Cannon find Startup Disk icon

Well I found the Startup Disk icon okay but now I rebooted and cannot find it.
I looked in the control panel under "Performance and Maintenance" in the category view. And also in the Classic View it has disapeared as well.
What cna I do about this? I cannot figure out how to boot back into OSX?
cheers,
Noah

Supposedly... holding the "x" key down when booting defaults to booting OSXS... never tried it... since I need a "9" key! LOL:-)

Similar Messages

Invisible Startup Disk Icon on Desktop and Finder

Today suddenly I found that my Startup disk icon was gone from the desktop and from the Finder. I did some searching and found the following solution that may be useful for someone else:
http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?p=4932292#post4932292
I pasted the solution below:
from a Terminal window, type:
ls -lOd /
(That's lowercase ell, lowercase ess, space, minus, lowercase ell, capital oh, lowercase dee, space, forward slash)
You should get something like this:
hostname:~ username$ ls -lOd /
drwxrwxr-t 32 root admin - 1156 Feb 8 20:35 /
Sounds like you might see something like this instead:
hostname:~ username$ ls -lOd /
drwxrwxr-t@ 32 root admin hidden 1156 Feb 8 20:35 /
(note it says "hidden" instead of "-")
To fix this, type:
sudo chflags nohidden /
and provide your admin password. You won't get any output back from the command but the icon should now appear on your desktop, and the hidden flag should go away if you repeat the 'ls -lOd /' command.
And just in case you missed it above, you've got to be sure Hard disks are turned on in Finder General Preferences under "Show these items on the Desktop"

A few days after trying the solution in my previous post, I realized that the Startup disk icon was still missing from Devices in the Finder's sidebar.
So, following some advice from other forums, I went and deleted com.apple.finder.plist and com.apple.sidebarlists.plist from homedirectory/library/preferences. Then did a control-option-click on Finder in the Dock and chose "relaunch".
So this completed the fix. Coincidentally this also fixed a "freeze" issue that I was having.

Corrupt "Startup Disk" icon in System Prefs

Wish I could post a pic, but I can't. The icon for the Startup Disk in my System Preferences is all messed up. It's way too wide, looks like a light switch with a circle or something down in the corner, and the title isn't even there.
Old skool: rebuild the desktop.
New millennium:...?
Thanks for any suggestions! (All software updates installed.)

Hello and Welcome to Apple Discussions ...
It could be that your System Preferences are corrupted. It happens... Try this. Locate this file;
com.apple.systempreferences.plist It's here: /Home/Library/Preferences. Open the Preferences folder, locate that file, drag it to the Trash, empty the Trash and reboot. Go to your System Preferences/Startup Disk pane and see if the icon is behaving.
Also, if you haven't already done so, create a new user: System Preferences/Accounts and see if the System Preferences/Startup Disk icon looks like it should in that account. The reason for doing this is to see if the problem is system wide or just your Home Folder.
Also, can't hurt to run Disk Utility. It's in your Applications/Utility folder. Repair Disk Permissions and see if that makes a difference.
Hope something helps!
Carolyn

Question mark on startup disk icon

I installed Mavericks yesterday and there is now a question mark on the startup disk icon inside System Preferences. I rebooted the machine but its still there.
Any help?
Thanks.

