Windows 8 : Navigating Startup and Power States

When you power on most computers, you can access the firmware interface by pressing the button shown for Setup in the initial display. For example, you might press F2 or Delete during the first few seconds of startup to enter the firmware interface. Firmware interfaces have control options that allow you to adjust the functionality of hardware. You can use these controls to do the following:

Firmware interfaces have the ability to report basic configuration details, including information about the following:

Most firmware interfaces allow you to create supervisor, user, and/or general passwords that are not accessible from the operating system. If a supervisor password is set, you need to provide the password before you can modify the firmware configuration. If a user password is set, you need to enter the password during startup before the computer will load the operating system. If you forget these passwords, you might not be able to operate the computer or change firmware settings until you clear the forgotten passwords, which generally also clears any customization you have made to the firmware interface.

A firmware interface update can often resolve problems or add features to the computer’s firmware interface. If you are not experiencing problems on a computer and are not aware of any additional features in the firmware interface that are needed, you might not need to update a computer to the latest version of the firmware interface. An additional cautionary note is that if a firmware interface update is not performed properly, it can harm the computer and prevent it from starting.

The information and configuration options available in the firmware interface depend on the computer you are working with, the type of firmware interface, and the version of the firmware interface. Most desktop computers have more configuration options than laptop computers do.

A popular firmware interface at the time of this writing is the Phoenix SecureCore. As configured on my laptop computer, this interface provides several menu pages offering information and controls, including Main, Advanced, Security, and Boot. The Main page provides basic information about the computer’s configuration, including

On the main page, you can set the system date and time using the options provided. The Advanced page provides additional configuration information and allows you to manage important settings. On this page, you can view or set the following:

The Security page allows you to view and set supervisor, user, and hard-disk passwords. The status information tells you the current state for each password, such as:

The following additional configuration options allow you to manage passwords:

To set a password, select the option, and then press Enter. When prompted, type the new password, and then type the new password again to confirm it. Press Enter to continue.

The Boot Priority Order allows you to view and manage the priority order for boot devices. A sample boot priority order listing follows from a Dell desktop computer:

When you power on the computer, the computer tries to boot using the device listed first. If that fails, the computer tries the second boot device, and so on. You can use the Up and Down Arrow keys to select a device and then use the plus sign (+) or the hyphen (–) to move the device up or down in the list.

The Exit page allows you to exit the firmware interface and resume startup of the computer. As with most firmware interfaces, you have several options:

Regardless of which menu page you are working with, you have a set of options that are standard in most firmware interfaces:

As you can see, the configuration options here aren’t very extensive. In contrast, desktop computers can have a dizzying array of options and suboptions. When you are working with a desktop computer, you’ll likely find options that serve similar purposes. However, because there are few standards and conventions among firmware interface manufacturers, the options might have different labels and values.

To better understand the hardware aspects related to boot issues, let’s dig in and take a look at Advanced Configuration and Power Interface (ACPI). A computer’s motherboard-chipset, firmware, and operating system must support ACPI for the related advanced power state features to work. ACPI-aware components track the power state of the computer. An ACPI-aware operating system can generate a request that the system be switched into a different ACPI mode, and the firmware interface responds by enabling the requested ACPI mode.

As shown in Table 1, there are six different power states, ranging from S0 (the system is completely powered on and fully operational) to S5 (the system is completely powered off). The states S1, S2, S3, and S4 are referred to as sleep states, in which the system appears off because of low power consumption but retains enough of the hardware context to return to the working state without a system reboot.

Motherboard-chipsets support specific power states. For example, one motherboard might support the S0, S1, S4, and S5 states but not the S2 and S3 states. In Windows operating systems, the sleep power transition refers to switching off the system to a sleep or a hibernate mode, and the wake power transition refers to switching on the system from a sleep or a hibernate mode. The sleep and hibernate modes allow users to switch systems off and on much faster than the regular shutdown and startup processes.

Thus, a computer is waking up when the computer is transitioning from the Off state (S5) or any sleep state (S1–S4) to the On state (S0). The computer is going to sleep when the computer is transitioning from the On state (S0) to the Off state (S5) or one of the sleep states (S1–S4). A computer cannot enter one sleep state directly from another; it must enter the On state before entering a different sleep state.

When you are working with firmware, you can go to the Advanced/Power Management screen or a similar screen to manage ACPI and related settings. Power settings you might see include the following:

Because Intel and AMD also have other technologies to help reduce startup and resume times, you might also see power settings such as these for Intel:

EIST (also known as SpeedStep) allows the system to dynamically adjust processor voltage and core frequency, which can result in decreased average power consumption and decreased average heat production. When EIST or a similar technology is enabled and in use, you see two different processor speeds on the System page in Control Panel. The first speed listed is the specified speed of the processor. The second speed is the current operating speed, which should be less than the first speed. If EIST is off, both processor speeds will be equal. Advanced Settings for Processor Power Management under Power Options can also affect how this technology works. Generally speaking, you should not use this technology with Windows 8 (although you might want to use this technology with Windows Vista).

QRTD allows an Intel Viiv technology-based computer to behave like a consumer electronic device, with instant on/off after an initial boot. Intel QRTD manages this behavior through the Quick Resume mode function of the Intel Viiv chipset. Pressing the power button on the computer or a remote control puts the computer in the Quick Sleep mode, and you can switch the computer to the Quick Resume mode by moving the mouse, pressing an on/off key on the keyboard (if available), or pressing the Sleep button on the remote control. Quick Sleep mode is different from standard sleep mode. In Quick Sleep mode, the computer’s video card stops sending data to the display, the sound is muted, and the monitor light-emitting diode (LED) indicates a lowered power state on the monitor, but the power continues to be supplied to vital components on the system, such as the processor, fans, and so on. This technology was originally designed for Windows XP Media Center edition, and generally should not be used with Windows 8. (In many cases, it does not work with Windows Vista. You might need to disable this feature in firmware to allow Windows Vista to properly sleep and resume.)

After you look at the computer’s power settings in firmware, you should also review the computer’s boot settings in firmware. Often, you can configure the following boot settings:

On some computers, you may simply have a list of bootable devices and be able to select which to boot.

As for power settings, your computer might not have the exact labels shown here, but the labels should be similar. You need to optimize these settings for the way you plan to use the computer. When you use BitLocker Drive Encryption, you should enable Boot To Removable Devices, USB Boot, or both to ensure that the computer can detect the USB flash drive with the encryption key during the boot process.