Creating A Fast Shut Down Icon

WindowsXP contains a bunch of built-in safeguards that, at times, intentionally reduce its operation to a snail’s pace, especially in its Shut-Down function.

If you want to turn off your machine, for example, you have to click Start>Turn Off Computer>Turn Off and then wait and wait and wait until windows slowly fades into the sunset.

Few people realize that WindowsXP has a program that allows you to turn off your computer in about half the time of the usual approach; and that same program also saves sufficient amounts of time whenever you restart your computer.

Buried deep inside WindowsXP lurks a little known program called SHUTDOWN that shuts down the computer system in a very fast, but orderly manner. Here is how to put an icon on your desktop that will shut down your computer quickly:

1. Right-click any empty location on your desktop.

2. Click New>Shortcut.

3. In the Create Shortcut Wizard, type: shutdown –s –t 0 (It is important to put spaces before each hypen and no space after each hypen; and that use a zero at the end).

4. Click Next.

5. Type a name for this shortcut such as: Quick Shortdown.

6. Click Finish and you have a new shortcut on your desktop.

7. Right-click the shortcut and click Properties.

8. Click the Change Icon Button.

9. Pick an appropriate icon for the shortcut and Double-click it.

10. Click OK. Your new, Quick Shutdown shortcut appears on the desktop

To test the new, fast shut down icon, make sure no programs are running, and double-click the ShutDown Icon. On a typical machine, you see the log-off screen in about few seconds and after another few seconds, you get the message: It is now safe to turn off your computer.

Once you Double-click the Quick Shutdown icon, and the shutdown program takes over, there is no way to stop Windows from shutting down; unless you set up yet another icon to abort the shut down

To create an abort shut down icon on your desktop, follow the same Steps as above, but in

Step 3, type: shutdown –a

that will switch ‘aborts a shut down’ or ‘restart’

If you start a shut down and change your mind, you can double-click that new icon before Windows really pulls the plug, WindowsXP quits the shut down entirely and returns to normal.
Both the Quick ShutDown and Restart icons are such a handy, fast and perfectly safe icons that you can drag to your Quick Launch toolbar that will work in a flash.

Hope you will enjoy this technique.