Q: Power On Self Test [POST] Sound - Not functioning

I forgot to include in the rectification attempts above that the ‘com.apple.systempreferences.plist‘ was trashed to no avail.

There are probably a few more omissions of this type.

Late last night I bit the bullet, that is decided the only way to go was to use the Lion Boot Disc that had been burned from the downloaded Lion Installer.

This proved to be a very slow process. Having never done the following, standing at the North Pole trying to stir a bowl of porridge with a straw, but it seems certain that would be quicker and less ponderous than installing Lion from this disc.

It was so slow and the ‘Time Remaining’ guesstimates were so erratic and it was already very late so the process was halted.

The remaining option was to re-install Lion from a copy of the Lion Installer that had been saved on the Desktop of my Snow Leopard Clone.

Disk Utility was used to Erase the Start-Up Disc and then running the Lion Installer choosing to install Lion in on the Start-Up Disc.

There were two re-starts necessary during the installation process and both produced a ‘healthy’ POST Sound. Looking good.

Ater the second re-start Apple ID and Password were required followed by a pleasant surprise, the offer to Transfer from a BackUp Folder/Disc.

If I had been aware of this beforehand there would not have been any hesitation in proceeding with a re-installation when all attempts at rectification failed.

I elected to use the Lion Clone HDD as the donor for this transfer, being unsure of what could be safely excluded and pressured by the VERY late hour, all the available check boxes were left with the existing checkmarks.

Sadly this was a mistake, although everything was functional and set up as required the POST Sound was still absent on rebooting.

The above exercise has just been repeated with the benefit of having several hours sleep, a hearty breakfast and a spell of Non-computing work.

At the point where the check boxes have to be set most were uncheck marked, I cannot remember all the available choices but the following are some of the choices I made:

Applications                 ✓

Desktop                       [these file could easily be copied over if required]

Settings                       [not sure if that is the full Title but was avoided due to the possibility of being the cause of the problem]

Library                         ✓

Other Docs & Files        [ditto Desktop]

In short I opted for the minimum to enable getting up and running quickly. Screenshots were not an option at that time but I wish the iPhone had been deployed in Camera mode.

I am happy to report that my choices preserved the POST Sound, this has been heard on every occasion that the Mac has started up since.

Best of all there is only a very small amount of work required to achieve the previous settings and have everything back to normal.

So now there are two minor irritations:

What caused this issue to surface?

Most importantly how do you turn off the POST Sound on demand?

Just to round off the above scenarios and answer the outstanding items as far as possible.

The above taught me a little about ‘Migration Assistant’, I have never previously had any occasion to use it.

By setting it up as near, IIRC, the settings used after re-installing Lion were similar to this:

Most Applications were fully functional without any additional action being required.

Several Applications required their Serial Number-Registration Code-or whatever, to be inserted MS Office 2011 required ‘Activation’.

Adobe Creative Suite 3 Master Collection, allowed Acrobat to open but reported that it needed one of the other related Applications to be opened.

After a similar experience with Photoshop Adobe decided that it was necessary to uninstall and reinstall CS3 to regain usability.

Inserting CS3 #1 Disc and hitting ‘Install’ revealed the true requirement.

CS3 needed to be ‘Repaired’.

The uside of this was that almost immediately an estimate of Time for the process was given, and this started to count down second by second, and when completed there was no need to enter the Serial Number.

Apple could learn something about ‘Estimating Time to Completion’ from Adobe.

The downside was that this, effectively, new installation required almost 20 updates to be applied amounting to about 750Mb, unfortunately this took as long as most Applications would take to install several Gbs and even this resulted in some failures for some component parts. CS3 runs as a damaged product in Lion.

Adobe seem to need to learn more about working with Mac?

Regarding the ‘outstanding irritations’ mentioned previously:

Please ensure that you read to the end of this post, I am not trying to ‘sell’ anything by offering these links.

Searching for an Application to mute the POST Sound I visited:

http://alphaomega.software.free.fr/downloads.php

This developer produces ‘Start-Up Chime Stopper’, more info on this can be found here:

http://alphaomega.software.free.fr/startupchimestopper/Documentation/Documentati on.html

After eMailing the Developer and receiving, IMO possibly related to language difference, an open ended reply I took advantage of the Free Download in order to trial this poduct.

It was found to be functional but it does not seem to be capable of applying a Mute to the POST Sound for a single event, other than by User intervention.

In fairness I may have missed something but believe all combinations of the settings were tested.

The upshot was that I removed [read trashed] this Application.

Having removed the Application on restarting the Mac, horror of horrors’, the POST Sound was absent.

A quick dive into System Preferences > Sound > Output tab > Internal Speakers, revealed that the setting had been left on Mute.

With the Mute checkmark removed normal service was resumed.

Also I subsequently found that altering the Volume Level reduced the POST Sound to an acceptable level.

In my earlier searches for a solution to Mute the POST Sound the System Preferences > Sound settings had been set every conceivable which-way.

No solution was found and this lead me to criticise Apple for not providing a means to turn off this sound when there was a real need to do so.

There seem to be a few possible explanations for what is happening now:

1. I failed, earlier, to test EVERY possible Sound Setting.

2. My recollection of events is completely off the rails and brain fade has set in.

3. My Sound Settings were corrupt and repaired by the reinstallation of Lion, I did not retest prior to the trial of Start-Up Chime Stopper.

4. Installing and removing Start-Up Chime Stopper has altered something within Sound.

Please can anyone help to confirm any of these items?

In the meantime I am a happy chappie, I have to listen hard for the POST Sound but have the comfort of knowing it is there.

That is until Apple spoil it again?