Fast Startup - Turn On or Off in Windows 8

How to Turn "Fast Startup" On or Off for a Hybrid Boot in Windows 8 and 8.1​

Fast Startup (aka: hybrid boot or hybrid Shutdown) is a new feature in Windows 8 to help your PC start up faster after shutting down. When turned on, Windows 8 does this by using a hybrid shutdown (a partial hibernate) method that saves only the kernal session and device drivers (system information) to the hibernate (hiberfil.sys) file on disk instead of closing it when you shut down your PC. This also makes the hiberfil.sys file to be much smaller than what hibernate would use (often 4GB or more). When you start your PC again, Windows 8 uses that saved system information to resume your system instead of having to do a cold boot to fully restart it. Using this technique with boot gives a significant advantage for boot times, since reading the hiberfile in and reinitializing drivers is much faster on most systems (30-70% faster on most systems tested). If you have a motherboard with UEFI, then fast startup will be even faster.



For more information about "Fast Startup", see:

Delivering fast boot times in Windows 8 - Building Windows 8 - Site Home - MSDN Blogs

and

Designing for PCs that boot faster than ever before - Building Windows 8 - Site Home - MSDN Blogs


This tutorial will show you how to turn Fast Startup on or off in Windows 8.

You must be signed in as an administrator to be able to do the steps in this tutorial.

The fast startup setting doesn't apply to Restart.

This is not the same thing as hybrid sleep/hibernate in Power Options.

If you shut down from the WIN+X menu in Windows 8.1, it will perform a full shutdown instead of a hybrid shutdown even if you have Fast Startup turned on.

   Warning

There have been many Windows 8 users complaining about various restart and shutdown issues when Fast Startup (aka: hybrid boot or hybrid Shutdown) is turned on. They report that their computers restart themselves as soon as the sign in screen appears, and some that their computer systems hang while rebooting or shutting down the system.

If you experience any of the issues, then you might turn off "Fast Startup" to see if it was the cause.

If you dual boot Windows 8 with a previous version of Windows (ex: Windows 7, Vista, XP), then it is recommended to turn off Fast Startup to avoid the issues above.

If you have Fast Startup turned on and have an external hard drive connected when you shutdown, then connect the external drive to another computer, it will create issues with Fast Startup. In this situation, it would be best to leave Fast Startup turned off.

OPTION ONE

To Turn "Fast Startup" On or Off in System Settings

1. Open the Control Panel (icons view), and click on the Power Options icon.

2. Click/tap on the Choose what the power buttons do link on the left side. (see screenshot below)





3. Click/tap on the Change settings that are currently unavailable link at the top. (see screenshot below)





4. If prompted by UAC, then click/tap on Yes.

5. Do step 6 or step 7 below for what you would like to do.

6. To Turn On "Fast Startup" (Hybrid Boot) for a "Hybrid Shutdown"
NOTE: This is the default setting.

A) Under Shutdown settings, check the Turn on fast startup box, and click/tap on the Save changes button. (see screenshot below)

NOTE: If the Turn on fast startup setting is not listed, then you will need to close the System Settings window, enable hibernate, then start back at step 1 again.





B) The Shut down Power option will now perform as a hybrid shut down when used.

C) Go to step 8 below.


7. To Turn Off "Fast Startup" for a "Full Shutdown"

A) Under Shutdown settings, uncheck the Turn on fast startup box, and click/tap on the Save changes button. (see screenshot below step 6A)

NOTE: If the Turn on fast startup setting is not listed, then hibernate has been disabled that removed this setting and also disabled fast startup.

B) The Shut down Power option will now perform as a normal full shut down when used.

C) Go to step 8 below.


8. You can now close the Power Options window if you like.

OPTION TWO

To Turn "Fast Startup" On or Off using a BAT File Download

   Note

The .bat files below are for the registry key and value below.

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Power

HiberbootEnabled DWORD

0 = Turn off Fast Startup
1 = Turn on Fast Startup

1. Do step 2 or 3 below for what you would like to do.

2. To Turn On "Fast Startup" (Hybrid Boot) for a "Hybrid Shutdown"
NOTE: This is the default setting.

A) Click/tap on the Download button below to download the BAT file below, and go to step 4 below.


Turn_On_Fast_Startup.bat







3. To Turn Off "Fast Startup" for a "Full Shutdown"

A) Click/tap on the Download button below to download the BAT file below, and go to step 4 below.


Turn_Off_Fast_Startup.bat







4. Save the .bat file to your desktop.

5. Right click or press and hold on the downloaded .bat file, and click/tap on Run as administrator.

6. If prompted, click/tap on Run and Yes (UAC).
NOTE: If you like, you can stop getting the Run prompt by unblocking the downloaded .bat file.

