Q: I have just upgraded to Vista Ultimate. Everything seems to run OK, but when I go to shutdown the computer, the process doesn't go as far as powering down the hardware. I didn't have this trouble in XP. Any idea's what may be causing this issue?

A: This sounds to me like it is a driver issue. Currently, Vista is having quite a few driver issues. While the hardware drivers were properly written for XP, this doesn't seem the case for your Vista Ultimate installation. The only way to resolve this issue that I am aware of is to use the process of elimination. Try uninstalling each piece of hardware until you find the offending one. Then, you can at least visit the manufactures web site for a more current driver (if available) than the one that Windows has installed for you.

It used to be that Windows made a troubleshooter for this type of issue. I can't find it within Vista. Also, viewing your event logs in this case won't do you any good either because Vista doesn't log driver troubles.