Boot menu bios how to open. How to enter the Boot menu - boot menu. How to enter the boot menu on a laptop and computer

Do you want to know how to enter the special boot BOOT menu of a computer or laptop?

To boot from a flash drive or CD - DVD disc A?

In this article you will learn how to do it correctly.

When we do clean install Windows, then we need to boot not from the hard drive but from another medium.

This is either a CD - DVD disc or a flash drive.

Typically, this is done by entering the BIOS of a computer or laptop.

This is exactly what we did in previous lessons.

We went into the BIOS and changed the boot order of the devices.

It is at this step that approximately 90% of users who want to reinstall Windows stop.

They cannot enter the BIOS and make the necessary settings there.

Exists alternative way select boot device.

This is the BOOT menu. The BOOT menu is simpler and more convenient than entering the BIOS.

The essence of the BOOTH menu is to press a certain key when booting a computer or laptop.

A menu like this appears:

In this menu we can select any device and immediately boot from it.

Let's look at this in more detail.

I connected it to my laptop bootable USB flash drive. On my laptop, the Escape key is responsible for entering the Boot menu.

I pressed the Escape button, hold it down and, at the same time, turn on the laptop with the button. The Boot menu opened in front of me.

Cursor keys, up down, I select required device. In this case it is a flash drive.

Once the desired device is selected, press the Enter key.

Ready! I booted from the flash drive and now I can start Windows installation.

So, to enter the BOOT menu, you need to press one key when you boot your computer or laptop.

As with the BIOS, the BOOT menu keys differ depending on the manufacturer and brand of your laptop or computer.

The most common keys are:

F12, Esc, F11, F9 and F8

Boot menu has significant advantages over BIOS.

1. Boot menu is simpler and faster to use.

2. You don't need to understand and change complex BIOS settings. Let me remind you that there are settings in the BIOS that, if you change them, your computer or laptop will stop booting completely. Using the Boot menu you will avoid this.

3. There is no need to return the BIOS settings back to their original state.

Of course, the Boot menu also has its own characteristics.

If you have Windows 10 or Windows 8.1, then to enter the BOOT menu, I recommend using restarting the computer instead of shutting down. The fact is that in these operating systems, the so-called Quick Start is activated by default.

Fast startup makes sure that when you shut down the computer does not turn off, in the usual sense of the word. He falls asleep, or rather enters hibernation.

So when you enable it, it will not give you the option to enter the Boot menu. It will simply wake up and show you the state it was in when you clicked the shutdown button.

The solution is very simple: use a reboot instead of shutting down.

Let's see how it's done:

So, my laptop is turned on, Windows is loaded, the bootable flash drive is connected. Now I enable reboot.


I just click on the Start button, click the Shut down button and click Restart.

Once the BOOT menu is in front of us, we can start installing Windows.

Quick startup can be disabled completely. And then you can use the Boot menu as usual when you turn on the computer.


The setup is very simple, I will now show you how it is done. Quick Start is disabled via the classic Control Panel. On Windows you can open it via search. Just enter the word “panel” into the search. As soon as the Control Panel icon appears in the search results, I simply press the Enter key.


In Control Panel, you can switch from categories to icons. Or you can simply search for Power Supply.

On the left we have Power Supplies. Click on it.


Here we need a button Actions of the power buttons. Click on it. To unlock settings that are not active, you need to click as shown in the picture. Changing parameters that are currently unavailable.


Now we can disable Quick Launch (Fast Boot), just uncheck the box. Then we save the changes.

After this, the Boot menu will be available to you upon boot.

In Windows 8.1, the setup is done in a similar way.

One more feature.

In some sophisticated BIOS and not so sophisticated ones, there is a menu item that disables the BOOT menu.

More details about this in the video.

If your BIOS has such an item, then you will have to go into the BIOS and enable the BOOT menu once. That is, activate this item.

After this, the BOOT menu will be available to you upon boot.

From the table, you can find out which keys you need to press on your PC or laptop to enter the BOOT menu.

