Windows 7 does not shut down, only hibernates

Question

I don't know if this is normal, or something is wrong with my laptop, but Hibernate is practically unusable, because the computer is too sluggish after waking up. (Switching between open applications takes more than 10 seconds, once I measured 42 sec from typing in Google.com in Firefox to Google being shown). So I never use it, and shut down every evening. Sometimes I forget to shut down, it goes automatically into hibernate sometime at night, and when I am back, I have to restart to be able to work properly.

But now I find the laptop waking up every morning, instead of booting. I started paying special attention that I really shut it down in the evening, but nevertheless it continues to wake up. I don't know how long this has been going on, maybe the last update or an application installation has changed the settings or caused a bug (normally I would suspect myself too, but I am certain that I haven't opened the control panel for months).

It looks like the settings are OK. The button in the Start menu says "Shut down", not "Hibernate", and when I use it, it looks like it is really shutting down. All fans and lights go out. But on start up, it definitely says "Windows is being resumed" (message backtranslated) and all programs and documents which were open when shutting down are automatically opened. I also don't see the screen for choosing an account, but only get prompted to enter the password for my account.

Does anybody know how to get Windows to actually shut down when the "Shut down" button is used?

Solution 1

One option would be to simply disable hibernation entirely. To do so, run powercfg -h off as an administrator.

Solution 2

I have a dual boot and such behaviour can be really irratating but I can't totally disable it as it has some use.

So my solution was to create a shortcut on the desktop which does a complete shutdown. To do so put the target of the shortcut as C:\Windows\System32\shutdown.exe /s /t 0. You can of course use the default shutdown icon for this shortcut.

Solution 3

Go to power advanced settings and select the shutdown option for what to do when power button in pressed

Comments

[吴环宇]

Even if you start it up again directly? Is it possible the computer boots during the night (Wake-on-LAN, BIOS setting?), hibernates itself (display folded down?) and therefore "wakes up" the next day?

[tombull89]

what happens if you use the "shutdown" command? Go to the cmd prompt, type in "shutdown -s -f -t 10" (-s, shutdown, -f force, -t 10 second timeout) and then start the computer back up again?

[吴环宇]

"The button in the Start menu says "Shut down", [...] I use it [...]."

[吴环宇]

It may be worth checking if hibernation is disabled there though. To disable it entirely, run powercfg -h off as an administrator.

[rumtscho]

@oKtosiTe I didn't want to spend too much time to research such an annoying small problem, so I decided to use your "disable hibernation" workaround and forget about it. It would be nice if you could make that a full answer so I can accept it and have the question "finalized" (what is the correct word for the opposite of open, when it is not "closed"?)

[吴环宇]

Done. Finalized works for me. Or solved. Or "marked as answered". @rumtscho