Story Of The Iconic Mac Startup Noise

Jim Reekes, a former software architect at Apple, tells the story of how he created the iconic Macintosh startup sound. Apple recently killed the startup chime on the new Macbook Pro.

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[apertureprometheus]

The Mac chimes is like the PS2 startup sound, nostalgic and encouraging me for being worked so hard to earn it

[minhlede]

God i miss that sound. I haven‘t rebooted in years 🤣

[lilbluefoxie]

I like the small chime on the Mac II and LC, apple should let you choose between the various historical chimes

[SJSOmar]

Rip I only get the start up chime on my old late 2006 imac with 4gb 2.16ghz cpu :( wish they brought it back

[garygates]

Why did I get a 3 min ad for the Church of Scientology before this video

[LikaLaruku]

Forget the startup chime, what about the groaning noise it used to make when it was loading?

[RabidLeroy]

If only some cartoon series would have the chips strong enough to immortalise the boot sound for their title cards. Sigh.

[musicmayer]

Want the Startup chime again on 2016+ Mac? Follow this info:
(so far confirmed to work on many models using Mojave or Catalina)

1. Open Terminal
2. Type sudo nvram StartupMute=%00
3. Restart Mac and enjoy.

To disable, do anyone of these 4:
- Type sudo nvram StartupMute=%01
- Type sudo nvram -d StartupMute
- reset PRAM on startup (press and hold CMD (⌘)-OPT(⌥)-P-R on startup)
- turn off and pull plug on desktop Macs (not all models)


Original (partial) source from Jan 2020:

Does not give absolute date, only relative date of “1 month ago”.
“SINdicate 1 point 1 month ago

Wild guess: sudo nvram StartupMute=%100”

[avienn]

I actually really like the mac 2 noise, certainly better than the basic pc speaker beeps at the time tbh

[rb]

Everyone with negative, and bitchy comments are using Windows.

[Klassenfeind]

blah welcoming experience, I hate the chime on my old 4, 1 so much