Problems powering down/up

Not sure where the problem lies but............

I cannot sleep/hibernate/power off my Medion desktop computer by clicking the Windows 10 options. Whatever I do, the computer appears to power down, then starts up again. The only method of powering down is to press and hold the main start up button on the front of the computer.

Once I have done this, more likely than not, it will not power up. Only disconnecting from the mains supply for at least two minutes will it then power up.

I have gone through all the common possible sources of the problem.

• The setting to restart on error is off
• There are no device empowered to wake the computer
• Full scans and health checks have been run
• Latest version of W10 installed along with all updates

I am currently tearing my hair out!

Any one have any thoughts?

Welcome to Bleeping Computer.

Press the Windows key and the R key to open the Run box.

Type control in the Run box, then click/tap on OK.  This will open the Control Panel.

Click/tap on Power Options.

In the upper left portion of this page click/tap on Choose what power buttons do.

Click/tap on Change setting that are currently unavailable.

Under Shutdown settings remove the check from Turn on fast startup (recommended0.

Shut down the computer and restart it.

I should have added that to my list of failed actions!

It was one of the first things I did!

Pressing the button on the front of the computer obviously does not turn of the power and it needs a short period of no power to clear its memory.

But this only happens after an extended period of 'shutdown' such a overnight. A short period of 'shutdown' allows an immediate restart.

You stated "Full scans and health checks have been run".  What scans and health checks did you run and what were the results?

Please do the following and post the version of Windows you are running.

Press the Windows key and the R key at the same time to open the Run box. Copy and paste or type in winver, then click/tap on OK.  This will show the version of Windows 10 you have running.

Version is 1709 build 16299.125

I have checked devices with powercfg -devicequery wake_armed and the result is none

I have also run DISM.exe and sfc /scannow with no errors being reported.

In fact the problem predates the current version of Windows 10!

Hi, I suspect the atx power button on the computer needs servicing, it is something you can do yourself OR take it to a repair shop to be safer. They can also check the power supply unit for you.

The power button is a normally open momentary switch.  This is like the old doorbell buttons which would make the bell ring as long as the button was pressed.  There are two wires which attach to the power switch, these are connected to two pins in the power header.  This button when pressed sends a signal through the green wire in the 24 pin PSU connector which attaches to the motherboard which initiates the start of the PSU.  With the computer shut down and the PSU unplugged you can test this switch in to ways.  If you have a Ohm meter (continuity) you can test the switch by placing the two probes of the meter to the two wires where they attach to the power header, press the button and the meter should zero out.  The other means of testing this would be to use a screw driver to short the two wire very briefly.  These switches don't fail very often since they are so simple.  If one does fail pressing the power button will not do anything.

As for the PSU, you can test this in a couple of different ways.  One way is to bypass the motherboard to start the PSU, the computer needs to be shut down and the PSU unplugged.  As I mentioned above, there is a green wire in the 24 pin PSU connector which attaches to the motherboard.  If you disconnect the connector from the motherboard you can place a wire jumper between the green wire socket ( there is only one green wire ) and any black wire socket.  With the jumper in place you are ready to test the PSU.  Plug the PSU back into the receptacle, this will immediately start the PSU.  If the PSU is working the case fan/s should start spinning and some LEDs may light as well.  This indicate that the PSU is working, but it doesn't test the three main positive rail voltages  +12VDC ( Yellow ), +5VDC ( Red ), +3.3VDC ( Orange ).  To test these voltages you will need a multimeter with a DC Volt scale.  You can read the three main rail voltages from a Molex connector or a SATA power connector which contain the black ( negative ) and the three positive voltages.

You can do this or purchase a PSU tester to determine if the rail voltages are within normal parameters.

Personally, I don't believe your problem is related to a bad switch or failed rail voltages.

Thanks Jenae and dc3

I suspect that dc3 is correct and that it's nothing to do with the on/off switch.

I have set W10 to allow the options to sleep/hibernate and shutdown.

When I choose any of these options, the computer goes into the shutdown process, is quiet for a few seconds and then restarts, That is why i removed the 'restart after error' option and also checked that there were no devices authorised to wake the computer.  

It's puzzling and annoying, especially with the frequent failure to restart after a 'hard' power off    i.e. by holding the start button in for a few seconds. The need to remove all power for a short period (2-3 minutes) before it will boot up seems to imply that there is still some software active somewhere.

Turn off the computer, unplug the PSU from the wall receptacle.  Press and hold the power button for thirty second.

Plug the PSU back in and turn on the computer.  See if this resolves the problem.

No change - still powered back on and rebooted!

Please run System File Checker.

The sfc /scannow command scans all protected system files and replaces corrupted and incorrect versions with correct Microsoft versions.

Important:  There will be a short message at the end of the scan informing you of the results.  If you receive the message "no integrity violations were found" you don't need to do anything else, no corrupt files were found.  You should watch the scan to see the results at the end of the scan.

This needs to be run using an Administrator account.  

Click/tap on the Taskbar Search icon (magnifing glass) and type cdm.

You will see Command Prompt under Best match, right click on Command Prompt and select Run as administrator.

Copy and paste the command below in the Command Prompt, then press Enter.

sfc /scannow

This scan will take a while to run, please do not abort the scan as this can result in damage to the operating system.

If integrity issues are found in the scan please post the CBS log using the instructions below.

To find sfc /scannow log click/tap on File Explorer, select the drive which Windows is installed on (this usually is the C: drive), click/tap on Windows, then Logs, then CBS.  If there are more than one log you can identify the log you want by the date and time it was run.  

Copy and paste the log at the host website I've suggested below.

This log usually is very large, for this reason you should use a host website like Dropbox to post the log.  You can start a free 30 day trial.  Once you have loaded the log at Dropbox post a link to the website.


 

In post #4 I asked you to post all of the scans you ran so that we wouldn't run into this type of redundancy.  Please do so.

From what you had posted I expected more than a three scans.

Please perform a Reset.

A Windows 10 Reset will reinstall the operating system.  You have the option to keep your personal files or remove them.  Any third party programs that you installed will be uninstalled during this process.

1. Press the Windows key and the I key to open Settings. and the I key to open Settings.

2. Click/tap on Update & Security, then Recovery, then Get Started.

3. You will now have the option to Keep my files or Remove everything.  Click/tap on the option you want.

4. You will now receive the message Getting things ready, Windows will list the programs which you will need to reinstall.  You may find it beneficial to copy these programs for a reference later.  When the list of programs is shown click/tap on Next.

5. You will now receive the message Ready to reset this PC, select Reset.

The installation will continue without any need to make any other selections.