I saw this old article in Businessweek.com and just had to blog about. One thing that gets me is when people write something and don’t know a thing about what they are talking about. Catherine Holahan is one of those people. The quote below has to do with different methods of energy saving in Vista, not as Ms. Holahan improperly states as ways to shutdown Vista.
How many ways should you be able to shut off a laptop? How about nine? Microsoft’s long-awaited Vista operating system, launched for business customers on Nov. 30, includes that many options, according to programmers familiar with the software. That’s two shortcut icons and a shut-down menu with a full seven options. …..[snip]
[snip]….Critics say that Vista, for all its capabilities, could end up being too complex for the average consumer. After all, how many features do you need for the computer equivalent of a light switch? “I’m sure there’s a whole team of [user interface] designers, programmers, and testers who worked very hard on the OFF button in Windows Vista,” writes Joel Spolsky, a New York software developer, on his blog, “but seriously, is this the best you could come up with?” ….[snip]
[snip]….Microsoft executives were not available to comment for this story. However, its supporters point out that each menu option switch user, log off, lock, restart, sleep, hibernate, and shut down does do something slightly different. “Restart,” for example, shuts off and then immediately reboots the computer. “Sleep,” on the other hand, puts the computer in a lower power state, saving battery juice while enabling the user to quickly resume activity. That’s different from “hibernate,” which saves work before, essentially, shutting down.
Source: Vista’s Many Turnoffs
Actually, all of these methods are in Windows XP, not anything new in Vista except that they are all on the start menu, but this seems to slip by Ms. Holahan during the course of her article. She even cites a “New York software developer” who didn’t even know this. Guess that goes to show being a software developer does not make you and expert on the OS.
Just to clarify hibernation and sleep mode, here is a definition of Hibernate for Windows from Wikipedia:
Hibernate (also known ambiguously as sleep mode) is a feature seen in many operating systems where the contents of RAM is written to non-volatile storage, such as the hard disk (as either a file or on a separate partition) before powering off the system. Later the system can be restored to the state it was in when hibernating, so that programs can continue executing as if nothing happened. Hibernating and restoring from hibernate is also generally faster than a hard reboot and, if necessary, can be done without user interaction (unlike shutting down, which often requires the user to specify if open documents should be saved).
Here is the quick definition of sleep mode for Vista from Microsoft.com:
Sleep Mode: This mode turns off most hardware on the mobile PC but maintains the RAM state. The user can quickly resume from standby with the same desktop configuration. (without the power to the computer being actually turned off)
To set the facts correct, there are 2 ways to completely shut down your computer:
- Choose Shutdown from the start menu or another place the Shutdown shortcut is located.
- Hold the Power button until the power goes off. (not the recommended method)
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Filed under: Computer Software, Microsoft , About computer software, Windows Vista, Windows/Microsoft
