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Q. I Upgraded to Windows 10. Where Are My Hibernate & Sleep Options?
Enjoy an abridged Q&A from Fred Langa's LANGALIST, a feature available exclusively to paid subscribers of the Windows Secrets newsletter. Today's Q&A: If my PC hardware is 64-bit, why can it address only 4GB RAM?
Fred Langa
November 17, 2016
2 Min Read
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Q. Before I upgraded to Win10, I used to be able to select Hibernate and Sleep as shutdown options from the Start button. Now they’re gone. What gives? Doesn’t Win10 support these?
A. Yes, Win10 supports hibernation and sleep, provided your hardware allows it. If hibernate/sleep options worked before upgrading, the hardware almost surely still supports it.
But various actions can disable the hibernation and sleep settings. One example: An aggressive disk cleanup might delete the hibernation file (hiberfil.sys), which could then disable hibernate.
Fortunately, it’s easy to restore hibernation/sleep.
First, make sure hibernation is enabled. Open an admin-level command window (Start right-click/Command prompt (Admin)) and type this command:
powercfg /hibernate on
Next, add Hibernate and/or Sleep to the shutdown/power menu:
In an admin-level account, open Control Panel/Hardware and Sound/Power Options. Then, on the left side of the Power Options window, click the Choose what the power buttons do link. That’ll open the “Define power buttons and turn on password protection” window.
Click the Change settings that are currently unavailable link.
In the “Shutdown settings” section, check the box next to Hibernate/Show in Power menu. You may also check (enable) or uncheck (disable) any other offered options, as you wish (see Figure 1).
Shutdown settings
Figure 1. You can show/hide shutdown options via Power Options/System Settings.
Click Save changes; the next time you access the shutdown/power menu, your power-down preferences should be visible (Figure 2).
Select power-down method
Figure 2. Once you've saved your power-down changes, they should appear immediately appear in the Start menus.
With these changes, your Win10 system should be able to hibernate or sleep from the shutdown menu, just as your previous Windows setup did.
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Editor's note: We feature an abridged Q&A from Fred Langa's LANGALIST, a column available exclusively to paid subscribers of the Windows Secrets newsletter,. What you see here is just a small sampling of what Langa's writing for the newsletter — go here for more information on how to subscribe.
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