Question (?) Mark, Blinking Folder, or Gray Screen at Startup
These are related but not identical issues. Their causes are outlined in Intel-based Mac- Startup sequence and error codes, symbols. Solutions may be found in:
A flashing question mark appears when you start your Mac
Mac OS X- Gray screen appears during startup
In most cases the problems may be caused by:
Problem with the computer's PRAM - See Resetting your Mac's PRAM and NVRAM.
Boot drive's directory has been corrupted - Repair with Disk Utility.
Critical system files are damaged or deleted - Reinstall OS X.
The disk drive is physically non-functional - Replace the hard drive.
Repair the Hard Drive and Permissions
Boot from your Snow Leopard Installer disc. After the installer loads select your language and click on the Continue button. When the menu bar appears select Disk Utility from the Utilities menu. After DU loads select your hard drive entry (mfgr.'s ID and drive size) from the the left side list. In the DU status area you will see an entry for the S.M.A.R.T. status of the hard drive. If it does not say "Verified" then the hard drive is failing or failed. (SMART status is not reported on external Firewire or USB drives.) If the drive is "Verified" then select your OS X volume from the list on the left (sub-entry below the drive entry,) click on the First Aid tab, then click on the Repair Disk button. If DU reports any errors that have been fixed, then re-run Repair Disk until no errors are reported. If no errors are reported click on the Repair Permissions button. Wait until the operation completes, then quit DU and return to the installer.
If DU reports errors it cannot fix, then you will need Disk Warrior and/or Tech Tool Pro to repair the drive. If you don't have either of them or if neither of them can fix the drive, then you will need to reformat the drive and reinstall OS X.
The main difference if you are using Lion or Mountain Lion is that you must first boot from the Recovery HD:
Boot From The Recovery HD:
Restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the COMMAND and R keys until the menu screen appears. Alternatively, restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the OPTION key until the boot manager screen appears. Select the Recovery HD and click on the downward pointing arrow button.
Reinstall Snow Leopard Without Erasing The drive
1. Repair the Hard Drive and Permissions
Boot from your Snow Leopard Installer disc. After the installer loads select your language and click on the Continue button. When the menu bar appears select Disk Utility from the Utilities menu. After DU loads select your hard drive entry (mfgr.'s ID and drive size) from the the left side list. In the DU status area you will see an entry for the S.M.A.R.T. status of the hard drive. If it does not say "Verified" then the hard drive is failing or failed. (SMART status is not reported on external Firewire or USB drives.) If the drive is "Verified" then select your OS X volume from the list on the left (sub-entry below the drive entry,) click on the First Aid tab, then click on the Repair Disk button. If DU reports any errors that have been fixed, then re-run Repair Disk until no errors are reported. If no errors are reported click on the Repair Permissions button. Wait until the operation completes, then quit DU and return to the installer.
If DU reports errors it cannot fix, then you will need Disk Warrior and/or Tech Tool Pro to repair the drive. If you don't have either of them or if neither of them can fix the drive, then you will need to reformat the drive and reinstall OS X.
2. Reinstall Snow Leopard
If the drive is OK then quit DU and return to the installer. Proceed with reinstalling OS X. Note that the Snow Leopard installer will not erase your drive or disturb your files. After installing a fresh copy of OS X the installer will move your Home folder, third-party applications, support items, and network preferences into the newly installed system.
Download and install Mac OS X 10.6.8 Update Combo v1.1.
Reinstalling Lion/Mountain Lion Without Erasing The Drive
Boot to the Recovery HD: Restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the COMMAND and R keys until the menu screen appears. Alternatively, restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the OPTION key until the boot manager screen appears. Select the Recovery HD and click on the downward pointing arrow button.
Repair the Hard Drive and Permissions: Upon startup select Disk Utility from the main menu. Repair the Hard Drive and Permissions as follows.
When the recovery menu appears select Disk Utility. After DU loads select your hard drive entry (mfgr.'s ID and drive size) from the the left side list. In the DU status area you will see an entry for the S.M.A.R.T. status of the hard drive. If it does not say "Verified" then the hard drive is failing or failed. (SMART status is not reported on external Firewire or USB drives.) If the drive is "Verified" then select your OS X volume from the list on the left (sub-entry below the drive entry,) click on the First Aid tab, then click on the Repair Disk button. If DU reports any errors that have been fixed, then re-run Repair Disk until no errors are reported. If no errors are reported click on the Repair Permissions button. Wait until the operation completes, then quit DU and return to the main menu.
Reinstall Lion/Mountain Lion: Select Reinstall Lion/Mountain Lion and click on the Continue button.
Note: You will need an active Internet connection. I suggest using Ethernet if possible because it is three times faster than wireless.

B&W G3 having trouble finding startup disk

Hi. Ever since the DVD drive of my B&W G3 died, it's taken an extra minute to find the startup disk. I get the blinking Mac folder plus the question mark that we all know and, well, don't love.
I've replaced the DVD drive, and currently there is no operating system on the computer. However, I had this problem even with OS 9 installed. I also get the blinking icon when starting up from a CD.
Does anybody know how I can remedy this problem, so the computer can find the operating system right away? I have two IDE (or ATA, whatever) internal drives. I think the master/slave configuration is correct.
Any ideas?

