Does anyone know a keyboard shortcut to force the login screen at satrtup?

Hi,

I'm on the eMac at the moment using Leopard 10.5.8.

Currently it is set up with 2 accounts and defaults to my wife's at startup for her convenience, and because she can never remember the complicated password I set.

So, every time I want to use this machine I have to either log her out or use fast switching.
No problem, but I wondered if anyone knew of a keyboard shortcut I could use at startup to force the login screen to come up?

I have searched, but with no results, so I thought I'd ask the gurus on here ...

Cheers

Hugh

Solved

Well, I've finally found the answer from Macintosh Reference Guide | Mac OS X Startup Keystrokes | Peachpit, near the bottom of the page, under Startup in Safe Mode.
Apparently if you press the shift key (during a normal bootup) when the blue screen/progress bar comes up, it will force the Login screen.

Hope this helps anyone else with the same problem...

Cheers

Hugh

Just a point of clarification as Safe Mode is doing something different than what you want. Safe Mode is used to put the system into a mode whereby 3rd party things are eliminated and only native OS X stuff is running. This mode is primarily used for troubleshooting problems when running in normal mode.

While there is no keyboard shortcut to make the login screen appear or disappear, you should probably just enable the login screen all the time. Go to System Preferences->Accounts and click on Login Options, uncheck "Automatically login in as" and save & exit.

Also, you should ensure that your online passwords are strong to ensure that noone can access your accounts, but your local password don't need to be so stringent that your wife can't remember it..

Sorry, it's a bit confusing, but the writer put his instructions into the Safe Mode section (which doesn't help matters as it does not apply in using this shortcut).

To clarify, what he is saying is, when in a normal startup, which normally is set to automatic login to one of several accounts, if you press Shift when the blue screen with the progress bar appears, this will force the Login screen.

I quote:- If your Mac is configured to automatically login as a particular user, press the Shift key when the blue background with the progress bar appears during startup. This forces the login window to appear. Log in as the desired user, then immediately press Shift again until the Finder desktop appears.

This is precisely what I have been looking for, as my wife is the primary user, can never remember the admin password (as it isn't actually a word just a key sequence), and I usually only log on to fart around / play games or do admin work.

With respect, I will be keeping the strong admin password as I've had occasion in the past to need a complete Carbon Copy restore due to her removing "unwanted" files without knowing what was being deleted

Cheers

Hugh

I shall look a complete prat if it doesn't work shan't I

Ahh OK, my mistake, I saw safe mode and shift key and that's how you get into safe mode from the computer start point, I didn't know that holding it down later change the behavior..but as long as it's working for you..that's great..

No problem Raz0rEdge ...

Update:- you need to press and hold either Shift as soon as the blue screen appears and hold until the Login comes up. This is in Leopard on an iMac G5 (the old eMac has been retired); I don't know yet if it works in Lion on our MacBook but will try later. Don't see any reason why not though.

It works, I'm happy - please can you mark the original title as "Solved" as I can't edit it, ta very much.

Cheers

Hugh