How to Turn Off Your Computer in Vista

Turning off your computer in Vista can be a bit tricky because Vista doesn't show you a "Turn off computer" button. So when you want to turn off your computer, here are four simple options:

Method 1

Start up your computer.

• Click on the power button in the Start menu.
• If you see a yellow exclamation point on the power button that means Vista will install updates before it turns your computer off.

Method 2

Lock your computer

• Click on the lock button in the Start menu.
• To be able to gain access to your computer once it has been locked, you will need to enter a password or use an account that isn't password protected.

Locking the computer is a good idea if you have to step away for a moment. You will be able to keep your information safe.

Method 3

Click on the small arrow next to the lock button

• When menu pops up.
• Choose log off, or lock the computer.
• Restart if the computer if it is running slowly
• Click Sleep or Hibernate if you won't be using your computer for a while.
• Click Shut Down to turn the computer off.

Another easy way to gain access to the same basis options for turning off your computer can be done by pressing CTRL, ALT, and Delete simultaneously. Depending on your options on the computer, if you leave your computer idle for several minutes, Vista will automatically go to Sleep and later Hibernate.

Method 4

Shutdown Shortcut the one-click turn off computer

For this method you will have to create a shutdown computer shortcut

Right click on any blank space of the windows desktop

• Go to 'New'
• Go to Shortcut.
• Click on 'shortcut'. This will open a 'Create Shortcut' window.

At the 'Create Shortcut' window

• Type shutdown.exe -s -t 0 in the blank space. What is command means is, shutdown and wait for zero seconds.
• Click on the 'Next' button
• In the blank space showing you type in the name you want to use for shutdown, e.g. 'turn off' or computer shutdown"
• Click the 'Finish' button.

You will now see a new shutdown shortcut on your Windows desktop. You can click it whenever you want to turn off your computer.

If you want to assign an icon to this shortcut then do the following:

• Right click on your new shutdown shortcut
• Then click on properties.
• Click the 'Change Icon' button. An alert may come up, ignore it and click 'O.K'.
• You will now see a list of icons you can choose from
• Select and icon and click the ''OK' button twice.

You should now see your new shutdown icon on your desktop.