Restarts

A restart is the process of stopping and starting a device or software again to reinitialize its state. Restarts are used to apply updates, recover from faults, or complete maintenance tasks. In computing, reboot is often used as a synonym for restart.

There are several forms of restarts. A cold reboot powers the system down and back up, while a warm reboot restarts without disconnecting power. A soft reboot initiates the process through software commands and avoids hardware resets. Some environments distinguish between hard resets (power cycle) and soft resets (software-initiated).

Common triggers include software updates, configuration changes, system crashes, unresponsiveness, and power outages. Manual restarts can be performed via a power button or a command such as reboot or shutdown -r; remote restarts use management interfaces like IPMI, iLO, or wake-on-LAN.

Restarts have implications for uptime and data integrity. They cause downtime and potential data loss if memory is not flushed; they also clear transient faults and reload drivers. In reliability engineering, restart strategies aim to minimize disruption, for example through graceful shutdowns, scheduled restarts, or redundant systems that can continue service with minimal interruption.