grey folder with question mark flashing on start up

If you don't have a Recovery HD from which to start, then you will have to reinstall Snow Leopard then upgrade from there:

Reinstall Lion, Mountain Lion, or Mavericks

Boot to the Recovery HD: Restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the

COMMAND and R keys until the Utilities menu screen appears. Alternatively, restart the computer and

after the chime press and hold down the OPTION key until the boot manager screen appears.

Select the Recovery HD and click on the downward pointing arrow button.

Repair the Hard Drive and Permissions: Upon startup select Disk Utility from the Utilities menu.

Repair the Hard Drive and Permissions as follows.

After DU loads select your hard drive entry (mfgr.'s ID and drive size) from the the left side list. In the DU status area you will see an entry for the S.M.A.R.T. status of the hard drive. If it does not say "Verified" then the hard drive is failing or failed. (SMART status is not reported on external Firewire or USB drives.) If the drive is "Verified" then select your OS X volume from the list on the left (sub-entry below the drive entry,) click on the First Aid tab, then click on the Repair Disk button. If DU reports any errors that have been fixed, then re-run Repair Disk until no errors are reported. If no errors are reported click on the Repair Permissions button. Wait until the operation completes, then quit DU and return to the main menu.

Reinstall Lion/Mountain Lion, Mavericks: Select ReinstallLion/Mountain Lion, Mavericks from

the Utilities menu, and click on the Continue button.

Note: You will need an active Internet connection. I suggest using Ethernet if possible because it is

three times faster than wireless.

Clean Install of Snow Leopard

Be sure to make a backup first because the following procedure will erase

the drive and everything on it.

1. Boot the computer using the Snow Leopard Installer Disc or the Disc 1 that came

with your computer. Insert the disc into the optical drive and restart the computer.

After the chime press and hold down the "C" key. Release the key when you see

a small spinning gear appear below the dark gray Apple logo.

2. After the installer loads select your language and click on the Continue

button. When the menu bar appears select Disk Utility from the Utilities menu.

After DU loads select the hard drive entry from the left side list (mfgr.'s ID and drive

size.) Click on the Partition tab in the DU main window. Set the number of

partitions to one (1) from the Partitions drop down menu, click on Options button

and select GUID, click on OK, then set the format type to MacOS Extended

(Journaled, if supported), then click on the Apply button.

3. When the formatting has completed quit DU and return to the installer. Proceed

with the OS X installation and follow the directions included with the installer.

4. When the installation has completed your computer will Restart into the Setup

Assistant. Be sure you configure your initial admin account with the exact same

username and password that you used on your old drive. After you finish Setup

Assistant will complete the installation after which you will be running a fresh

install of OS X. You can now begin the update process by opening Software

Update and installing all recommended updates to bring your installation current.

Download and install Mac OS X 10.6.8 Update Combo v1.1.

Most likely, your boot volume has failed and requires replacement. They are not unreasonably expensive to replace.

Read: A flashing question mark appears when you start your Mac

John,

If you read the article you linked you will find that Apple never states that a flashing question mark means the drive needs to be replaced. They suggest any number of possible solutions, but replacing the drive is not one of them. 🙂

Two days ago I had a less than friendly argument with another user about this same article.

Now you've been kind enough to educate me on many occasions for which I am eternally grateful. I hope I'm returning the favor. 😎

Today I got the flashing question mark folder. I did the boot while holding <command> and <r> keys I was then eventually given the choice to boot via the internet and up came the screen offering a download of OSX or other options like Disk Utility. I was wanting to reset to factory settings anyway so I chose Download OSX

My Machine is a macbook Air 2011

I have an SSD so I guess the internet restore facility is for that.

Why not boot up from the CD using Command/C and use the disk utility to check/repair your HDD

I'm not sure if you found a solution yet, but I just had this same experience today (Dec 11, 2013). I know what I did to get the problem, but that's another thread conversation. Long story short, when I turned on my MBP, a blank/gray screen appeared with an icon that was a folder with a "?" inside it. This ?/folder icon was flashing, and wouldn't stop flashing.

I tried finding solutions from threads, and honestly, nothing seemed to help. I tried:

-turning off and on again

-turning off and trying to reboot from an install disc (nothing happened, except I got an "apple" logo instead of the flashing ?/folder icon

-reboot while trying out different about 10 different combinations of pressing certain keys....

But none of these solutions fixed it... except one. And that was this:

Step 1.) Turn off computer

Step 2.) Power computer on

Step 3.) Once it's on, hold the "alt" key (also labeled as the "option" key) until a window pops up about the wireless network. (From your initial post, maybe you've tried this so far and had no luck. If you did/do this and don't get any further, I'm sorry... it worked for me though.)

Step 4.) Log into my wireless network at home.

(one post took me this far, but left me hanging there... after I logged onto the wireless, I was told it would take care of the rest, but it didn't)

Step 5.) After you've successfully got wireless, press the "Command" and the "R" key at the same time. This made the computer link to the internet and download the proper install software.

Step 6.) After this (it took about 5 minutes to download from the internet), I was taken a reboot-like screen which I'm familiar with (the one with option to install from backup, reinstall OSX, go to Disc Utilities, etc. It was at this screen that I went to Disc Utilities, erased the HDD so that whatever glitche there was would be erased, and then went back to the screen with the option to "Reinstall OSX."

That has solved my problem.

Hope this helps.

Thank you so much for posting this ! I had the same flashing question mark and I was totally freaked out . I follow the steps and it worked !!

This tip helped me. My 2009 iMac had the flashing folder with the question mark.

I held the ALT key while booting and was prompted for my firmware password (this is good). The iMac then booted up fine.

All the other startup key (and multiple key) options did nothing.

Don

I have the same issue, im make a a time machine backup from other mac and choose the time machine option, works flawless