To shut down Windows 8 or perform the other power-related functions, you can use one of the following methods:
Keyboard:
Type CTRL + ALT + DEL at any time and then tap the Power button in the
lower-right corner of the screen to access Sleep, Shut down, and Start
options. Or, type WINKEY + I to display the Settings pane and then tap
the Power button from there.
Mouse:
Activate the Charms bar by moving the mouse cursor to the lower-right
or upper-right corner of the screen and then move the cursor along the
right edge of the screen towards the middle of the ridge edge. Click
Settings and then Power.
Touch: Activate the Charms bar by swiping in from the right edge of the screen. Click Settings and then Power.
Hardware button:
Tap the Start key button or the power button on a Windows device to
activate Sleep. Or, on a traditional PC, tap the machine's power button
to activate Shut Down. (Be careful: This will happen immediately and
without warning, regardless of which applications are running.)
(That
last bit about the hardware button assumes you're using the default
power scheme, Balanced, and that you have not customized what happens
when the power button is pressed.)
Customizing what happens when you press hardware button(s)
You
can of course customize what happens when you press a power button.
This can be very useful, especially if the PC's or device's power button
is in easy reach.
To
change what happens when the power button on your PC or device is
pressed, launch the Power control panel. (There are many ways to access
this control panel. I recommend Start Screen Search or the power user
menu that appears when you right-click on the new Start tip thumbnail.)
From this interface, click the link on the left titled "Choose what the
power buttons do" or "Choose what the power button does."
In
the resulting interface, you can choose what happens when the Power
(and possibly Sleep) button does when pressed. Available choices include
Do nothing, Sleep, Hibernate, and Shut down. Portable devices will
further allow different actions based on whether the device is plugged
in or on battery power.
You
might be able to similarly customize other related actions. For
example, on a typical portable computer, you will see an option titled
"Choose what closing the lid does."
Making these options more accessible in Windows 8
You
may not be thrilled with the placement of the lock/sign out and power
options in Windows 8, and maybe configuring a power button to do your
bidding isn't cutting it either. Short of using a silly utility to
return the old-school Start menu to Windows 8, is there some way you can
surface these commands in a more elegant and usable fashion?
Of course there is.
The
key is to make a shortcut to the relevant command and then make that
shortcut visible where you want it: On the taskbar, the Windows desktop,
or even on the Start screen. And doing so is simple enough because, as
any power user or IT pro can tell you, Windows has long support a
command line utility, shutdown, that offers all of these options.
To see this command, open a command line window by typing WINKEY + R (for "Run") to display the Run box. Then type cmd
and hit Enter. In the command line window that appears, type the
following to display all of the options associate with the shutdown
command:
shutdown /?
You should see something similar to this:
Given
this information, you might consider using the following commands to
accomplish the relevant, lock/sign out and power-related options...
Shut down immediately (with no warning)
shutdown.exe /s /t 0
Restart immediately (with no warning)
shutdown.exe /r /t 0
Sign out
shutdown.exe /l <- That's a lowercase "L", not a one.
Armed
with this information, you can make a shortcut to any one of these
commands. To do so, right-click on the desktop and choose New and then
Shortcut from the menu that appears. In the Create Shortcut wizard,
paste one of the above commands into the text box. (I'll use shut down
in this case.) Then tap Next.
In the next page of the wizard, give the shortcut a name, something like Shut down, and then click Finish.
The
resulting shortcut has a plain icon, so right-click it and choose
Properties. In the Properties window that appears, click the Change Icon
button and then click OK in the warning dialog that appears. In the
next window, select an appropriate icon.
Click
OK and then OK again to close out the windows. Your new shortcut now
has a useful new icon. Repeat these steps for each shortcut you wish to
create and then move them somewhere easy to find. (I put them in a
folder I created, C:\Program Files\Shutdown.)
Now you can place them where you want them. I recommend choosing a spot between the following:
Taskbar. You
can drag the shortcuts, one by one, to the Windows taskbar for quick
access. Note, however, that this can be dangerous since these shortcuts
act immediately with no warning. So if you tap the Shut down button by
mistake, your PC will shut down immediately whether you want it to or
not.
Taskbar, in a new toolbar. Alternatively,
you can create a new taskbar toolbar that points to the folder that
contains the shortcuts and then position that toolbar on the right side
of the taskbar where you may be less likely to click one inadvertently.
Remember that you can unlock the taskbar and choose various toolbar
options to make it look the way you want. A few possible configurations
are shown below.
There
are other configurations, but you get the idea. To get started,
right-click the taskbar and choose Toolbars then New toolbar from the
menu that appears.
Start screen.
To place tiles for these options on the Start screen, right-click each
in turn and choose Pin to Start from the menu that appears.
Then, navigate to the Start screen and position the tile(s) where you'd
like them. Optionally group them and give the name a group.
Desktop. Finally, you can do it the old-fashioned way: Simple copy the shortcuts to the desktop and access them from there.
