Power Plan - Create Shortcut to Change Power Plan

How to Create a Shortcut to Change Power Plans in Windows 7 and Windows 8​

   Information

This tutorial will show you how to create or download shortcuts that will allow you to change or switch to the High Performance, Balanced, Power Saver, or a custom power plan instantly without having to go through Power Options in the Control Panel in Windows 7 and Windows 8.

EXAMPLE: Power Plans
NOTE: These shortcuts will allow you to toggle between your power plans here automatically.

OPTION ONE

To Download Shortcuts to Change Default Power Plan

NOTE: If you would like to have a shortcut to change to a custom power plan, then you will need to manually create one for it in OPTION TWO below.
1. Shortcut to Change to the High Performance Power Plan
A) Click/tap on the download button below to download the file below, and go to step 4 below.
High_Performance_Power_Plan.zip

Download


2. Shortcut to Change to the Balanced Power Plan
A) Click/tap on the download button below to download the file below, and go to step 4 below.
Balanced_Power_Plan.zip

Download


3. Shortcut to Change to the Power Saver Power Plan
A) Click/tap on the download button below to download the file below, and go to step 4 below.
Power_Saver_Power_Plan.zip

Download


4. Save the downloaded .zip file to your desktop.

5. Open the .zip file and extract (drag and drop) the power plan shortcut to your desktop.

6. Right click or press and hold on the power plan shortcut, and click/tap on Properties, General tab, and on the Unblock button. (See screenshot below)
NOTE: If you do not have a Unblock button under the General tab, then the shortcut is already unblocked and you can continue on to step 7.

7. In Windows 7, you can now Pin to Taskbar or Pin to Start Menu, add to Quick Launch, assign a keyboard shortcut to it, or move this shortcut to where you like for easy use.

8. In Windows 8, you can Pin to Taskbar on desktop, Pin to Start screen, add to Quick Launch, assign a keyboard shortcut to it, or move this shortcut to where you like for easy use.

9. When finished, you can delete the downloaded .zip file if you like, or save it to use again.

OPTION TWO

To Manually Create the Shortcuts to Change Default Power Plan

1. Open a command prompt, type powercfg -list at the prompt, and press enter. (See screenshots below)




2. Make note of the GUID number for the power plan (name at far right) that you want to create a shortcut for. (See screenshots above)
NOTE: You will need to enter this GUID number in step 4 below. You can Copy to Clipboard the GUID number from within the command prompt for step 4 to make this easier for a custom power plan.

3. Right click or press and hold on an empty area on your desktop, and click/tap on New and Shortcut.

4. Type powercfg.exe /setactive GUID number into the location area, and click/tap on the Next button. (See screenshot below)

NOTE: For a custom power plan, substitute GUID number in the command with the actual GUID number displayed from step 2 above instead. You can copy the complete command in bold below for the default power plans to make this easy.

• High Performance
  

  powercfg.exe /setactive 8c5e7fda-e8bf-4a96-9a85-a6e23a8c635c

• Balanced
  

  powercfg.exe /setactive 381b4222-f694-41f0-9685-ff5bb260df2e

• Power Saver
  

  powercfg.exe /setactive a1841308-3541-4fab-bc81-f71556f20b4a

5. Type the power plan name (ex: High Performance), and click/tap on the Finish button. (See screenshot below)
NOTE: You can name this shortcut anything you would like though.

6. Right click or press and hold on the new power plan shortcut, and click/tap on Properties.

7. Click/tap on the Shortcut tab, and click/tap on the Change Icon button. (See screenshot below)

8. Click/tap on OK. (See screenshot below)

9. In the line under "Look for icons in this file", type in the location below, and press Enter. (See screenshot below)
%SystemRoot%\System32\powercpl.dll

10. Select the Power Options icon highlighted in blue above, and click/tap on OK. (See screenshot above)

11. Click/tap on Apply, then to the right of Run, click/tap on the drop down menu, select Minimized, and click/tap on OK. (See screenshot below)
NOTE: This is so the command window will not be seen flashing quickly open and closed when you use the power plan shortcut to change power plans. If you would like to see the command prompt flash to help see that the shortcut was used, then you can leave this set to Normal window.

12. In Windows 7, you can now Pin to Taskbar or Pin to Start Menu, add to Quick Launch, assign a keyboard shortcut to it, or move this shortcut to where you like for easy use.

