So, I have Player installed on a slowish laptop.
I have win8 Enterprise installed.
Close Player with "Suspend" = 1:22 (1-m :22-s)
Start Player from Suspend = 1:34
Close Player with "Shut-down" = 0:33
Start Player from "Shut-down" = 0:59
So, unless you absolutely need to save the Virtual Machine-State, it is much faster to use "Shut-down" from both directions. 
Just sayin'