If the system eventually finds the startup disk and boots from it, the problem can be solved by setting a Startup disk.
If not, the parameters (which hold some essential values that make starting up your Mac simple and painless) have been corrupted. This can be caused by "just because", but it is more often caused by interruption of the main power when the backup battery is in a very weak state.
The first level of fix on a Blue & White G3 is to open the side door and press and hold the CUDA Reset button (nearest the 1/2 AA-size battery) for a quarter minute. Avoid momentary presses which can be damaging to battery health.
The second level of fix is to replace the battery and repeat the reset procedure.

Startup Disk Icon in Preferences Changed..change back?

For some reason, the icon for Startup Disk in the System Preferences changed on me, and I am unsure of how to change it back. I have already tried repairing permissions with no sucess. If someone could let me know how to change it back and (if i need it) send me the icon or point me to where the original icon would be. Thanks in advance.
Here is a picture of the current icon: /___sbsstatic___/migration-images/migration-img-not-avail.png
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MacBook 1.83 GHz, 1 GB RAM Mac OS X (10.4.7) HP zv5000 P4 2.8 Ghz (128 ATI 9000, 512 mb, XP); PowerMac G4 400 AGP 1 GB OSX 10.3.9

hi - Welcome to Apple Discussions!
try this:
Open your hard drive > Library > Caches folder in the finder...
Drag the file named com.apple.preferencepanes.cache to your Desktop...
look at System Preferences again - is it o.k.?
if so, trash that prefpanes cache file on your desktop...
if not, post back...
cheers

Yosemite cannot find startup disk

Hi, I have a problem with Yosemite installed on my mid2007 iMac, which has me perplexed. After installing Yosemite I found that on booting, my iMac would not find the startup disk, and shows me a blinking question mark. The iMac might sometimes find the startup disk the first time after installation, but would fail to find the startup disk on subsequent startups. So to get the iMac to start I boot into my yosemite installer flash drive go to the start up disk section in the apple menu of the installer and select startup disk from there, and that gets me into the Yosemite session. Less than ideal.
I have tried a number of things;
A couple of clean installs of Yosemite 10.10.2.
Checking the integrity of the Hard Disk with Disk utility. (it said it was OK in cheery green lettering) I have had an aftermarket Corsair Neutron SSD as the startup disk for 8 months or so, which has been running well.
Checking the hardware with Apple Hardware Test which said no problems detected. I did this as I also had other issues, like beachballs occurring, particularly on the login page delaying login, and a couple of instances of Yosemite telling me that it couldn't shut down immediately because I had a app open, when I had in fact quit the app earlier.
A couple more clean installs, one next to last where even the Yosemite installer flash drive could not see the start up disk. With the last clean install I currently can start the iMac with the help of the installer flash drive.
Googled around, but didn't find a lead.
The only option I can think of to enable me to boot into Yosemite with less fuss is to install Refit, a program that helps people who want to dual boot linux on their mac. It may be able to present the startup disk.
Any suggestions gratefully received.
iMac 7,1(24-inch Mid 2007),2.8 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 4 GB memory, 256Gb Corsair Neutron SSD, ATI Radeon HD 2600 Pro 256 MB

The repairs were unrelated. I had a bad logic board and some bad RAM. The hard drive checked out fine.

What happened to the Startup Disk icon?

I've only had my MacBook Pro for about two weeks (and already seem to have screwed things up). The last couple of day I've notices that my System Preferences > Startup Disk has gone from the harddrive icon to this icon:
http://symtym.com/rsc/startupdisk.jpg
Any suggestions as what caused this and what to do to fix it? TIA
MacBook Pro Mac OS X (10.4)

A lot of people have had this strange light switch icon replace normal ones. See this thread:
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=2819841&#2819841
Removing the preference files recommended by Ferd seems to fix it.
Francine
Francine
Schwieder

I can't find startup disk in Mac OS X Lion window

While performing the following instructions, I coudn't get through step 4 since there is no startup disk appearing in the pane ??
OS X Mavericks: Reinstall OS X
Use the built-in recovery disk to reinstall OS X while keeping your files and user settings intact.
Important: You must be connected to the Internet to reinstall OS X.
Choose Apple menu > Restart. Once your Mac restarts (and the gray screen appears), hold down the Command (⌘) and R keys.
If you’re not connected to the Internet, choose a network from the Wi-Fi menu (in the top-right corner of the screen).
Select Reinstall OS X, then click Continue.
Follow the onscreen instructions. In the pane where you select a disk, select your current OS X disk (in most cases, it’s the only one available).

