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• Nektony How to stop applications from opening on Mac startup This article is based on our expertise of macOS, its file system, the work of third-party apps and startup programs. We’ve been working 10+ years in developing our own disk utilities for making a Mac work smoothly.
• When your startup disk is almost full, the entire machine will run slowly. It is a best practice that we keep the free disk space at 20% level (minimum). If you can lighten the Mac drive and delete those unnecessary files, for example, system junk, duplicate files, unused third-party apps, etc., that will help optimize your Mac startup.
• You can make your Mac start up from a CD or DVD, a network volume, a different disk, or another operating system. To do so, you change your startup disk. Important: If you have a Mac with an Apple T2 chip, added security features may need to be set in order to change the startup disk.
• Such items can increase your Mac’s startup time and decrease its performance. Plus, sometimes when you remove an application or a service, it leaves a login item with a broken link. These broken login items are completely useless, cause unwanted messages, and waste your Mac's resources (because they look for non-existent applications).

Wait until the startup progress bar appears and release the keys. (If you see a globe, skip down to the end of the article.) When Recovery starts up, select Disk Utility and click Continue.

When you’re trying to wipe an old Mac to set it up fresh or to give it away or sell it, you typically want to erase the drive. Sometimes, you’re thwarted.

The easiest sequence is the following:

1. Select  > Restart if your Mac is running.

2. Just as the computer starts, hold down Command-R, which loads macOS Recovery.

3. Wait until the startup progress bar appears and release the keys. (If you see a globe, skip down to the end of the article.)

4. When Recovery starts up, select Disk Utility and click Continue.

5. Make sure you’re selecting your macOS startup partition and not the entire drive, which contains the macOS Recovery partition you’re currently using. Fom the View menu, select Show All Devices.

6. Select just the partition or container with macOS and click the Erase button.

7. Quit Disk Utility and use Reinstall macOS from the main recovery window.

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It’s possible you’ll hit an error at any one of these points.

For instance, some readers report receiving the message: “Secure Disk Erase Failed—Couldn’t Unmount Disk.” This happens in a few circumstances, but most of the time because you’re trying to erase the entire disk—consult steps 5 and 6 above.

If that doesn’t help, because you’re trying to erase the entire drive, you can shift to internet-based macOS Recovery, which downloads the recovery software temporarily from the internet and can erase the entire drive. For most Macs in recent years, restart and hold down Command-Option-R. (For Macs running a version of the operating system before Sierra, the key combinations will be different.)

In a few moments, you should see a rotating globe, which indicates your Mac is pulling down the necessary files over the Internet. You’ll be prompted at some point for the name and network password for a Wi-Fi network, unless you’re connected via Ethernet to a network.

You should now be able to proceed to erase the disk in full and reinstall a fresh copy of macOS.

This Mac 911 article is in response to a question submitted by Macworld reader Dan.

Ask Mac 911

We’ve compiled a list of the questions we get asked most frequently along with answers and links to columns: read our super FAQ to see if your question is covered. If not, we’re always looking for new problems to solve! Email yours to mac911@macworld.com including screen captures as appropriate, and whether you want your full name used. Every question won’t be answered, we don’t reply to email, and we cannot provide direct troubleshooting advice.

Apple has just released the final version of macOS Big Sur to the public. You can start upgrading your compatible Mac devices by downloading Big Sur from the App Store or Settings > Software Updates. But if you prefer to completely wipe out your Mac and do a fresh install of macOS Big Sur, you will need a bootable media.

I perform a fresh install every time Apple releases a major macOS version – which usually happens once a year. This time too, I will update my Macbook Air by performing a fresh install. And to do that, I will make a bootable SD card. You can also use a USB stick aka pen drive aka flash drive and perform a fresh install.

In this quick tutorial, I will share how I make a bootable macOS memory card or USB stick, wipe my Mac, and perform a fresh install. You will need a stable internet connection and a storage media with minimum 16GB space. Before you begin, make sure you have taken backup of your Mac.

Step 1: Download macOS Big Sur

Open App Store and search for macOS Big Sur. Click Get and the Software Update window will open. Click upgrade now and it will start downloading the macOS update. If you don’t see macOS Big Sur in App Store, follow this link and choose open link in App Store.

The installer is 12GB so be patience.

Once it finished downloading, the macOS installer is placed under Applications and will run automatically. Close the setup window.

Step 2: Preparing the Storage Media

Insert the storage media you would like to use. I use a 64GB micro SD card with my MacBook Air. You can use a USB-C to USB adapter for Mac models without USB A ports and memory card slot.

Open Disk Utility.

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Select the storage medium you just connected from the list on left and click Erase. Select Mac OS Extended (Journaled) from Format dropdown. Type BigSur or any other name you like. Make it simple because you will use this name in the next step.

Click Erase and wait until the media is erased.

Step 3: Making the Bootable Media

Now open Terminal and type the following command. Make sure you don’t leave any spaces. Replace BigSur with whatever name you chose in Step 2.

Press enter.

Enter your password, type Y and press enter again. The process takes roughly 20 minutes. After it’s finished, you will notice that the name of your USB stick/SD card has been changed to Install macOS Big Sur.

Step 4: Installing macOS Big Sur from Bootable Media

Right. Now you have a Big Sur bootable media. It’s time to start the installation process.

Restart your Mac. When it’s booting up (right after the chime sound), press and hold Option key until you see a screen with an option to select the startup disk.

Select Install macOS Big Sur and click continue. Let the installer load.

Now you will see the macOS Recovery screen which will ask you to select a user account which you know the password of. Choose your administrator account and enter password. Note that this is the user on your current macOS setup.

Click Disk Utility and continue. Select the volume where macOS is currently installed on your Mac. Click Erase. Leave all options as default. Click Erase again.

After the process finishes, close Disk Utility and you will return to the recovery screen. Choose ‘Install macOS’ this time and click continue.

The macOS installation process will start and your Mac will reboot a few times.

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Once finished, you should see the macOS setup screen. After you are done with onboarding, you will see the desktop and are all set to start using macOS Big Sur.

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The same bootable media you just made can be used to install macOS Big Sur on all your (compatible) Macs. This approach helps save bandwidth if you have more than one devices while also letting you erase all data and perform a clean install. It will also come in handy as a recovery media if your Mac software misbehaves in future.

That’s all, folks. This was a tutorial on making a bootable macOS Big Sur installation media. I hope you found it useful and I’d like to thank you for reading.

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