As I explained in a previous post, when Microsoft designed Windows 8 they made drastic changes in the way we have always performed a number of common tasks. One of the most irritating of these changes is in how we initiate the Shutdown/Restart procedure.

With Windows 8, instead of needing just a couple of simple mouse clicks to shut down or restart our PCs, we now have to go through a frustrating process that’s about as intuitive as learning how to pilot a 747.

If you’d like to be able to shut down or restart your PC in a hurry again, here is a fast and easy way to add a pair of Shutdown and Restart tiles right to your Windows 8 Start Screen:

1 – Right-click on a open area of the desktop, then select New > Shortcut.

2 – In the “Location” box type shutdown /p and click Next.

3 – Name your new shortcut Shutdown and click Finish.

4 – Find your new Shutdown shortcut on the Desktop, right-click on it and click Pin to Start. You now have a Shutdown tile right on your Start Screen! Clicking on this tile will shut the system down right away.

5 – Repeat steps 1 – 4, replacing shutdown /p with shutdown /r /t 0  and naming the shortcut Restart. Finish up by repeating step 4. Now you now have a Restart tile on your Start Screen as well.

As I have mentioned in previous posts, Microsoft made some pretty drastic changes when they designed the look and feel of Window 8.

In this post I’ll show you how to activate another popular feature they decided to “hide” by default: The option to place the computer into Hibernation mode at shutdown.

First of all, I’ll spend a few moments explaining what Hibernate mode is and when you might want to use it instead of Sleep mode or simply clicking Shutdown. There are three primary ways of powering down your PC: [Read more…]

As I explained in this post, Windows 8 looks and works quite a bit differently from previous versions of Microsoft Windows. Some items have been hidden or moved to new locations while others have been either replaced or eliminated altogether.

There is the missing Start Menu of course (click here for instructions for adding one), and a couple of other rather important items aren’t in their usual places. But luckily, they are extremely easy to find and use. Here’s how: [Read more…]