A follow up to this issue ... At the time of the slow start ups, improved by PRAM resets, I had an OCZ Vertex 4 SSD installed. There were other compatibility issues isolated this drive, so I replaced it with an OWC Mercury Extreme. All of my problems resolved with this hardware change, including this one. That would explain why nobody had any ideas, I suppose. Anyway, this issue was caused by the OCZ hardware, and I will attempt to close out this item at this time.
Last edited: Jul 27, 2012