How to prevent users from shutting down or restarting XP and VIsta
By Ashish MohtaBoth Vista and Windows XP let you take control of preventing a user not to shutdown the machine by editing the group policy. For example if your friend is using your computer and you went somewhere ( and you have still some unsaved document left) and he shutdowns the pc without saving them…you loose a good amount of data. ( Trust me I have lost one whole blog post and project code at same time ). This is what you can do

Restrict PC Shutdown

- Type gpedit.msc in run dialog box [ WIN KEY + R ]
- This will open Group Policy Editor. Now there are two things in it, Computer Configuration and User Configuration
- Click on User Configuration > Administrative Templates > Start Menu and Task Bar
- Now look for “remove and prevent access to shutdown command”
- Double Click and Enable it.
- Exit the group policy editor.
This setting removes the Shut Down option from the Start menu and disables the Shut Down button on the Windows Security dialog box, which appears when you press CTRL+ALT+DEL. This setting prevents users from using the Windows user interface to shut down the system.

Now if you try to shutdown by clicking on start , the shutdown button must have disappeared. Moreover check the task manager and you will find all shutdown,restart and others disabled except switch user.UPDATE: New article written on Vista Tricks and Performance ( Click to read)
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About The Author of this article: Ashish is one of the co-author of this blog and writes on various interesting softwares, PC tips and more. You can read more of his articles here. |
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In my system, the computer has been set to shutdown on pressing the button!
@Innovations: Its brute forced only when you keep it pressed. But pressing the power button once its like normal shutdown which we do from windows.
Perhaps, Microsoft didn’t realize that many people leave their computers for others to access, but not to shutdown.
I guess, a dumb user would probably shut down the regular way, but if he doesn’t see the option, he’ll probably do the last resort by holding the power button for over 4 sec.