What You've Learned

In this lesson you learned the basic description of the various stages of the Mac OS X startup sequence. The following table lists these stages. For each stage, the table lists the corresponding visual and auditory cues. Once you have identified the stage where startup is failing, you can isolate the cause and fix it.

Startup Sequence Stage	Cue
Power On	Black screen
BootROM-POST	Flashing lights and LEDs, and activity sound as POST mounts all devices, including hard disks and removable media One beep No RAM installed Two beeps Incompatible RAM types Three beeps No good memory banks Four beeps No good boot images in BootROM Five beeps Processor is not usable
BootROM-Open Firmware	Startup chime
BootX	Metallic Apple logo Found BootX Circle with slash Could not find BootX on the startup volume Flashing square with globe Looking for BootX on a remote disk via the network Small metallic spinning globe Found BootX on the network Flashing question mark over a folder or floppy disk icon Open Firmware did not find a bootable OS Broken folder icon Missing Mac OS X components Folder icon with a black belt around it Restored Mac OS 9 incorrectly on a drive with Mac OS X installed
kernel	Gray screen with Apple logo and spinning gear
launchd	Blue screen
loginwindow	Login window appears
User Environment Setup	The text "Logging In" appears in login window along with a progress bar upon successful login Desktop and Dock appear

In comparison to starting up, the process of logging out or shutting down is simpler. After a user chooses Log Out, Restart, or Shut Down from the Apple menu and confirms the action, loginwindow quits all of the user's applications, and if appropriate, resets hardware and restarts or shuts down the computer.

References

The following Knowledge Base documents (located at www.apple.com/support) will provide you with further information regarding the startup sequence in Mac OS X.

42642, "'To continue booting, type mac-boot and press return' Message"
58042, "A flashing question mark appears when you start your Mac"
75459, "Mac OS X keyboard shortcuts"
106294, "Mac OS X: Reinstalling Mac OS 9 or recovering from a software restore"
106388, "Mac OS X: How to Start up in Single-User or Verbose Mode"
106464, "Your Mac won't start up in Mac OS X"
106805, "Mac OS X: 'Broken folder' icon, prohibitory sign, or kernel panic when computer starts"
106908, "Mac OS X: Issues after removing 'etc' and/or 'var' directory alias when started up from Mac OS 9"
107392, "What is Safe Boot, Safe Mode? (Mac OS X)"
107393, "Mac OS X: Starting up in Safe Mode"
107394, "Mac OS X: Safe Boot Takes Longer Than Normal Startup"
107396, "Mac OS X: Cannot print, use Classic, start file sharing, burn discs, or update software if /tmp missing"
14438, "You hear 'breaking glass' or 'musical beeps' when you turn on your Mac"