Manufacturer Model (if not specified - all models) Key to enter BOOT menu
Asus Desktop computers F8
k25f, k34u, k35, k43u, k46cb, k52f, k53e, k55a, k60ij, k70ab, k72f, k73, k84l, k93, k95vb, k501, k601, R503C Esc
x32a, x35u, x54c, x61g, x64, x75a, x83, x90, x93sv, x95gl, x101ch, x102ba, x200ca, x202e, x301a, x401a, x401u, x501a, x502c, x750ja F8
VivoBook f200ca, f202e, q200e, s200e, s400ca, s500ca, u38n, v500ca, v550ca, v551, x200ca, x202e, x550ca, z202e Esc
N550, N750JV, g750, Infinity ux301la, Prime ux31a, Prime ux32vd, R509C, Taichi 21, Touch u500vz, Transformer Book TX300
Compaq Presario ESC, F9
Dell F12
eMachines F12
Fujitsu F12
HP Pavilion Media Center a1477, Pavilion 23 All In One, Pavilion g4, g6 and g7, Probook 4520s, 4525s, 4540s, 4545s, 5220m, 5310m, 5330m, 5660b, 5670b, Pavilion a410n Esc
Pavilion Elite e9000, e9120y, e9150t, e9220y, e9280t ESC, F9
Pavilion HPE PC, h8-1287c, Pavilion PC, p6 2317c, Pavilion PC, p7 1297cb, TouchSmart 520 PC, ENVY x2, m4, m4-1015dx, m4-1115dx, sleekbook m6, m6-1105dx, m6-1205dx, m6- k015dx, m6-k025dx, touchsmart m7, Envy, dv6 and dv7 PC, dv9700, Specter 14, Specter 13, 2000 - 2a20nr, 2a53ca, 2b16nr, 2b89wm, 2c29wm, 2d29wm Esc (Then press F9 to enter “Boot Menu”)
Other models ESC, F9
Intel F10
Lenovo Desktop computers F12, F8, F10
IdeaPad P500 F12 or Fn + F11
IdeaPad s300, u110, u310 Touch, u410, u510, y500, y510, yoga 11, yoga 13, z500 Novo Button (next after the power button), F12
ThinkPad edge, e431, e531, e545, helix, l440, l540, s431, t440s, t540p, twist, w510, w520, w530, w540, x140, x220, x230, x240, X1 carbon, IdeaPad S10-3, g460, g470 , g475, g480, g485 and other models F12
NEC F5
Packard Bell F8
Samsung NC10, np300e5c, np300e5e, np350v5c, np355v5c, np365e5c, np550p5c Esc
Series 5 Ultra, Series 7 Chronos, Series 9 Ultrabook Esc (You need to disable "Fast boot" in BIOS)
Ativ Book 2, 8, 9 F2 (You need to disable "Fast boot" in BIOS)
Other models F12, ESC
Sony VAIO Duo, Pro, Flip, Tap, Fit Assist button (Press the Assist button when the computer is turned off, not when booting)
VAIO, PCG, VGN F11
VGN ESC, F10
Toshiba F12

When installing operating system You must go to the Boot Menu to tell your computer which device to boot from. This is also necessary when you need to start from a Live CD or bootable USB flash drive. Today I will tell and show you how to enter Boot Menu How on motherboards PCs and laptops.

Just like you need to press a special key (F2 or Del) to enter the BIOS or UEFI, there is also a specific button to bring up the boot menu. As a rule, these are the F11, F12 or Esc keys, but there are exceptions. Usually, when you turn on the computer, under the splash screen you can see a key that is responsible for calling the Boot Menu.

You can, of course, do without the Boot Menu by simply selecting a certain order for loading devices in the BIOS, but if you want to boot one-time (checking for viruses or installing a system), then I would advise using the boot menu, because it is much faster.

So, why do you need the Boot Menu at all - you ask. This menu shows a list of devices connected to the PC from which you can boot (flash drives, CDs, hard drives) for further installation of the system or for testing components.

