -rf /Library/Receipts/MySQL*
sudo rm /etc/my.cnf

You will lose any data in your MySQL database if you do this, so migrate if you need to.

I got this info from Google, I am not an expert so take this advise as without warranty. This was the reason MySQL was not working on my machine and I found this to remove it:

http://tomkeur.net/39/how-to-remove-mys ... opard.html

Good luck, hope this helps