Booting from a USB stick or CD on a Mac is very, very easy. One way to do this is by looking at System Preferences> Startup Disk. You will love the built-in hard drive as well as compatible operating systems and physical drives.
Click the iconIn the lower left corner of the window, enter your administrator username and password, select the boot disk you want to boot from, and click Restart. This process saves your boot disk settings until you repeat the process when you need to choose a different option.
To do the actual USB boot once, use Boot Manager instead. Here’s how it works:
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Restart your computer
Restart your computer here. Press and hold the right Option button while the device reboots. Release it when the Boot Manager window opens (or when you are prompted for the firmware password).
Select the correct drive
You will see icons for available drives. On the right you will find an external drive or (CD-USB) with its name below. Use the arrow keys or the mouse to highlight this disc, then go back to the grow rack or click the arrow to see some of them. (If you hold down the Ctrl key at the same time, Your computer will definitely save this as your preference – similar to above.)
From there, your computer will continually boot from a USB CD or compile instead of OS X, and you’ll probably do whatever you need to do by following the onscreen instructions.
This was originally posted on 3/22/13 and is considered updated on 9/27/19 to provide more detailed and up-to-date information.