Mac OS X Start Up Keys
// November 29th, 2007 // 85 Comments » // Technology Bits
I often search around trying to find the various ways to boot OSX in a special sort of way. I’ve especially needed these sort of things lately, as I had a brand new hard drive die on me.
You can hold any of the following to access any of these special boot modes:
C – Boot from the internal optical drive (CD or DVD)
D – Boot the diagnostic volume of the install DVD
N – Start from the Network (NetBoot)
R – Force PowerBook screen reset
T – Boot into Firewire target disk mode
X – Reset startup disk selection and boot into Mac OS X Server
Shift – Boot into “Safe Boot” mode, which runs Disk First Aid. A reboot will be required afterward.
Option – Boot into “Startup Manager”
Mouse Button – Eject (internal) removable media
Command-S – Boot into Single User Mode (command line)
Command-V – Boot using “Verbose” mode (shows all kernel and startup console messages)
Command-Option-Shift-Delete – Bypass internal hard drive on boot and seek a different startup volume (such as a CD or external disk)
Command-Option-P-R – Reset Parameter RAM (PRAM) and non-volatile RAM (NVRAM)
Command-Option-O-F – Boot into “Open Firmware”
Rumor has it, firmware password protection can be removed by intalling or removing a stick of RAM, then zapping the PRAM three times in a row.
These bootup options were compiled from Apple and this blog.
