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A friend just had her computer shutdown for no reason and she cannot start it back up.What might be the problem and what might be the cheapest fastest way of recovering info?
Apparently she didn't Backup

Assuming it's a PC, boot it up in safe-mode if possible.

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/hel ... -safe-mode

Can you give a few details like PC or laptop, Windows or other OS, level of OS, how modern is the machine, etc? And what is it doing? (i.e. nothing, or not booting completely or something else?)

Imagine if your car quits and won't start. If you call a car repair shop and say "My car quit, and now it won't start" and told them nothing else about your car, do you think they'd give you a good diagnosis over the phone?

Most problems are software problems, including data corruptions and viruses and ransomeware. In such a case, find a knowledgeable person to restore it to operating condition. I do not personally believe in paying ransoms, and do not keep anything online that is of vital importance.

If you can't get it to power up, and you see NOTHING in the display, you have a hardware problem. If the computer is old, the best way to proceed is to buy a new computer, and pay someone to salvage the data off the old hard drive.

If the hard drive is what failed, without any backups, all the data is gone. That would be the worst case.

Thanks everyone for the good input. Oh and OS, you are totally right did not provide enough info for a good diagnosis. Have a great week guys.

Hold the Start button down for 10 seconds, then wait 3 seconds and now press the Start button.

Still no start? Hold the Start button down 3 minutes, then wait 3 seconds and now press the Start button.

Still no start? Send it in for repair.

If you can't start it up it could be a bad power supply. This happened to me once, cost about $40 to fix.