How to Cold-Boot a Computer

People of all ages from around the world are using computers daily for many reasons. Many people use them for their jobs, at home for pleasure or research and students depend on them for as a resource for homework assignments. If you have recently purchased a computer, you may want to consider a basic computer class to help get you started.

Instructions

Difficulty: Easy

1. Determine if it is absolutely necessary to cold-boot your computer. You will only want to do this as a last resort. When you cold-boot your computer, you may create other problems.
2. Attempt to diagnose the problem before cold-booting your computer. If your computer is running slow, a restart may be the answer by selecting "Start", "Turn off your Computer" and "Restart".
3. Acknowledge that insufficient resources such as memory can slow your computer down to a crawl. Restarting your computer of shutting it down using the start menu will empty out memory and allow these resources to become available.
4. Check for any programs that may be running in the background. To do this hold your "ctrl", "alt" and "del" keys simultaneously. This will display a list of programs or processes running on your computer. It may be necessary to highlight a program and click "End Process".
5. Look at your computer usage by again clicking the "ctrl", "alt" and "del" keys simultaneously. The windows task manager will open again select the "Performance" tab and look for high CPU or Page File Usage.
6. Note if your computer is frozen and you are unable to do anything, you may have to cold-boot your system. Do this by turning the power button off and waiting about 15 seconds or so before turning it back on.
7. Seek help from a professional if your computer does not seem to return to its original state.

Tips & Warnings

• Protect your computer by always shutting it down properly.
• Avoid having problems with your computer by shutting it down through the start menu at least once a week or when it's not in use.

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