Apple Macintosh LC - Manual (Page 19)

CHAPTER 4
USING SOFTWARE PROGRAMS
In previous chapters, you have been working with the Macintosh software
program that lets you organize your files on your desktop (that software is
called the Finder). In this chapter you will learn how to use the programs
that help you actually do your work.
Starting up the Computer
The first step is to get your computer up and running. You have done this at
least once already, at the start of the last chapter. Even so, follow these
steps closely to learn a few new points about starting up the computer.
1.If your computer is on, shut it down and off following the steps in
"Shutting Off the Computer" in Chapter 3. Then continue with these steps.
2.With no disks in your disk drives, keep your eyes on the screen as you
press the top of the on/off switch to turn the computer on. Notice the first
icon that appears on your screen.
Your computer will beep and begin starting up. At this point you will see one
of two things on your screen.
Either you see the disk icon with a blinking question mark in it, or you see
the smiling Macintosh icon, which is replaced in a few seconds by the
familiar Macintosh desktop.
What's Going on Here?
As you learned in Chapter 3, when you start up your computer it needs
instructions in order to know what to do. These instructions are on disks
called startup disks.
If you saw a smiling Macintosh
If you saw the smiling Macintosh icon when you turned on your computer, it
means that your computer has found a startup disk and is reading the
information it needs.
Since you haven't inserted a floppy disk, the smiling Macintosh icon means
that the computer is reading the startup information from a hard disk. Apple
prepares the hard disks it puts in computers at the factory so that they are
startup disks.
When you turned on your computer, it looked first in the floppy disk drive
for a startup disk and found no disk. It then looked for a hard disk startup
disk. It found the hard disk, and on it found the startup information it
needed. It read the startup information from the hard disk and displayed the
smiling Macintosh to let you know it had the information it needed.
Because you have a hard disk that is prepared as a startup disk, you do not
need to insert a floppy disk into the disk drive to start up your computer.
Continue now with step 3.