Machine not going to sleep properly

bug67 said:

EDIT:

OK, this is what really ticks me off! I look in the device manager and see yellow triangles on 2 USB devices and 1 on the 80211 n WLAN device. I see the message that says, "The drivers for this device are not installed. To find a driver for this device, click Update Driver." I do so, but am returned with the message, "Windows could not find driver software for your device." Or, the one I really like, "Windows has determined that the driver software for your device is up to date." Then why is it telling me I need to update the darn thing? Grrr!

EDIT 2.0:

I got the Wireless driver installed and that yellow triangle for that went away. I have no idea where to start with the USB stuff.

What are the exact USB devices? Are they connected devices or is it the controllers themselves?

Browse for them on the Support Downloads webpage for your model computer or the Device itself.

But first I would try the excellent suggestion to revert to a System Restore Point before the sleep problems began.

What are your other Display driver options? Look on the computer or Device's Support Downloads webpage for newer or other drivers, then google the Display device model to check there as well. You may need to try several of these if System Restore doesn't work.

An easy thing to do is simply to unplug all your USB devices, use Device Mgr with "show hidden" checked and uninstall all of the greyed ones, and start over (Windows will reinstall drivers). A very nice tool to help in this regard is Uwe Sieber's DriveCleanup. I have used it on numerous occasions and it's only fixed stuff for me (never hurt a computer).

System Restore is nothing to fear but is one of the best tools to resolve a problem like this.

If Updates are causing the problem then the way the problem is fixed is to install them in small groups, if one causes the problem then use it's System Restore point to go back and install those Updates singly until you find the problem update, post it up here in our Updates forum or open a Windows Update email support case.

I'm not sure why you're unhappy with Sleep finally working last night. I would test it's reliability by setting Power Options to sleep at 1 minute and Hibernate at 2 minutes, then observe it thorough several cycles to see how it functions. Getting Pandora to wake it is another issue from getting WIn7 to sleep which may be solved now.

You can trace the exact hardware for any missing drivers using this tool: Hardware Identification

I would try System Restore first to a point before the problem began. Then deal with the other issues and you may not have the problem reoccur.

If it does it will be due to something which happens after the REstore.

If its Updates, they will each have a Restore point to use.