Windows 11 sleep problem
I’ve recently encountered a sleep problem in both Windows 10 and 11. I’ve been bouncing between Windows 10 and successive Insiders Builds of Windows 11 to check my 2018 Skylake X system could run Windows 11. On my first attempt, I discovered an error with Cyberlink Power DVD 20 telling me I didn’t have a valid graphics driver. I’ve tried it three times and followed instructions given to me by Cyberlink, but it didn’t work, so went back to Windows 10.
This has happened on subsequent tests of new Insider Builds, even after switching from Cyberlink to Nero 14 Blu-ray. I then started getting errors in Windows Live Mail when clicking links, so I rolled back to Windows 10 from an Acronis backup and then found a new build of Windows 11. I installed and everything was working okay... or so I thought. Now, I find whether I’m running Windows 11 or Windows 10, that when I put the computer to sleep it appears to do so before shutting down completely after three seconds.
I’ve tried a recent BIOS update and tweaking the only setting related to power in the BIOS, but no luck. No luck either with any combination of power settings in Windows via the Control Panel. It’s only a minor inconvenience, but I want to keep my PC off or asleep when not in use.
Phillip Tursky TechLife responds: The sleep problem may be linked to the Intel Management Engine driver. This may have been wiped out by a generic Windows 11 driver that doesn’t work with your 6th generation CPU. You could try reinstalling it via www.intel.com/ content/www/us/en/ download/19406/ (remove the current version of IME via Device Manager under System devices, then install the downloaded driver),
However, given that Microsoft has announced that Windows 11 won’t be supporting Sky Lake processors, the best thing to do is reinstall Windows 10 from scratch. Given all the switching between Windows 10 and 11, you’ve probably garbled parts of your current installation. Rather than try to unpick them, we recommend removing all traces of Windows 11 from your system.
If your Acronis backups go back far enough, roll back your PC to the point in time before you first attempted to install Windows 11. This may be sufficient to wipe out all those changes and restore the sleep function to its proper working condition.
If not, follow one of our recent reinstall guides to back up, wipe your Windows 10 partition and then reinstall Windows 10 from scratch using the latest version of Windows 10 as offered by the Windows Media Creation tool ( www.microsoft.com/ software-download/windows10).
Once Windows has been restored and you’ve verified things are working correctly again, do not continue experimenting with Windows 11 Insider Builds. While you may have been able to install Windows 11 successfully on your Sky Lake system, unless Microsoft has a sudden change of heart, you’ll be getting no official support going forward.