Very brief "?" mark at startup

[63dot]

I sometimes see a brief question mark on a folder right before the Apple icon at startup in the grey startup screen.

What does that mean?

 

[r.j.s]

Maybe it is trying to boot from a network drive first?

Check System Preferences > Startup Disk

 

[iBookG4user]

It means that it is trying to boot from something other than the main hard drive with the OS on it. The same thing happened to me when I set the computer to boot from the Superdrive while I was fixing something (This is while there wasn't a disk in the drive.). I would also recommend checking that system preference setting to see what it is trying to boot from.

 

[63dot]

I know that a sustained or blinking question mark can mean this, but it just lasts for a fraction of a second.

I think the best I can do it make sure startup is on internal hard drive and not one of the attached external hard drives. (2006 iMac, dual core Intel 2.0 Ghz, 1 gig RAM).

 

[yojitani]

You likely need to reset your pram if it's not trying to boot from a different drive.

 

[Gelfin]

Do you have a Boot Camp partition?

 

[wrldwzrd89]

I agree with yojitani - having had this problem myself. A PRAM reset cured it.

 

[63dot]

put the startup mode to "Macintosh hard drive" instead of "network startup" and now there is no more question mark. Thanks guys, all seems OK.