Logging into the Boot Menu in Windows 8 and Windows 10

If you are the proud owner of a laptop on which Windows 8, 8.1 or Windows 10 was originally installed, then you may not be able to enter the Boot Menu. I’ll explain why: shutdown in these systems is not complete, since it is more like hibernation, so when you press F11, F12, Esc, the boot menu may not open. There are several ways to fix this:
- hold down the Shift button when selecting “Shutdown” and then the PC should turn off completely;
- disabling quick system startup - in G8, go to the Control Panel,

Go to "Power Supplies"

On the left, click on "Power button actions"

Disable the “Enable” item quick start"(you can do this not even on a laptop).

Logging into the Boot Menu on Asus laptops and motherboards

Almost all landlines Asus computers To enter the boot menu you need to press the F8 button immediately when the computer turns on. If we press F9 or Del, we will get to the BIOS.

Regarding laptops, it's a little confusing. The Esc key opens the boot menu on modern models; on older laptops, the F8 key works, and mainly on models whose names begin with the letter k or x. In short, if the Esc key does not bring up the Boot Menu, then we reboot and try pressing F8.

Logging into the Boot Menu on Lenovo laptops

To call up the boot menu on Lenovo laptops Just press the F12 key. If you want to use additional options loading, press the additional arrow key,

Logging into the Boot Menu on Acer laptops

On all Acer laptops and all-in-one PCs, the Boot Menu can be accessed using the F12 key when turned on. But laptops from this company have one unpleasant feature - the ability to call the boot menu is disabled in the BIOS settings. To fix this, let's get into the BIOS by pressing the F2 key. Now let's find the "F12 Boot Menu" parameter and activate it so that the word Enabled appears next to it. All that remains is to save the settings and exit the BIOS.

Below in the table you can see all other laptops and the key to call the Boot Menu and BIOS:

I hope the information in this manual was useful to you. If you have any difficulties getting into the boot menu, then write in the comments, I will try to help!

Good day everyone.

When installing Windows (for example), it is very often necessary to select boot media other than hard drive. This can be done in two ways:

1) Go into the BIOS and change the boot queue (i.e. put the flash drive in the boot queue before the HDD - this way the PC will first check the flash drive for boot entries, and only then HDD);

2) Call the Boot Menu and select the specific media to boot into this moment. In my opinion, this option is even better than the first: faster and no need to go back and forth into the BIOS to change the boot queue.

To enter the BIOS (call Boot Menu) in most cases the following keys are used: F2, Del, Esc, F12 (depending on the device manufacturer). The button must be pressed immediately after turning on the computer (you can do it several times so as not to miss the right moment.

By the way, if you look closely at the first screen, which is visible immediately after turning on the computer, there is often a button written on it to enter the necessary settings (call up the menu). An example in the screenshot below.

Rice. 1. Dual Bios. DEL button - enters BIOS settings, F12 button - Calls Boot Menu.

Table No. 1: hot keys for computers

To use the table, you need to know what motherboard you have and the BIOS version. There are several ways to find out, here are the fastest:

Simple free program, which will tell you quite a lot about your hardware. For example, you can find out information about: processor (CPU), random access memory(Ram), motherboard (Motherboard), video card (Graphics), HDD drives, SSD (Storage), etc. In addition, you can find out and control in the mode online temperature main components: hard drive, video card, processor.

A screenshot of the operation of this utility is shown in Fig. 2.

Rice. 2. Speccy - obtaining information about the motherboard

Table No. 1

Motherboard BIOS version Hotkey Which menu will be open
Acer Del Enter Setup
F12 Boot Menu
ASRock AMI F2 or DEL run Setup
F6 Instant Flash
F11 Boot Menu
TAB switch Screen
Asus Phoenix Award DEL BIOS Setup
TAB Display BIOS POST Message
F8 Boot Menu
Alt+F2 Asus EZ Flash 2
F4 Asus Core Unlocker
BioStar Phoenix Award F8 Enable System Configuration
F9 Select Booting Device after POST
DEL Enter SETUP
ChainTech Award DEL Enter SETUP
ALT+F2 Enter AWDFLASH
ECS (Elite Group) AMI DEL Enter SETUP
F11 BBS POPUP
FoxConn (WinFast) TAB POST Screen
DEL SETUP
ESC Boot Menu
GigaByte Award ESC Skip memory test
DEL Enter SETUP/Q-Flash
F9 Xpress Recovery Xpress Recovery 2
F12 Boot Menu
Intel AMI F2 Enter SETUP

Table No. 2: hot keys (Bios/Boot Menu, etc.) for laptops

Note: on modern laptops, the key combination in Windows also works: hold down the SHIFT button + select the restart button with the mouse.

