A reader asks: “How do I unfreeze my laptop? I’ve pressed ctrl-shift-del but it did not work.”

If a laptop is completely unresponsive to normal keys and switches, your only option is to kill the power.

Try pressing and holding down the PC’s power button for 15 seconds or so: Many electronic devices (not just PCs) will perform a forced power-off after the power button is continuously depressed for around 4-10 seconds. But if nothing happens after 15 seconds or so, it’s probably not going to work.

Next, remove the PC’s power source: Unplug it, if it’s plugged in; and/or remove the battery, if the laptop allows this.

If you can’t remove the battery, the last resort is to let the laptop run on its battery until it dies; the laptop will definitely shut down then! (This is a last resort because running a Li-ion battery all the way down is very hard on the battery and shortens its life.)

If the laptop is unresponsive after you power it back up, the problem is deep-seated — perhaps a hard drive or mainboard failure. A trip to a repair shop, or getting a replacement laptop, is likely in your immediate future!

But with luck, the PC will restart normally, and you can then check your files for damage; and try to diagnose why the PC froze in the first place.

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