How To Change The Startup Disk On A Mac

No startup disk plant would certainly make your Mac machine unbootable. And if it's happening during the process of updating a recent macOS like Monterey or Big Sur, the update won't move on without selecting a startup disk for that. The startup disk is commonly an internal hard drive inside your Mac, which installs the operating system and applications. The lack of a startup disk in Mac surely disables you from doing any upgrade or downgrade or accessing the estimator. Therefore, when yous are in the same boat to come across no startup disk, or startup disk missing/not showing in Mac, follow our advice to find information technology, or modify some other startup disk that is properly functioning!

Though the symptoms are similar when a startup deejay cannot be constitute, the situations for getting the error are distinct. You can check the table for various scenarios yous may encounter no startup disk issue, and directly jump to the corresponding solutions.

Workable Solutions	Step-by-pace Troubleshooting
#ane. Repair Startup Disk in macOS Recovery	Turn on your Mac and go along to press and hold the power button...Total steps
#2. Make startup deejay appear in Deejay Utility	Close downwardly your Mac and disconnect all peripherals from your Mac...Full steps
#3. Reset MVRAM on your Mac	Shut down your Mac, then turn it on and immediately press and hold the keys...Full steps
#4. Modify another startup disk	Turn off your Mac, press and hold the power push to startup your Mac...Full steps
Tip: Recover data from unbootable Mac	Download EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard for Mac and create a bootable...Total steps

Earlier proceeding, brand sure that you take a electric current fill-in of your important files and purchased programs (the activation key/lawmaking is quite important for reinstalling and activating the 2d fourth dimension). Otherwise, you tin only rely on 3rd-political party Mac data recovery software to recover missing files.

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Solution one. Repair Startup Disk in macOS Recovery Mode

Since your startup disk is not showing at the moment, you cannot use the regular way to open up Disk Utility by just launching the Applications folder and then selecting the Utilities folder. You lot'll enter Deejay Utility from macOS Recovery mode this fourth dimension.

Step 1: Depending on you lot're using Mac with Apple silicon or Intel processor, yous'll use different keys/entries to enter this mode.

Apple silicon: Plow on your Mac and go on to printing and concur the ability push until y'all meet the startup options window. Click the gear icon labeled Options, then click Continue.
Intel processor: Turn on your Mac, and so immediately printing and agree Command (⌘) and R keys until y'all see an Apple logo or other image.

Pace two: Select a user and afterward you lot'll be asked to enter a password to continue. Adjacent, you'll be invited to the macOS Recovery mode, choose Disk Utility on the window, and click Continue.

open disk utility in macos recovery

Step 3: In the Deejay Utility window, navigate to View > Show All Devices. (None disks are showing? Leap to #solution 2#.)

show all devices in disk utility in macos recovery

Stride 4: If y'all're lucky and the startup disk appears hither, select it and click the Start Aid button and then click Run. Commencement Aid will check the selected volume for errors, and try to repair it if there are bug found.

run first aid to repair startup disk in macos recovery

Solution 2. Brand startup disk appear in Deejay Utility

Deejay Utility can cheque any connected disk and repair bug once it detects. How to repair a startup disk if it'due south not showing up in Disk Utility? For those who didn't run across a whole disk or any containers or volumes on that disk, try to use the below steps to make it detected.

Footstep 1: Close down your Mac and disconnect all peripherals that are connected to your Mac.

Footstep 2: If you installed macOS on an external difficult drive, make sure that its connection cablevision is alright and the connectedness is solid. Plow off the drive and back on.

Step three: Follow the #Solution 1# guide to entering Disk Utility in macOS Recovery and repair startup disk. Still tin can't see whatever drive in the bachelor devices? The well-nigh fourth dimension-efficient way is to get back up from https://getsupport.apple.com/ and start with the Mac entry.

contact apple support to fix startup disk not showing in disk utility

Solution three. Reset MVRAM on your Mac

When you effort to boot your Mac from the startup disk but it finally starts upwardly to a flashing question mark like this, it ways that your startup disk is no longer available or doesn't comprise a working Mac operating system. If it's an upshot that persists each time yous try to boot your Mac, yous'll need to repair the startup disk with Deejay Utility in macOS Recovery, which the #Solution one# has demonstrated the steps.

boot mac into a flashing question mark

For the example the question mark appears only momentarily before your Mac starts up normally, perhaps past resetting NVRAM (nonvolatile random-access retention) volition aid resolve the problem. As y'all know, the NVRAM tin can store settings of startup disk choice.

Step 1: Shut down your Mac, then plough it on and immediately printing and concord the keys together, which are Option, Command, P, and R.

restart mac

Pace 2: When your Mac booted upwards, become and check your preferred startup deejay is selected in Startup Deejay preferences.

Solution four. Modify Some other Startup Disk

We cannot exclude the chance that your current startup disk has failed somehow the macOS can longer recognize it. If these options are available to you, like a CD/DVD, a network book or a dissimilar concrete deejay, yous can try to alter your startup disk with a working one.

Change a startup disk at one fourth dimension:

Step 1: Turn off your Mac

Step ii: Press and hold the power button to startup Mac. If you lot're using Apple silicon, press and agree the power button until the "Loading startup options" appears.

Step three: Click the Upwards arrow on Mac, or Go along push button on Mac with Apple silicon to select the new startup disk when you see all the available startup disks showing up.

Change a startup disk for every startup:

Step one: Open your Mac and navigate to the Apple card and so System Preferences. Click Startup Disk.

Step 2: Choose the wanted disk past clicking the icon of information technology and click Restart.

Can You Recover Data from Unbootable Mac Difficult Drive?

Ane big concern of finding no startup disk on Mac is losing the admission to data. Is this a new round of trouble making you upset? Don't worry. Whenever you're confronted data loss on an inaccessible Macintosh Hard disk drive, ask EaseUS Mac hard bulldoze recovery software for help. You'll boot your Mac from its bootable version and perform the below steps to recover desired data and transfer information technology to a safety location.

How to Create a USB Bootable Media

Stride 1. Install and run EaseUS Data Recovery Wizard for Mac on another Mac reckoner, select "File" > "Create Bootable USB". Then, cull a USB bulldoze to create the bootable disc.

Mac data recovery from bootable media - step 1

 Alert: The creator will prompt to erase the drive to reallocate the space; then it tin write the bootable files to this bulldoze. Please back upwardly all USB files earlier processing "Eraser".

Step 2.The program starts to create a 2GB space and save the kick files. The rest space on the USB tin exist still used for storage.

Mac data recovery from bootable media - step 2

Step iii. Once information technology completes, please follow the guide to kicking the corrupted Mac from the bootable disc and kickoff the recovery. We propose you restore the data to an external hard drive.

Mac data recovery from bootable media - step 3

How to Recover Information from Mac Hard Disk

Step i. Select the deejay location (it can be an internal HDD/SSD or a removable storage device) where you lost information and files. Click the "Scan" button.

select a location and click scan

Footstep 2. EaseUS Data Recovery Magician for Mac will immediately scan your selected deejay book and brandish the scanning results on the left pane.

scan the selected disk to find lost data on your Mac