The Boot Menu is a small window in which, using the mouse (arrow keys on the keyboard), you can select the device from which to boot. An example of such a menu is shown in Fig. 3.

Depending on the manufacturer of your device, the menu may differ slightly, but the principle of operation is the same everywhere.

Table No. 2

Laptop manufacturer BIOS version Hotkey Function/menu call
Acer Phoenix F2 Enter Setup
F12 Boot Menu (Change Boot Device,Multi Boot Selection Menu)
Alt+F10 D2D Recovery (disk-to-disk system recovery)
Asus AMI F2 Enter Setup
ESC Popup Menu
F4 Easy Flash
Phoenix Award DEL BIOS Setup
F8 Boot Menu
Benq Phoenix F2 BIOS Setup
Dell Phoenix,Aptio F2 Setup
F12 Boot Menu
eMachines (Acer) Phoenix F12 Boot Menu
Fujitsu Siemens AMI F2 BIOS Setup
F12 Boot Menu
Gateway (Acer) Phoenix Click mouse or Enter Menu
F2 BIOS Settings
F10 Boot Menu
F12 PXE Boot
HP (Hewlett-Packard)/Compaq Insyde ESC Startup Menu
F1 System Information
F2 System Diagnostics
F9 Boot Device Options
F10 BIOS Setup
F11 System Recovery
Enter Continue Startup
Next F1 Calling Boot Menu
F2 BIOS setup
Lenovo (IBM) Phoenix SecureCore Tiano F2 Setup
F12 MultiBoot Menu
MSI (Micro Star) *** DEL Setup
F11 Boot Menu
TAB Show POST screen
F3 Recovery
Packard Bell (Acer) Phoenix F2 Setup
F12 Boot Menu
Toshiba Phoenix Esc,F1,F2 Enter Setup
Toshiba Satellite A300 F12 Bios

Table No. 3: recovery from a hidden partition (for laptops)

Most modern laptops have a built-in hidden section with the ability to restore Windows OS using a “pair” of keys (no need to prepare a bootable USB flash drive, download ISO images with Windows, etc.).

As a rule, to launch the recovery function, after turning on the laptop, just press one key (F9, for example, on Asus laptops). Next, a window will appear in which you need to follow the instructions of the recovery wizard.

Note: when restoring information, the system drive “C:\” is often formatted and all information is deleted from it. Make a copy of important data from it in advance.

Rice. 4. ACER laptop - recovery service utility

Table No. 3

Laptop manufacturer Button combination Note
Acer Alt+F10 First you need to log in Laptop Bios, and enable the D2D Recovery function. The default password in the recovery system is 000000 or AIM1R8.
Asus F9
Dell Inspiron Ctrl+F11
Fujitsu Siemens F8
HP F10, F11
LG F11
Lenovo ThinkPad F11
MSI F3
Packard Bell F10
RoverBook Alt
Samsung F4
Sony VAIO F10
Toshiba F8, F11

PS

The tables will be updated (over time). For additions on the topic of the article - thank you very much in advance. Good luck to all!

So, you need to boot from a flash drive or other device, for example, to install an operating system or scan the system for viruses. To resolve this issue, there are two options. For the first method, you first need to enter the BIOS, then go to the boot menu, and there set the device from which you want to boot the computer. The second method does not require entering the BIOS, you just need to call the boot menu directly, this is done by pressing keys when starting the computer.

Keys to enter BIOS and Boot Menu

Typically, the keys for entering the BIOS and Boot Menu (POST keys) are indicated at the initial stage of booting the computer; in the screenshot, these keys are indicated at the bottom of the screen.