7. You will now notice your screen flicker as a command prompt quickly opens and closes to apply the registry changes.

8. You can now delete the downloaded .bat file if you like.

OPTION THREE

To Turn "Fast Startup" Off by Disabling Hibernate

1. Do step 2 or 3 below for what you would like to do.


2. To Turn On "Fast Startup" (Hybrid Boot) for a "Hybrid Shutdown"
NOTE: This is the default setting.

A) UseOPTION ONE or OPTION TWO above.



3. To Turn Off "Fast Startup" for a "Full Shutdown"
NOTE: This will turn off Fast Startup and also disable hibernate.

A) Disable hibernate.





That's it,
Shawn

Related Tutorials

---

• How to Check if Last Boot was from Fast Startup, Full Shutdown, or Hibernate
• How to Force "Fast Startup" to Always be Turned On in Windows 8 and 8.1
• How to Enable Fast Boot or Ultra Fast Boot in UEFI Firmware Settings for Windows
• How to Enable or Disable Hibernate in Windows 7 and Windows 8
• How to Change the Size of the hiberfil.sys File in Windows 7 and Windows 8
• How to Create a "Hybrid Shut Down" Shortcut in Windows 8 and 8.1
• How to Lock, Log off, Restart, Shut Down, and Switch User in Windows 8 and 8.1
• How to Add "Shut Down" Computer to the Desktop Context Menu in Windows 8 and 8.1
• How to Add a "Power" Cascading Desktop Context Menu in Windows 8 and 8.1
• How to Speed Up the Shut Down Time in Windows 7 and Windows 8
• How to Reduce the Startup Delay Time for Desktop Apps in Windows 8 and 8.1

[/note]

 

[kholis]

Hi Brink,

What Windows 8 theme do you use in your screenshot? I really love it.


Sorry if not related with the topic.

 

[Brink]

Hello Kholis, and welcome to Eight Forums.

I have "Color and Appearance" set to this below for that.

http://www.eightforums.com/tutorials/6479-window-color-appearance-change-windows-8-a.html

 

[yy1971yy]

Hi, I'm confused about step 7.
7. To Turn Off "Fast Startup" for a "Full Shutdown"
A) Under Shutdown settings, check the Turn on fast startup box, and click/tap on the Save changes button. (see screenshot below step 6A)

Shouldn't it be (the single change is in red)
7. To Turn Off "Fast Startup" for a "Full Shutdown"
A) Under Shutdown settings, check the Turn off fast startup box, and click/tap on the Save changes button. (see screenshot below step 6A)

 

[Brink]

Hello 1971, and welcome to Eight Forums.

Nope. It's just to "uncheck" to turn off.

 

[emoxam]

If you shut down from the WIN+X menu in Windows 8.1, it will perform a full shutdown instead of a hybrid shutdown even if you have Fast Startup turned on.

So how to turn off PC?

 

[Brink]

Hello emoxam, and welcome to Eight Forums.

Shutting down the computer will still turn off the PC.

It's just now you have an option between a full shutdown, or one that shuts down to a low power state (lower than hibernate) to have a fast startup when turned on next.

 

[emoxam]

And how to shutdown PC to low power state ?

 

[Brink]

And how to shutdown PC to low power state ?

Have hibernate enabled and Fast Startup turned on as per the tutorial on the first page, and shut down the computer from any other location than the WIN+X power menu.

http://www.eightforums.com/tutorial...estart-shut-down-switch-user-windows-8-a.html

 

[rock1m1]

I just don't understand why I hae problems with Fast boot. With Fast boot enabled, when I start from a previous shutdown, i am quickly taken to the login screen and then my display stutters a bit and turns black, freezes. I have to do a hard reset.

My system, everything including BIOS is updated:

MSI Z87 G-43 Gaming
Core i5 4670
Sapphire Trix R9 290 OC UEFI
Windows 8.1 all updates installed
8GB RAM
Samsung Evo 250GB SSD

I went to the motherboard BIOS and checked Fastboot option. Also tried unchecking it, it does not make any difference. The actual Fastboot is on/off only happens when I use the Windows power options. Any help would be appreciated.

 

[Brink]

It happens with some motherboards when using Fast Startup. Unfortunately, about all you can do is turn off Fast Startup until your motherboard manufacturer may hopefully release a new UEFI/BIOS firmware update to sort this issue.

If you were wanting the PC to startup faster, then you could put the computer to "sleep" instead though.