13. In Windows 8, you can Pin to Taskbar on desktop, Pin to Start screen, add to Quick Launch, assign a keyboard shortcut to it, or move this shortcut to where you like for easy use.
That's it,
Shawn

Related Tutorials

---

• How to Add "Choose Power Plan" to Desktop Context Menu in Windows 7 and Windows 8
• How to Select a Power Plan Scheme in Windows 7 and Windows 8
• How to Change the Power Plan Settings in Windows 7
• How to Change Power Plan Settings in Windows 8
• How to Create or Delete a Custom Power Plan in Windows 7
• How to Restore Default Power Plan Settings in Windows 7 and Windows 8
• How to Run a Windows 7 Power Efficiency Diagnostics Report
• How to Change the Return to Sleep Timeout for a Unattended Wake Up in Windows 7
• How to Create a Power Options Shortcut in Windows 7
• How to Create a "Advanced Power Options" Shortcut in Windows 7
• How to Create a Power Troubleshoot Shortcut in Windows 7
• How to Export and Import Power Plans in Windows 7
• How to Rename a Power Plan Name in Windows 7
• How to Specify Default Power Plan for All Users in Vista, Windows 7, and Windows 8

 

[Night Hawk]

Another good one threre! Shawn That's far more direct then simply creating a shortcut to the power options by itself!

 

[Brink]

Hello Night Hawk,

Yeah, I was noticing a few posts out there for people wanting to be able to easily toggle between their power plans.

 

[Night Hawk]

That will be a help here since each system restart seems to reset the settings for the plan selected even when that's a custom plan. Having the display set to never it ends up being reset to 20 minutes even for a quick restart.

Note the only place this is seen is on the 64bit RC not the 32bit. Each time I startup for the first time or reboot the system these will be a large help for this rather then going through the settings over and over!

I certainly have room for them on the second taskbar here where they will come in handy!

 

[dw96]

That's awesome! I have 2 power plans which I switch very often, and this is definitely a solution! I'd rep ya, but it says I gotta spread around some rep before giving it to you! LOL!

 

[WinSmith]

Yeah, cool. Athough there exists an alternative solution. Yesterday I found a small program which shows all powerplans in list and also changes the tray icon color like R-G-B on changing to power saver - balanced - high performance. I got it at http://www.techspot.com/downloads/4883-power-plan-assistant-for-windows-7.html

But what I like most of all: this Power Plan Assistant puts my laptop to high performance on plugging in and lets me to standby the monitor with a mouse click. Overall neat, although I'd like it as well to put my lappie back to balanced on plugging out.

 

[Brink]

Yeah, cool. Athough there exists an alternative solution. Yesterday I found a small program which shows all powerplans in list and also changes the tray icon color like R-G-B on changing to power saver - balanced - high performance. I got it at Power Plan Assistant for Windows 7 - TechSpot Downloads

But what I like most of all: this Power Plan Assistant puts my laptop to high performance on plugging in and lets me to standby the monitor with a mouse click. Overall neat, although I'd like it as well to put my lappie back to balanced on plugging out.

Hello WinSmith,

It's ok, but it will not have any custom power plans available to select from in that program.

 

[dw96]

...but it will not have any custom power plans available to select...

Exactly the benefits of your solution!
I have a power plan that I use when I leave my computer for working at night. It makes the computer go to sleep only 3 minutes after it has finished it's work. Machines need a rest too, you know. So I configured it like this:

 

[bbalmer]

I wrote an application that works with Windows 7 that lets you schedule when particular power plans should be used. I have a fairly regular schedule it automatically sets my computer so it can fall asleep during evening hours, but will always remain awake during the day.

If interested check it out at http://www.setpowersoftware.com/Free.aspx


Even better it doesn't consume any system resources except for when the plans are actually being switched.

 

[Night Hawk]

I wrote an application that works with Windows 7 that lets you schedule when particular power plans should be used. I have a fairly regular schedule it automatically sets my computer so it can fall asleep during evening hours, but will always remain awake during the day.

If interested check it out at SetPower - Free Edition


Even better it doesn't consume any system resources except for when the plans are actually being switched.

Welcome to the sevenforums! bbalmer I'll be giving this one a good lookover while still running the 7 RCs for the time being until 7 is out.

