Boot Menu doesn't work?

Hey Guys, when i boot holding in ALT what should it give me? all i get is a mouse pointer.

Thanks Scott

It should be showing an icon for every bootable device.

it doesnt seem to do that it only comes up with the mouse pointer, do you know of any way to fix this? is it possible to reflash the bios?

Your MacBook has no BIOS to re-flash. Try resetting the PRAM and NVRAM. Link

Regards.

thanks again for the reply, i should have mentioned i already tried that and i am a complete mac noob lol, the model is a1181 if thats any help.

Scott

Haktar said:

thanks again for the reply, i should have mentioned i already tried that and i am a complete mac noob lol, the model is a1181 if thats any help. Scott

Click to expand...

OK, not a problem. Let's try something else....

This Link refers to a hidden drive problem with OS X Tiger but it's also applicable to Leopard. I'm not sure if it will help you or not but it does sound like that's what may be happening on your machine.

Let us know.

Regards.

thanks so much for the reply, i think ive explained it poorly, i usually repair windows machines, this is my friends one day she turned it on to a flashing folder with a question mark, i assumed it was the hard drive and switched it for a 320Gb however i cant seem to get the OS to install, every time i try it ejects the disc, i have been holding in C to get it to boot from the optical drive, the boot menu i was refering to was the one when you hold the option key when you first turn the macbook on, i cant actually get into Tiger at the minute.

Thanks Again

What OSX DVD are you using to install on the new 320GB drive? Is it the DVD that came with your friends Mac? If not, which one is it? The Gray DVD's that come with macs are tied to the machine. You just can't use any old OSX DVD.

Also is the DVD clean? No scratches nor smudges?

Hey, its definetly not the ones that came with her mac, its a Leopard Retail disc, yeh its pretty clean, shes going to send me her grey discs in the post, i am worried about the boot menu though, is there any way to fix this?

Thanks

You shouldn't need the boot menu whatsoever if you are doing a fresh install from a Leopard retail disk.

When you hold the C key down does it boot to the DVD? Hold it down until you see the apple on the screen.


It may take a minute or so to boot. Once there click next - from the menu at the top select Utilities - Disk Utility
Format the drive as HFS Journaled
Once done close Disk Utility from the menu

Should be ready for the install now.


edit: If it's spitting the disc out instead of getting to the menu - is the disk spinning up or no? If it is spinning up and your disk is clean, I'd try taking a can of air and hitting about 3 quick blasts at a couple different angles, see if the lens is dirty and try again.

Hey bobtomay, nah i knew i would need the boot menu i was just curious why it wasnt showing up properly, it dosent boot the CD, she sent me the Grey install discs the got with it, it is 10.4.6 the disc does spin up but it spits it out after a bit, i will try the air thing and let you know .

Thanks

hey Haktar, i know this thread is a little old but i'm currently having the exact same issue. Im a pc technician, and last week i had this mac a1181 delivered to me, with the folder + flashing question mark issue.

Were u able to solve it? Your guidance here would be of great appreciation.

Thanx.

The folder with the Question mark usually means there is no bootable system found. Either the hard drive is dead/dying of the OS is messed up.

Did they give you the OSX Install DVD with the machine?

the machine's owner said she had lost the install DVD. So this is what i did:

-I downloaded a tiger OS X install dvd image through torrent

-I replaced the old hard disk for a new blank hard disk

-I've been trying to load the OS from CD/DVD drive pressing C at startup so it can install on the new HDD, but nothing happens. It starts to seek the OS in the drive but after a while it stops and the question mark appears.

I have tried with .dmg and .toast image files, should i try with .iso format?

I also downloaded a 7.5-GB leopard OS install dvd image, but its too big to fit on a regular blank DVD. Could i install it through USB?

Like I said before, i'm new in Mac and i would appreciate alot your help

Sorry but we do not allow discussion of Pirated OS's here at Mac Forums.

That is your issue, the tormented OSX. You are going to have to get a legal and real retail version of OSX, then the machine should boot from it.

same is happening to me

Manuel86 said:

the machine's owner said she had lost the install DVD. So this is what i did:

-I downloaded a tiger OS X install dvd image through torrent

-I replaced the old hard disk for a new blank hard disk

-I've been trying to load the OS from CD/DVD drive pressing C at startup so it can install on the new HDD, but nothing happens. It starts to seek the OS in the drive but after a while it stops and the question mark appears.

I have tried with .dmg and .toast image files, should i try with .iso format?

I also downloaded a 7.5-GB leopard OS install dvd image, but its too big to fit on a regular blank DVD. Could i install it through USB?

Like I said before, i'm new in Mac and i would appreciate alot your help

Click to expand...

Find a solution yet? I've mounted my retail snow leopard disk into a disk image on my boot partitioned hard drive, but no go. Just the arrow will pop up and wait. Luckily, I have a hard drive with a copy of snowleopard working on it but need to reinstall, if i use the copy of lion i bought, i think i can just upgrade from that without manually starting up a boot selection.

I understand. I'm just trying to start the machine, once i see it runs its OS i'll know for sure its not a hardware issue. As I told you before, i'm getting started with Mac maintenance, i've been a PC technician and I've got some windows licenses only. I'm gonna request their installation DVD to Mac clients from now on. Thanks.

Could you tell me a flawless key combination to enter a Mac's bios? I believe it's called Open firmware right? I've been reading in forums different combinations and none has been effective.

Hey MyFriendBen, same is happening to me... when reading the disc the arrow just pups up and waits too... it does anything afterwards. Let me know when something works out for you please, i'll do likewise!

nothing solid

Manuel86 said:

Hey MyFriendBen, same is happening to me...

Click to expand...

So after messing around with different combinations, I plugged in the drive that I said already had an install of snow leopard on. Though, I still wanted to reformat and reinstall.

Sorry Manuel, I don't know exactly what I did, but after messing around with it for a while, I was able to get the boot option menus and have the system recognize that I had a drive and an install disk available.

I did have my installation of snow leopard on an external hard drive that was partitioned to boot. I don't think that had much to do with it, but it could have.

This is my sense... but I feel something on the motherboard has recognized that drive was bad, and throws up that question mark folder symbol. I feel when a new good drive is plugged in, it's still thinking that nothing has changed or something has not reset to recognize the new config. I think all my tinkering also might have set something to reset it. I should have wrote this right after I got it running, but I have let a week and half past so, i'm real fuzzy what it might have been. I did also replace the screen for my buddy, so I had his whole computer apart. My other suggestion, is to try things again that you tried way in the beginning that you deduced as not working, maybe it just needed time and a setting has changed to let it work again.

I know nothing I have said is solid, but that's how I felt mine starting working, and I didn't want to leave an empty reply to yours.

Hope something works for you. Please be careful with your components, would hate to think b/c of me that I led you to break a ribbon or tear a socket out