Marc Chabot wrote:
MacBook Pro (13-inch, Early 2011)...
Since your MBP came with Snow Leopard (OS 10.6.x) and you're referring to the Mac OS Lion window in Recovery Mode, do you have Mavericks currently installed or Lion? If you boot and hold down the Option Key after the chime, you'll invoke Startup Manager and you should see a row of bootable partitions. The Recovery Partition should say what the operating system number is (e.g., 10.7.5, 10.8.3). If it's 10.7.x, which is Lion, and you've already installed Mavericks, the issue may be that you can't install an older OS (Lion) directly over a newer OS (Mavericks).

Leopard can't find startup disk, or HD

Hi,
My MacBook (installed Leopard on it about a month ago) hung last night as I was using Firefox, so I powered down and then restarted. A folder with flashing ? icon showed up, so I searched the forums and found some other people who had had the same issue, and tried the suggestions of booting in single-user mode (no luck) and also resetting the PRAM (no luck either).
I then inserted the install disk, and from the Install screen tried to repair my disk using Disk Utility. Unfortunately my HD is not being recognized, so there's no way for me to repair it. Also, when I tried to just reinstall Leopard, the install disc does not recognize any place on my machine where it can be installed-apparently my HD is invisible/missing there as well.
Any ideas? Also, I cannot figure out how to get the install disk out!
Thanks

your hard drive seems to be completely hosed and needs to be replaced. to eject the install disk restart and hold option at the chime. at the startup manager screen press "eject".

No Startup Disk Icons in System Preferences

I've been combing the discussion forums several days and haven't had any success: I'm running OS X 10.2.8 on a 800 MHZ PowerPC G4. My problem is the when I attempt to open the system prefernces folder start up disk preference pane it doesnt display either of the 2 40 Gig hard drives that I have installed and I have force quit System Preferences. Then I have to do a manual re-boot.
I've tried to trash the system preferences cache temporarily and restart and I downloaded the shareware "Pacifist' and extracted the old StartUp PreferencePane folder and installed a new one and the issue is sitll there.
I would rather not create a seperate partition and re-install the old operating system or do a clean install, especially since I'm motivated to upgrade to Tiger OS. If I did upgrade, would it trash any potential corrupted files?? I'm hoping that would be an easy solution. Any ideas or feedback would be greatly appreciated at this point. Thanks!

petra:
Welcome to Apple Discussions.
The first think I would try is:
Repair Disk
Insert Installer disk and Restart, holding down the "C" key.
Go to Installer menu and launch Disk Utility.
Select your HDD (manufacturer ID) in the left panel.
Select First Aid in the Main panel.
Click Repair Disk on the bottom right.
If DU reports disk does not need repairs quit DU and restart.
If DU reports errors Repair again and again until DU reports disk is repaired.
If DU reports errors it cannot repair you will need to use a utility like Tech Tool Pro or Disk Warrior
Then:
Repair Disk Permissions
While booted from the internal HDD:
Go to (Applications > Utilities > Disk Utility.
Select your HDD (manufacturer ID) in left column and First Aid in main column.
Click Repair Disk Permissions at bottom left.
Take a look at Dr. Smoke's FAQ Resolving Disk, Permission, and Cache Corruption.
If I did upgrade, would it trash any potential corrupted files??
If you decide to re-install, or upgrade to Tiger, I suggest that you wipe the disk then install Tiger. That should definitely take care of things.
Please, do post back and let me know if anything worked, or with further questions or comments.
Good luck.
cornelius

