Startup Chime

boogieman said:

Out of curiosity my Mac Pro Chime takes about 20 to 30 seconds to chime. My Macbook Pro is instant so is my Air. Is this normal? I have tried different ram, hard drive still the same. Restet PRAM all.

Click to expand...

Mine takes about 5-10 seconds before the startup chime after POST. Try different video card.

Slow Boot Chime

Hey there,

Question for the original poster: Did you ever get this resolved, or did the machine ever have any major issues? I have a 2009 8-core 2.26 mac pro with just about the same issue.... it's consistent... 12-22 seconds before the machine chimes.


I know this is a long-since forgotten topic here... it's over 2yrs old, but I have had the same issue with my machine for at least 18 months. I spent 2 hours on the phone with a great AppleCare rep, and he thought it needed to go into a Genius Bar.

I worked at Apple retail at the time of the troubleshooting, so I took it to one store closest to me, and after 3 days they thought the machine was fine... even though it still booted with 12-22 second delays before the POST chime.

The store I worked in at the time said "bring it over here... we'll get it fixed... that doesn't sound right." and after a week, they told me "your machine is fine... it just takes a long time to POST."

Having to work with all these people, I chose not to make a stink about it... but now I'm out of AppleCare coverage and I'm just worried that it might crap-out on me at some point and I'll always wonder if it should have been fixed.

Also, I'm a musician and I do a lot of work in Logic Pro with software synthesizers and samplers... I think it's a little strange that my Macbook air puts up slightly better software synth performance than this tower.

Here's the spec:

8-Core, 2.26ghz Mac Pro (2009) with 10GB of Ram (added 2x 2GB sticks, and all original 6x 1GB sticks are in there. System says they're in the properly moved spots)

512GB OCZ Vertex 4 SSD on bootable PCIe 2.0 card.
Various other SATA drives, including the stock 640GB SATA drive
SonnetTech PCIe USB2.0 card
ATI Radeon 5870 1GB Video Card (bought from Apple to upgrade from stock GT120 card)
Apogee Symphony PCIe audio card.


Here's a synopsis of the different things I've tried to see if the issue persists..

1. Every different possible RAM combo down to 2GB of original memory
2. problem existed even before new Video Card, but swapped back to GT120 as a test. Also booted machine with no video card and controlled it via screen sharing
3. removed all PCIe add-on cards
4. Tried different wall outlets in the house, on and off UPS box, even tried it at a friends house and two apple stores
5. PRAM & SMC resets galore
6. Booting from multiple different drives / OS's / Netbooting / Boot from Snow Leopard DVD
7. voodoo and juju magic, prayer,... I stopped short of a "fonzie-fix".

...but the slow boot chime was identical under all different tests.

Machine passed Apple Hardware Tests in two Genius Bars.

Anyone.... Beuller?

RAM was my issue

I have been getting 18 seconds until chime boots for a while now (total of 50 seconds to login screen). Hasn't ever really bugged me, but having read your post, thought I might investigate. Anyway. I disconnected everything, pulled out 3 of my drives (leaving the original OEM drive in bay 1, and pulled all the ram and put in 4 gigs of the original ram in the first two slots.

In that configuration it was 4 seconds to the chime. As soon as I put back in my larger ram sticks, even tried a single 8 gig, two 8 gig, and three 8 gig in various combinations, the time went back up. With a single 8 gig it was around 14 seconds to chime. With anything more it went back to 18. Mine are non-ecc since I don't need it and they were so much cheaper.

Sorry I couldn't be of more help.

alexdingley said:

Hey there,

Question for the original poster: Did you ever get this resolved, or did the machine ever have any major issues? I have a 2009 8-core 2.26 mac pro with just about the same issue.... it's consistent... 12-22 seconds before the machine chimes.


I know this is a long-since forgotten topic here... it's over 2yrs old, but I have had the same issue with my machine for at least 18 months. I spent 2 hours on the phone with a great AppleCare rep, and he thought it needed to go into a Genius Bar.

I worked at Apple retail at the time of the troubleshooting, so I took it to one store closest to me, and after 3 days they thought the machine was fine... even though it still booted with 12-22 second delays before the POST chime.

The store I worked in at the time said "bring it over here... we'll get it fixed... that doesn't sound right." and after a week, they told me "your machine is fine... it just takes a long time to POST."

Having to work with all these people, I chose not to make a stink about it... but now I'm out of AppleCare coverage and I'm just worried that it might crap-out on me at some point and I'll always wonder if it should have been fixed.

Also, I'm a musician and I do a lot of work in Logic Pro with software synthesizers and samplers... I think it's a little strange that my Macbook air puts up slightly better software synth performance than this tower.

Here's the spec:

8-Core, 2.26ghz Mac Pro (2009) with 10GB of Ram (added 2x 2GB sticks, and all original 6x 1GB sticks are in there. System says they're in the properly moved spots)

512GB OCZ Vertex 4 SSD on bootable PCIe 2.0 card.
Various other SATA drives, including the stock 640GB SATA drive
SonnetTech PCIe USB2.0 card
ATI Radeon 5870 1GB Video Card (bought from Apple to upgrade from stock GT120 card)
Apogee Symphony PCIe audio card.


Here's a synopsis of the different things I've tried to see if the issue persists..

1. Every different possible RAM combo down to 2GB of original memory
2. problem existed even before new Video Card, but swapped back to GT120 as a test. Also booted machine with no video card and controlled it via screen sharing
3. removed all PCIe add-on cards
4. Tried different wall outlets in the house, on and off UPS box, even tried it at a friends house and two apple stores
5. PRAM & SMC resets galore
6. Booting from multiple different drives / OS's / Netbooting / Boot from Snow Leopard DVD
7. voodoo and juju magic, prayer,... I stopped short of a "fonzie-fix".

...but the slow boot chime was identical under all different tests.

Machine passed Apple Hardware Tests in two Genius Bars.

Anyone.... Beuller?

Click to expand...

Im getting about 40 secs to the chime. Will be watching this tread to see how things work out for you

I need about 15s for POST.
I changed everything except RAM so far, and I guess this is because of that. Although, I use regualr DDR3 1066MHZ Kingston ECC RAM.