In our case, to get to the boot menu you need to press the key, and to get to the BIOS you need to press the key.

BIOS entry keys for laptops and PCs

Acer (Altos 600 Server) - ++ or
Acer (Aspire, Power, Veriton, Extensa, Ferrari, TravelMate, Altos) - or
Acer (Older PC) - or ++

AMI (American Megatrends AMIBIOS, AMI BIOS) -
AMI (American Megatrends AMIBIOS, AMI BIOS) - Old Version - or

Award BIOS (AwardBIOS) -
Award BIOS (AwardBIOS) - Old Version - ++

Compaq (Older Computers) - , , , or
Compaq (Presario, Prolinea, Deskpro, Systempro, Portable) - - at the moment the logo is displayed.
Compaq (Presario, Prolinea, Deskpro, Systempro, Portable) - - cursor in the upper right corner.

Dell (Older 486 Models) - ++
Dell (Older Laptop Models) - + or +
Dell (Some Models) - Reset - press the button twice
Dell (XPS, Dimension, Inspiron, Latitude. OptiPlex, Precision, Vostro) -
Dell Dimension L566cx System -

eMachine (Some Older Computers) —
eMachines (eMonster, eTower, eOne, S-Series, T-Series) - or

Gateway (Some Older PCs) -
Gateway Using Phoenix BIOS (DX, FX, One, GM, GT, GX, Profile, Astro)

Hewlett-Parkard (HP Alternative) - or
Hewlett-Parkard (HP Pavilion, TouchSmart, Vectra, OmniBook, Tablet) -
Hewlett-Parkard (HP) Tablet PC - or

IBM (Older Computers or Notebooks) —
IBM (PC, XT, AT) -
IBM ThinkPad using IBM BIOS (Early Models) - ++ - when the cursor is in the upper right corner.
IBM ThinkPad using IBM BIOS (Later Models) - - press and hold
IBM ThinkPad using Phoenix BIOS - ++ - from command line DOS

Lenovo (Older Products) - ++, ++ or +
Lenovo (ThinkPad, IdeaPad, 3000 Series, ThinkCentre, ThinkStation) - or

NEC (PowerMate, Versa, W-Series) -
NEC Versa Notebook - - press and hold.

Packard Bell (8900 Series, 9000 Series, Pulsar, Platinum, EasyNote, imedia, iextreme) - , or
Packard Bell (Early 386 and 486 Dodels) - ++[S] - sequentially.

Phoenix BIOS (Phoenix-Award BIOS) -
Phoenix BIOS (Phoenix-Award BIOS) - Old Version - ++[S], ++, ++ or +[S]

Sharp (Notebook Laptops, Actius UltraLite) -
Sharp (Old PCs) - Requires diagnostic disk to enter BIOS.

Sony (VAIO, PCG-Series, VGN-Series) - , or
Sony Vaio 320 Series -

Tandon - ++
Tandon 386 — ++

Toshiba (Portege, Satellite, Tecra with Phoenix BIOS) -
Toshiba (Portege, Satellite, Tecra) -

After pressing the keys, the BIOS system menu will open. The appearance of the BIOS system may differ depending on the motherboard manufacturer and BIOS version.

But every version of Bios has a Boot menu, and this is exactly the parameter we need to find – Boot if we need to set it to boot from a flash drive, for example. Next, let's look at entering the boot menu without visiting BIOS.

Keys for calling up the boot menu on laptops and personal computers

At the beginning of the computer boot, you can see a key combination or key (POST hotkeys) by pressing which you will be taken to the boot menu directly bypassing visiting the BIOS. On some computers, Boot Menu hotkeys may be disabled by default in the BIOS. To be able to use hotkeys, you need to enable it in the BIOS settings. Opposite the F12 Boot Menu column you need to set the Enabled parameter.

This must be done before loading the operating system. If this does not work, restart the computer and try again.

This is what the boot menu looks like; the appearance may vary depending on the manufacturer. Listed below are the keys (POST keys) for calling the boot menu for laptops and personal computers.

