Computer Shutdown

[MiniNerd24]

I'm sure that it doesn't let your computer save your settings.

[EHaskins]

I corrupted a drive once by holding the power button. Luckly I'm paranoid about loosign data so I had backups.

You should only do that as a last resort.

If you have it configured to shutdown properly, go into sleep, ect., thats fine, but killing it is bad.

EDIT: Someone menitioned USB drives getting corrupted, I had that happen once too, but that wasn't backed up.

[Sam Fisher]

On my Latitude C600 under Power management it has a section asking what the computer should do when the power button is pressed, so i guess if they have a section for it it must be ok. I normaly don't turn it off that way and only use it when the system becomes frozen. But I don't seen any problem with forced shutdown occasionaly.
If you just don't want to wait for it to shut down change the registry(Found this on the web)

Sometimes when you're shutting down, XP will sort of just sit there and twiddle its thumbs, so to speak. That's because it is waiting for applications or services to stop hanging and shut down. Eventually it will do something about it, but why not get to it quicker? Here's how to make XP force a quick shutdown
1. Click Start -> Run -> type 'regedit' -> OK
2. Locate 'HKEY_CURRENT_USER\ Control Panel\Desktop\'
3.Select 'WaitToKillAppTimeout'
4. Right click and select 'Modify'
5. Change the value to '1000'
6. Now select 'HungAppTimeout'
7. Right click and select 'Modify'
8. Change the value to '1000'
9. Now find 'HKEY_USERS\ .DEFAULT\Control Panel\Desktop'
10. Select 'WaitToKillAppTimeout'
11. Right click and select 'Modify'
12. Change the value to '1000'
13. Now find 'HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ System\CurrentControlSet\Control\'
14. Select 'WaitToKillServiceTimeout'
15. Right click and select 'Modify'
16. Change the value to '1000'

[PC-Dad]

Wow, pretty good thread on such a simple thing as how to use the power button on a PC! The FIRST crew never ceases to amaze me.

To summarize, you all are pretty much in agreement that pressing and holding the power button to forcefully shutdown should be considered a last-resort measure. The typical type of problem associated with this action is data corruption or data loss, usually due to a disk write being in progress when the power is shutdown.

As for the ability to program the power button, I've always advised people to stay away from that and to use the GUI for shutdowns/hibernates/sleeps instead. The reason IT folks like me make broad statements like, "NEVER shutdown your PC that way" is because we usually don't know how much computer savvy the user in question has, so better to be safe than sorry. The bottom line is this: if you know the pitfalls, and you know the mechanics of what you are doing, then proceed at your own peril. If you're not sure what might happen, then you should stick to the safe route.