Shutdown, Hybrid Boot, and Hibernate in Windows 8

When I was configuring my Lenovo C440, sometimes the select boot device menu won’t be available after shutdown Windows 8.  It becomes available again after I choose reboot instead of shutdown.

After some googling, I realize the shutdown feature has changed in Windows 8. You may switch between complete shutdown or hybrid shutdown.

Explain of Shutdown in Windows 8

MSDN: Delivering fast boot times in Windows 8 and MSDN: Windows On/Off Transition Performance Analysis provides a very detail explain about the new shutdown in Windows 8 from a technical view.

In Windows 95 to Windows 7’s word, with hybrid shutdown, you log-off and go hibernate. When you turn-on your computer next time, it restore from file instead of the traditional boot-up process and save your time.

Problems and Solutions with Hybrid Shutdown

Hibernation takes too much time to save my RAM contents into a file on my ThinkPad R61i with 4GB RAM and Vista. Therefore, I choose to shutdown instead of hibernation to save time and reduce SSD write cycle.

Windows 8 provides hybrid shutdown to balance boot time and shutdown time by skipping the user session. Less to save and quicker to restore. You only need to login again which is good for security concern, too..

The only problems to me is I cannot see my boot device menu. It is not good when I need to use GParted or Clonzilla which need to be select from different bootable device like flash drive or CD-ROM / DVD-ROM.

If you want to disable hybrid shutdown, you may lanuch [Power Options] from [Control Panel]. On the left side bar, choose [Choose What the power buttons do]. Click [Change settings that are currently unavailable] and remove the tick on [Turn on fast startup (recommended)] then [Save changes].

Change the hybrid shutdown feature in Windows 8 Control Panel

If you have problems to shutdown your computer, try to disable hybrid shutdown.

Reference

1. ASKVG: Fix Windows 8 Restart and Shutdown Problems by Disabling “Hybrid Shutdown” Feature
2. Clonzilla
3. GParted
4. Lenovo C440
5. MakeTechEasier: How to Disable Hybrid Boot and Shutdown in Windows 8
6. MSDN: Delivering fast boot times in Windows 8
7. MSDN: Windows On/Off Transition Performance Analysis
8. TechRepublic: Sleep, hibernate, fast boot, and hybrid shutdown are not all the same thing in Windows 8. Greg Shultz explains how it all works.
9. Wiki: Hibernation (computing) – 5.1 Microsoft Windows
10. Windows Eight Forums: How to Turn “Fast Startup” On or Off for a Hybrid Boot in Windows
11. Windows: Shut down, sleep, or hibernate