Startup trouble - looking for startup disk

I've been experiencing occasional start up trouble for a few weeks, where my iMac takes a long time on the startup phase (getting stuck on a blank gray screen), and on 3 occasions it has just come up with a folder with blinking question mark (can't find startup disk) icon. When this happens, I hold my breath and manually restart, and so far it's then started right up (knock on wood). But obviously this is worrisome.
I did recently swap out some RAM (trading out one card from 1GB to 2GB), and since the Apple store no longer carries the appropriate RAM for my iMac (fall 2006), I can to buy it elsewhere, but that seemed to go fine... could it have affected my startup?
Another, probably unrelated issue, is that when I do start up successfully, or even come up from sleep, the computer now makes a big POP sound. I have a JBL "creature" amp with little speakers plugged into the computer, but it doesn't seem to be that - it's definitely an in-computer sound. Could the sound card be going bad, or somehow affected by the start up problem or the new RAM? I'm guessing it's an unrelated thing, but wanted to include as much info as possible.

Hi Jessamyn
Many times a connected External HD, iPod or other storage device can cause the startup manager to have a problem finding your startup volume, first disconnect all other storage devices to see if that helps. Second go to *System Preferences > Startup Disk* and select the *Mac OS X, 10.4 on Macintosh HD* click the lock and restart.
If you are still having a startup issue then use the following link for testing and repairing your startup disk: > http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?path=DiskUtility/10.5/en/duh1018.html
Dennis

No startup disk for windows in preferences on Mac

I re-installed Snow Leopard, an already had a Boot Camp partition for WinXP Home SP3. All went fine but...
There's no startup disk icon in startup disk options on the Mac.
Sometimes I hold down option key to chose Mac or Windows and it's fine, bit if I boot to windows, the next time it auto boots to windows everytime, even with key held in. I then, in windows, chose boot camp icon in taskbar and chose "restart in Mac OSX" and it does.. Now however it boots to Mac everytime!
I didn't do a re-install of the boot camp partition, as was all fine installation wise after I did with Snow Leopard.
Anyone help please
Cheers

Still having bother with this, can anyone help please.
The Windows disk doesnt show up in Mac OS on "startup disk preference", when in windows boot camp, both the Mac OSX and Windows partition show up.
Sometimes if I boot into Mac, I then cant boot into Windows via the "option key", if I've been in Windows, I cannot get to Mac with option key, have to goto boot camp options and "restart in Mac OSX"
So something is messed up, can anyone help please? I use Mac and its fine, but kids use Windows, and when I'm not in it doesnt work, so its difficult to explain over phone.
I have a wireless keyboard and it seems it doesnt switch on when booting up iMac, so the option key isnt detected - again randomly
cheers

I guess I didn't explaine that I have a healthy operating Windows 8 Boot camp partition on my hard drive. When I upgraded to Mavericks I am no long able to access the bootcamp partition from the disk icon in system preferences; the Windows 8 works fine.

On both Mini Mac and iMac 27" I am no longer able to utalize the Startup Disk icon in System Preferences; the Windows 8 on Bootcamp partition works fine if I close the Mavericks OX and select the Windows partition at bootup from the hard drive. My question is why don't the icon in System Prederences work anymore since I upgraded to Mavericks. Also, Users & Groups, Printers & Scanners icons no longer work either.

On both Mini Mac and iMac 27" I am no longer able to utalize the Startup Disk icon in System Preferences; the Windows 8 on Bootcamp partition works fine if I close the Mavericks OX and select the Windows partition at bootup from the hard drive. My question is why don't the icon in System Prederences work anymore since I upgraded to Mavericks. Also, Users & Groups, Printers & Scanners icons no longer work either.

IMac G4 won't boot off startup disk

Looking at a G4 20" flat panel for a friend. He blew away some unknown file and hosed the computer. It will not start in safe mode. Get a Darwin kernel panic screen on normal start-up. Will not boot in safe mode. Will not boot off start-up disk (C) - get an interminal grey apple screen that does not proceed. It will boot off of the disk for hardware test (Option), but cannot launch off startup disk icon - get one of those Verboten circles with a line thru it. Hardware test returns two errors loading default text (1) and control (2) fonts and returns an invalid memory access at %SRRO 00000000.00000000 %SRR1 10000000.00083030.
G$ Mac OS X (10.4) unknown version of Tiger

Oops - G5, not G4. And what this young man did was delete his system library. Any suggestions about how to get him up again would be greatly appreciated.

Cannon find Startup Disk icon

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