PC diagnostics help

[Neil_Asheville]

I've always been curious what all my running processes in Task Manager are doing? Some have dubious looking names and I wonder if they're up to no good and running in the background. Can anyone recommend a freeware or inexpensiveware that will look at all my currently running processes and what apps each is associated with? I have about 130 processes running at any given time.

I currently run Trend PCcillin and Registry Cleaner daily. XP O/S. Just tried SANDRA 2007 Lite but it kept hanging up and not responding. Optimally I'd like one app to handle reg cleanup, cache and temp cleanup, and system diagnositics scan. I get real ill when my laptop slows down and gets buggy. I want something that can fix the typical stuff that collects here and slows me down.

Thanks!

[RPetry]

Neil,

You are right, there is a lot of fluff and useless stuff in Windows XP and much can be done to boost performance.

Built a custom PC last off season, with one partition formatted and optimized for XP. I use it to play a few games. Followed this guide with great success:

TweakGuides.com - The TweakGuides Tweaking Companion

Mind you, this is no automatic, sit back and let 'er rip solution. Don't believe one exists. You will get your hands dirty, spend about a day, and take some risks. Unless you are experienced in operating systems, make sure to backup important files, the registry, and the system before proceeding.

It works. With a new, freshly installed XP, I gained ~ 20% overall performance in load times, task switching, graphics performance, etc. The OS seems to boot up in ~ half the time.

[seymore]

Neil,

If you look in the middle where it says "user name" of the program in the task manager when you are looking at the processes.You will see the programs that running are either "System" "User name" or "network" etc. The programs that have your PC's username listed are programs running in the background IE: virus scan,messangers etc.This will alow the PC to access these programs quicker.You can see the program name_____.EXE "executable file".


It sounds to me like you need an upgrade on RAM and it wouldn't hurt to back up files and do a fresh install of XP.It's becoming harder to multitask with programs now a days eating up your system resources.You can only reboot to fix the PC slow down and regenerate system resources.

Neil go to ..... PC Pitstop: Free PC Diagnostics, computer help and Tuneups and run the full test it will let you know the health of your HD,video card and programs that are running in the background.

If you need any help give me a call

[seymore]

Neil this might help explain things a little better.

Takeaway: The Task Manager may tell you more than you want to know about what's going on with your Windows XP system. If you're baffled by the myriad processes running without programs, you can learn what they are before you shut them down. Greg Shultz explains how to identify svchost.exe and services.exe processes in Task Manager.

When you're troubleshooting a problem in Windows XP, you may turn to Task Manager, which is designed to provide detailed information about the programs and processes running on a system. But when you access the Processes tab, you'll probably see that there are many more processes running than programs.
Some of the processes are easy to identify, especially if they represent an application (e.g., the notepad.exe process corresponds to Notepad). However, other processes, such as svchost.exe or services.exe, are not as easy to identify.
Svchost.exe is a generic host process name for services run from dynamic-link libraries (DLLs). You'll also see a process titled services.exe, which hosts several essential Windows operating system services. You can learn more about specific services that are running as svchost.exe or services.exe processes by using the Services tool. Here's how:

1. Go to Control Panel | Administrative Tools, and double-click Services.
2. In the Services tool, click on the Status column header to sort the services so those that are started are at the top of the list.
3. Double-click on one of the services and check the Path To Executable text box.

If the Path To Executable text box lists svchost.exe or services.exe, you've identified a specific service that is associated with a running process. To learn more about the service, you can check the Description panel on the Extended panel of the Services tool.

[Beth n Rod]

Neil,
Try this one. It helps to decide what will start up and what not.
INAC STARTUP MANAGER
International Net Applications Corp
Ok, hang on, I gotta check on something...I think it came with the Firefox Browser. Just checked the link to make sure it was there and I didn't see anyway to download there.
I'll get back to you on it.


Rod!~

[smokey51]

Neil,

You can download CCleaner to help you clean and analyze your pc. It is FREE, small, fast, and does a good job. It removes unused files from your computer, fixes the registry, lets you uninstall programs and list the programs that run at start up and lets you remove them if you don't need them. Works great!

Terry

[Neil_Asheville]

Thanks for the replies. PCPitstop has some cool stuff.

/neil

[PLD]

I run AdAware and SpyBot S&D regularly. Best two mal-ware products on the market IMHO.