Option Key not picked up - cannot boot into Boot Loader

Question

Level 1

0 points

Option Key not picked up - cannot boot into Boot Loader

I am a first time Mac owner and am still coming to grips with the differences between a Mac and a PC. Getting kind of old for these changes!

This is driving me nuts. Here is the situation:
I cannot get the boot loader to appear at startup through the Option key. I have tried everything, including keeping the external drive powered down at start, taken every USB device off the computer, etc and to no avail. The only way I can get into the non-booted operating system is to use the System Preferences/Startup Disk applet to kick the machine into the other startup. Observing the keyboard light and behavior, my best guess is that there is a timing issue with the boot up process and that the keyboard drivers are not loaded in time for the option key to be picked up (and I do not have an Apple Remote to try the IR approach). Interestingly enough, the Option key does seem to work the first time I reboot after I have unplugged the iMac for a few minutes. Subsequent attempts fail.

Here is my setup:
I have a late 2009 27" iMac with quad core i5, 8GB RAM, 1TB internal, a 1TB firewire drive. I am using the Wireless Keyboard and Magic Mouse that came with the machine. I am running OS X 10.6.4 and have a boot camp installation of Windows 7; Boot Camp was upgraded to 3.1 after successful installation of Windows 7 using the included Boot Camp Assistant and Boot Camp 3.0. I have Paragon NTFS for Mac OS X installed, but disabled for purposes of this discussion.

Any suggestions or inside knowledge? Maybe my Google-fu has gone south, but I have searched the internets high and low and tried everything that I have come across. My system is fully updated and I am at a loss. Please help a Mac newbie find the love...

Thanks,
CBinTX

iMac 27" Quad Core i5, Mac OS X (10.6.4), 8GB RAM 1TB Storage

Posted on Jun 21, 2010 7:56 AM

Reply

Answer 1

Best reply

Fortuny

Level 7

21,455 points

Jun 21, 2010 9:22 PM in response to CBinTX

Hi and welcome to Discussions,

never too old to start something new... 😉

The useage of the Option-key it indeed timing-critical and I myself hoften had difficulties even using an USB-wired keyboard.

With a wireless keyboard I never tried.

I then found rEFIt http://refit.sourceforge.net/ as a Boot-Menu and used it ever since.
With it there is is no need for the Option-key as it displays all bootable partitions on your harddisk(s) for 30 seconds before starting from the default startup volume you choosed unless you choose to boot from another.

Very convenient.

Regards

Stefan

Reply

Answer 2

CBinTX Author

Level 1

0 points

Jun 22, 2010 7:01 AM in response to Fortuny

Stefan,
I appreciate your response. I was aware of 3rd party boot loader solutions, but I have also seen a few items around issues with them that jive with my own experiences on PCs with similar products. I really would like to solve this with the legacy platform; my belief is that the delivered product should function as advertised and if there are bugs/issues with them (as I think there are), they should be fixed. It appears that Apple does have some work to do with this "feature," as evidenced by troubles with both wired and wireless keyboards of their own manufacture.

Bottom line is, I will go with rEFIt-type solution if I can find no fix for this, but I would prefer to stick with the standard software if possible. Once again, thanks for your time!

Regards,
CBinTX

Reply

Answer 3

The hatter

Level 9

60,980 points

Jun 22, 2010 8:36 AM in response to CBinTX

Your NTFS drive probably also has a control panel to do Windows startup disk volume control of its own.

Apple keyboards and mice can have USB issues along with USB hub (keyboard).

Guess selling a system sans keyboard and letting customer pick up their own (I have 4 now MS DigitalMedia 3000 keyboards).

The people that tend to use rEFIt also seem to like to bend and push the envelope in other ways and modify the partition table.

System Picker use to be one other way. And there was a linux boot loader/manager.

Windows on Mac: good enough to say it can be done, but fuzzy around the edges. And PC users also can have lots of problems with getting into BIOS and hard drive boot list, too, not just Macs.

All that you need is startup manager just the EFI Alt/Option or "x" to force OS X. I HAVE to use Windows Boot Camp to make default change to Windows also, it isn't there in OS X Startup Disk.

Reply

Answer 4

droopee

Level 1

10 points

Jun 22, 2010 10:42 AM in response to The hatter

Have you tried reinstalling Bootcamp 3.1?? I know it sounds like a redundant process, but that is what we just did, and now we have full EFI "snag" keys working once again. Make sure that you install the appropriate version of Bootcamp as they have a 32 and a 64 bit install.

Reply

Answer 5

CBinTX Author

Level 1

0 points

Jun 30, 2010 3:31 PM in response to droopee

Well, I have tried this reinstall of Boot Camp method and it appears to restore the boot loader access until the next time it does not! Windows may be updating and interfering with the entire process, but results have not been entirely consistent. Regardless, this seems to be an answer to my problem, even if it is not ideal. Thanks!

Reply

Answer 6

rdenton

Level 1

8 points

Jul 12, 2010 9:07 PM in response to CBinTX

Dunno what is causing this problem.

Same problem just started occurring yesterday for my 09 Mac pro with factory shipped wired al keyboard. Has worked as expected until now.

Don't know what might fix this but am going to try diff keyboard. This problem has been mentioned all over these boards and outside.

Reply

Answer 7

tonywong

Level 1

15 points

Jul 21, 2010 10:35 PM in response to rdenton

I have found the standard wired keyboard to be a bit buggy for using the option key to boot. Most of the time that I am successful with the option key is when there is no CD in the drive. Once I put in the CD, the keyboard almost never picks up the option key on boot.

The only reliable way around using the option key was to plug in my old macally icekey keyboard and then the option key boot selection works every time.

Reply