Turn Windows Vista Off
You have more than one way to turn your computer off. In fact, the proper term isn’t even turn the computer off. No, you shut down the computer. As it turns out, turning the computer off is merely one of several ways you can shut down a computer.
Here are your choices for shutting down your computer:
Log Off: Tell Windows that you’re done working without having to turn the computer off and then on again.
Lock the computer: Use this quick way to suspend computer operations and present the login screen, but without actually logging off.
Switch User: Allow another user on the same computer to access his or her account without logging off from your own account.
Sleep Mode: The computer slips into a special, power-saving mode.
Hibernate: The computer turns itself off, but when you turn it back on again, it comes back to life much faster.
Restart: You turn the computer off and on again in one step, mainly when installing or upgrading software or sometimes to fix minor quirks.
Shut Down: This is the one true option that turns the darn thing off.
Many of these options are found on the official Shutdown menu, located on the Start button’s menu, as shown in the following figure.