My Windows XP doesn't shut down

My XP does not shut down sometimes.

It says it is shutting down but doesn't.


It only shuts down if you pull the plug.


Any suggestions?

I highly suggest do not do a system restore. Quite often your PC end up in a mess, and if you don't have a full backup you may end up in worst position than when you started.


Not shutting down usually means some software keeps the pc from closing down properly or the registry is locked by some process. One thing to try first is download this utility from Microsoft and see if it fixes the problem.


It is called User Profile Hive Cleanup Service http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=1B286E6D-8912-4E18-B570-42470E2F3582&displaylang=en


If you still get problmes try deleting all the temprorary files from you PC.. There is a utility for this under Start->All Programs->System Tools.

You can use "Start, Run, msconfig" go to the "Startup" tab and disable all of the startup programs. Use the machine for 5 minutes and then shut it down. If it shuts down normally, it is probably one of the startup programs that is hanging up. (If the problem is sporadi, you need to use it long enough to either have it hang again, or until you are comfortable that it is no longer hanging.) So you can start going through and re-enabling each program (or groups of programs)and reboot, to see if you can identify the culprit. Now, it is very likely that the computer shut down properly, until just recently, otherwise you would not be complaining. So, what did you change just before it stopped shutting down? Installed a new program? Uninstall it. Added new hardware, remove it and the drivers. See if that fixes the problem - if so, there is the problem. If the problem seems to happen only when you run a particular program - that is probably the culprit.