  • Keys for calling up the Boot Menu on personal computers

Manufacturer - BIOS - Hotkey.

Acer - key
ASRock (AMI) - key
Asus (Phoenix-Award) - key
BioStar (hoenix-Award) - key

ChainTech Award - key
ECS (EliteGrour) - key
FoxConn (WinFast) - key
Gigabyte (Award) - key
Intel AMI Enter SETUP
MSI (MicroStar) Enter SETUP

  • Boot Menu Keys on Laptops

Manufacturer - BIOS - Hotkey.

Asus - key
Acer (Inside H2O) - key
Acer (Phoenix) - key
Hewlett Packard (Hp) - key and
Samsung - key (Press once)
Sony Vaio - key
Toshiba - key
Dell - key
Lenovo - key
Packard Bell - key
MSI (MicroStar) - key

So, if you need to change the boot order of devices, for example, set the computer to boot from a flash drive, in this case it is not necessary to go into Bios, it is more convenient to use the POST keys and call the boot menu directly. Successful work!

Sometimes it becomes necessary to boot a computer (or laptop - there is no difference) bypassing the installed operating system, from external media: CD/DVD disks or flash drives. These can be so-called LiveCD or other utilities for recovery, testing and other needs.

1. Insert the flash drive into the USB connector or install the disk into the drive. In the case of a disk drive, you can only open it while the computer is running (we won’t talk about the method using a needle or pin).

2. Turn on the computer. A window appears with a splash screen (usually the motherboard logo) and at the bottom of the screen, as a rule, it will be written which key you need to press on the keyboard to download Bios And get to the Boot Menu. You need to have time to press the desired key before the operating system starts loading. Otherwise, you will have to restart your computer and try again.

Advice: Press the desired key repeatedly as soon as the monitor screen lights up when you turn it on.

If you need to perform a one-time boot operation from external media, you can use the quick Boot Menu (the settings will not be remembered). If you plan to boot from disks and flash drives regularly, you can Bios setup. I don’t recommend doing this to boot from flash drives, because then when you start the system, every time you start, it will first try to boot from the flash drives (if you forgot to remove them), and only then access your hard drive. This will take additional time when turning on the computer and loading the operating system. This was a lyrical digression, let's return to practical actions.

In most cases, on motherboards from different manufacturers, the start buttons Bios And Boot Menu different.

3.1. For launch Boot Menu Usually one of the keys on the top row of the keyboard is used. Most often: Esc, F1, F2, F7, F11, F12 .

The Boot Menu looks something like this:

The list shows all the media from which you can try to boot: disk drives, hard disks, flash drives (in this case HL-DT-STDVDRAM GT40N- this is a disk drive and WDC WD5000BPVT-60HXZT3 - hard drive, if you insert a flash drive, then it will appear in this list). Using the arrows on the keyboard, select the desired media and press Enter. The download will begin from the specified media, but our choice will not be remembered. If you need to download again, the operation will have to be repeated.

3.2. If for some reason you were unable to boot from a disk or flash drive using the description from paragraph 3.1., then proceed to Bios settings.

The most common keys used for Bios downloads also the keys of the top row of the keyboard: Del, F2, Esc, F10, F12 .

We get to Bios. The figure shows one of its options appearance. The interface on different motherboards may differ, but the essence of the required settings remains the same.

Finding the section Boot(or Boot Menu). Go to it by pressing the arrow keys - left-right - and press Enter, to expand the section.

Select with arrows Boot Option #1(may be called First Boot Priority or similar) and press Enter. A selection window opens. Here we indicate which device we want to boot from first. Select and click Enter .

Similarly, you can assign a device from which we will boot in the second place, etc.

If you don’t find yours in the list of devices (for example, if you are going to boot from a flash drive, and the computer decides that it is another hard drive). Then you should go to the section Hard Drive Priorities. All hard drives will be listed there, and you can set the boot order for them in the same way.

When all the necessary changes have been made, click F10 (which actually calls the command Save and Exit - Save and Exit) and confirm saving the settings by selecting Yes(sometimes you need to enter a letter y from the keyboard).

That's all. Good luck!




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