As everybody knows, the Start menu has been removed from Windows 8. Many people who have been avid users of previous Windows version find it difficult to navigate through the system. Creating shortcuts to power down or reboot the operating system makes living without the Start menu a little easier.
As the Windows 8 OS got rid of the Start menu, sometimes it is complicated to find the most commonly used shortcuts like shutdown and restart.
This tech-recipe is a guide for creating a shortcut for both shutdown and restart in Windows 8. These options will be displayed both on the Windows tiles and in the desktop views. This will definitely save some extra clicks and your valuable time.
We will use the shutdown inbuilt Windows command utility.
1. To set up a shortcut, first switch to desktop view. You can either press the Windows logo key + D on your keyboard or move your mouse pointer and click on the bottom left of your screen.
2. Right-click anywhere, and select a new shortcut from the context menu. In the target field, enter shutdown –s –t 00 to shutdown the system or shutdown –r –t 00 to restart. Then click Next.
3. In the target field, give the shortcut a name such as Shutdown or Restart, depending on the type of shortcut you have just created.
4. Assign an icon to the shortcut for easy identification. Right-click on the shortcut you created, and click on Properties in the context menu. Navigate to the Shortcut tab, and click on Change Icon. Then select the picture of your choice.
5. Now, create a shortcut on the desktop to be displayed on a Windows tile. Right-click on the shortcut you created, and click on Pin to Start. You will see the shortcut on a Windows tile, too.
You can see two new items added on Windows tiles for shutdown and restart.