 

[rock1m1]

Well I tried a 'new' testing or unofficial BIOS for my motherboard from MSI forums, it didn't make any difference. Sucks really as all my components are fairly new and advertised to support this.

 

[SimonHolford]

WARNING VERY IMPORTANT

What isnt mentioned in the OP is that if you use an external hard drive or USB flash drive that is also used on a seperate computer then with Fast Startup on you will at some point get a file system corruption and lose data.

This is because Windows 8 and 8.1 when "shutting down" (loose term) with the fast startup enabled creates some kind of cache of how the computer looked before shutting down, this includes any connected external drives. If you then go and use the external drive on another computer and make modifications to the file system i.e. add files, use software that writes to databases on the drive etc.. then reconnect the drive to the Windows 8 or 8.1 computer without the Windows 8 or 8.1 computer having performed a boot and shutdown without the external drive connected in between this then the external drive will be and look different to the cache that the Windows 8 / 8.1 computer has. Now Microsoft havent been clever enough to take this rather common scenario into account so what happens is Windows 8 / 8.1 assumes the drive is corrupted and makes some kind of effort to delete any files that wernt there before or which have been modified (it doesnt ask if you would like to do this or even tell you it is doing so, but you will notice alot of hard disk activity on boot up and then a pop up telling you that the drive needs to be scanned. If you look in the file explorer you will see files are missing.

There appears to be no official information on this issue, this is based on my own personal experiences (yes experiences, thos happened several times before I got to the bottom of it).

SO YOU MUST SWITCH OFF FAST STARTUP.

 

[rock1m1]

Without Fastboot, I get about 4.7sec of Bios time. Is it good? Windows loads within 2 circular loading revolutions.

 

[SimonHolford]

Without Fastboot, I get about 4.7sec of Bios time. Is it good? Windows loads within 2 circular loading revolutions.

I'd rather a few seconds extra at boot up than Windows 8 deleting files without permissing and then popping up "Hard drives knackered mate".

I really dont get what the fuss is with how long it takes to boot. I mean it's a few seconds here or there, it's not like it takes an extra week.

 

[jamesluk]

Fast startup wakes my system at night

Every night I shut down my system, and in the morning I find it has powered on. This seems to be due to automatic windows updates turned on combined with the system being in sleep mode rather than shut down due to fast system startup being enabled. When I look at the event viewer I can see that the system has entered sleep when I shut it down if fast startup is turned on. Hello Microsoft, when I select shut down, I want the system to shut down. Make your labels mean what they say. If I want to put my system to sleep, I won't select shut down!

 

[Brink]

Hello James,

If it's Windows Updates (automatic maintenance) waking the computer, then you could change the settings below to uncheck the Automatic Maintenance to wake the computer to run at this scheduled time box to stop it.

http://www.eightforums.com/tutorial...-change-maintenance-settings-windows-8-a.html

Hope this helps,
Shawn

 

[jamesluk]

Fast startup

Thanks Shawn, I realize I can disable Windows updates (by the way, the Allow scheduled maintenance to wake up my computer at the scheduled time button has always been unchecked on my system, I just have the Install updates automatically option selected) but I really want to be able to fully shut down my computer, not just put it to sleep when I choose Shut down. Disabling fast startup does the trick.

 

[Brink]

No problem. I'm glad that did the trick for you.

Just to note, that fast startup is not the same as sleep. It's a hybrid shutdown that's a quicker form of hibernate instead.

 

[menace97]

hardware (UEFI BIOS) vs. software disabling of fast boot?

sorry for the silly question (perhaps)... but i have had hibernation off for about a year and a half with windows 8.x without trouble. so i shouldn't even have the option to turn fast boot on - if i have read through your tutorial correctly - that by disabling hibernation it does in fact turn off fast boot. i double-checked by going to the registry entry you showed, and sure enough, hibernation was set to off. lately i've been having some random reboots, which i assumed were power-related (i.e. fast boot) or hardware (psu) failure. as a side note, i also found out i had two audio drivers installed, and disabled the ones i didn't want to be used.

after reading through this and finding out how problematic fast boot can be i thought "well, i don't even have fast boot enabled!" but now i have checked in my UEFI BIOS and there is a setting for fast boot that is enabled.

so, if it's enabled in UEFI BIOS and disabled in windows - would that essentially mean that the BIOS would override any software settings and i have had fast boot enabled this whole time?

thanks for any insight into this.

 

[Brink]

Hello Menace,

"Fast Boot" (for PC) in your UEFI firmware settings is a different setting than "Fast Startup" (for Windows) in Windows.