Upon each first startup of the day or when simply rebooting the system the settings for never turn off the display are always reset to the default 20 minutes for some unknown reason on the 64bit RC. We'll have to see if this is a solution for that one!

 

[WinSmith]

Yeah, cool. Athough there exists an alternative solution. Yesterday I found a small program which shows all powerplans in list and also changes the tray icon color like R-G-B on changing to power saver - balanced - high performance. I got it at Power Plan Assistant for Windows 7 - TechSpot Downloads

But what I like most of all: this Power Plan Assistant puts my laptop to high performance on plugging in and lets me to standby the monitor with a mouse click. Overall neat, although I'd like it as well to put my lappie back to balanced on plugging out.

Hello WinSmith,

It's ok, but it will not have any custom power plans available to select from in that program.

Oh, haven't noticed that! However 3 default plans seem enough for me. By the way, I was wrong about NOT putting my laptop to balanced on plugging out - program is capable to do so, I just had check the relevant item in settings menu. Regarding custom powerplans, again, I do see the option 'Show custom power plans' in settings menu, it's dimmed though, that's the problem. I'm going to write a support request to its creator, just wondering why the option available yet dimmed...

 

[pcadrgas]

How to cut and paste the GUID codes

1)Open a CMD window
2)Redirect the command powercfg -list output to a text file the following way:

• Open a command prompt

• type powercfg -list > guid.txt

• Go to Users /Username

• Open guid.txt with Notepad

3)Now, from the opened file, you can copy and paste the codes as per your needs.

 

[Brink]

Hello Pcadrgas, and welcome to Seven Forums.

Thank you. You can also just copy it straight from the command prompt.

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/21874-command-prompt-copy-clipboard.html

 

[morrislee]

PowerToggle.exe program!

Hello to all, I just feel like I had to give out this program I made not too long ago, I am new to programming, so this isn't exactly perfected yet, A hidden app that toggles from High Performance to Power Saver vise versa by running the exe, you can hook it to laptop buttons if your laptop supports such feature.

It uses a separated registry entry, so using the tray icon from windows to change the power plan won't notify the program that the plan has been changed, it only saves what it is currently using to a separated registry entry.

Until I learn how to detect current power plan, this is the most efficient way I have produced so far.

Program is completely free, no watermark, no limitations etc

If you use launching hooks for your keyboard (ones without OSD), this will not disturb the fullscreen applications such as games, on laptops, you can real-time switch your power profile to reduce power usage without having to minimize game and switch the plan.

Program runs from anywhere on the computer, since it uses the registry to save the current profile, NO INSTALLATION NECESSARY!!

Works with Windows Vista and Windows 7, both 32 and 64 bit with the "High Performance" and "Power saver" defaulted in Windows

Eventually I want add support for different and custom profiles support.


Morris Lee
Feedbacks are appreciated!

 

[WinSmith]

@morrislee: thanks for an effort man. although to be honest Power Plan Assistant application (powerplan7.com) works in Vista, too. I know Vista support is not declared, but it does actually. Power Plan Assistant is a very convenient tool, nicely integrated into OS. God bless your work, but at a moment I'd prefer to use Power Plan Assistant to manage powerplans.

 

[morrislee]

I am aware of that, I know the developer of GMABooster/PowerPlan7 myself, I recall there is only one problem that is why not declared as vista supported, it was the monitor off on double click the icon. But you never know if he fixed it yet!

Morris Lee

 

[morrislee]

Haha, I got it

Ok, after searching through the registry(what a pain...) finally found the entry, so it is finally done(in a way), in the future, I will write more features for it.

so now it detects the real current plan rather then creating a temporary one.

Enjoy~

 

[tranqueirex]

thanks a lot m8s, it works like a charm. I always like to disable asus'cool'n'quite feature before gaming.... that's a handy way to do it. I used to run powertogler in windows XP. thanks!

 

[jasimracer]

Thanks a lot Brink!! This is much more convenient than the task bar method! Just wanted to know, I assigned keys to the shortcuts (Ctrl+Alt+1 etc) for the power plans, and would like to know if these shortcuts will work when running a full screen application?

 

[Brink]

Hello Jasimracer, and welcome to Seven Forums.

I've never tried with a full screen application, but if not, you can always use the keyboard shortcut right before and after you open and close the app.