Physical Memory

[John John (MVP)]

the utility i mentioned will
simply unload any orphaned
processes, leaving only
those that are actually being
used by the system.

Yet more absolute fudd and another desperate attempt to clutch at straws
in an attempt to promote your useless junk! Orphaned child processes
only occur when services or processes are terminated abnormally, this is
an uncommon occurrence, your crap utility doesn't know if the orphaned
child process is in use or not and it can't do anything more than what
can already be done using "End Process" in the Task Manager or the
Tskill and Taskkill commands, your snake oil program is utterly useless!

John

 

[JohnD]

Here's the list. Actually, looking at the items, I suppose they basically
look reasonable. By the way, I have XP Pro, so I guess I have Tasklist.exe.
What would I do with it?

These Windows services are started:

Apple Mobile Device
Application Layer Gateway Service
Ati HotKey Poller
Automatic LiveUpdate Scheduler
Automatic Updates
Background Intelligent Transfer Service
Bonjour Service
COM+ Event System
Computer Browser
Cryptographic Services
DCOM Server Process Launcher
DHCP Client
Distributed Link Tracking Client
DNS Client
Error Reporting Service
Event Log
Fast User Switching Compatibility
Help and Support
HTTP SSL
iPod Service
IPSEC Services
Lavasoft Ad-Aware Service
LiveUpdate Notice
Logical Disk Manager
Network Connections
Network Location Awareness (NLA)
Plug and Play
Print Spooler
Protected Storage
Remote Access Connection Manager
Remote Procedure Call (RPC)
Remote Registry
Secondary Logon
Security Accounts Manager
Server
Shell Hardware Detection
SoundMAX Agent Service
SSDP Discovery Service
Symantec Core LC
Symantec Event Manager
Symantec Lic NetConnect service
Symantec Settings Manager
System Event Notification
System Restore Service
Task Scheduler
TCP/IP NetBIOS Helper
Telephony
Terminal Services
Themes
Universal Plug and Play Device Host
WebClient
Windows Audio
Windows Firewall/Internet Connection Sharing (ICS)
Windows Image Acquisition (WIA)
Windows Management Instrumentation
Windows Media Player Network Sharing Service
Windows Time
Wireless Zero Configuration
Workstation

The command completed successfully.


Image Name PID Services
========================= ====== =============================================
System Idle Process 0 N/A
System 4 N/A
smss.exe 920 N/A
csrss.exe 976 N/A
winlogon.exe 1004 N/A
services.exe 1048 Eventlog, PlugPlay
lsass.exe 1060 PolicyAgent, ProtectedStorage, SamSs
ati2evxx.exe 1244 Ati HotKey Poller
svchost.exe 1260 DcomLaunch, TermService
svchost.exe 1340 RpcSs
svchost.exe 1464 AudioSrv, BITS, Browser, CryptSvc, Dhcp,
dmserver, ERSvc, EventSystem,
FastUserSwitchingCompatibility, helpsvc,
lanmanserver, lanmanworkstation, Netman,
Nla, RasMan, Schedule, seclogon, SENS,
SharedAccess, ShellHWDetection, srservice,
TapiSrv, Themes, TrkWks, W32Time, winmgmt,
wuauserv, WZCSVC
svchost.exe 1608 Dnscache
svchost.exe 1668 LmHosts, RemoteRegistry, SSDPSRV, upnphost,
WebClient
CCSVCHST.EXE 1716 ccEvtMgr, ccSetMgr, CLTNetCnService,
LiveUpdate Notice
aawservice.exe 368 aawservice
ati2evxx.exe 1444 N/A
explorer.exe 1600 N/A
spoolsv.exe 180 Spooler
AppleMobileDeviceService. 1396 Apple Mobile Device
AluSchedulerSvc.exe 1872 Automatic LiveUpdate Scheduler
mDNSResponder.exe 508 Bonjour Service
svchost.exe 788 HTTPFilter
SMAgent.exe 1816 SoundMAX Agent Service (default)
SMax4PNP.exe 880 N/A
SMax4.exe 948 N/A
jusched.exe 1200 N/A
svchost.exe 324 stisvc
CLI.exe 2156 N/A
wmpnetwk.exe 2160 WMPNetworkSvc
CCSVCHST.EXE 2360 N/A
hpgs2wnd.exe 2620 N/A
iTunesHelper.exe 2752 N/A
GoogleToolbarNotifier.exe 2812 N/A
hpgs2wnf.exe 2828 N/A
ctfmon.exe 2868 N/A
msmsgs.exe 3316 N/A
wmpnscfg.exe 3648 N/A
Hotsync.exe 3956 N/A
iPodService.exe 1800 iPod Service
alg.exe 2740 ALG
symlcsvc.exe 4088 Symantec Core LC
CLI.exe 1484 N/A
CLI.exe 3360 N/A
rundll32.exe 3376 N/A
aolsoftware.exe 1704 N/A
AOLSP Scheduler.exe 1972 N/A
aolsoftware.exe 2964 N/A
AOLacsd.exe 2312 N/A
waol.exe 184 N/A
shellmon.exe 2184 N/A
cmd.exe 2516 N/A
tasklist.exe 2552 N/A
wmiprvse.exe 2944 N/A

 

[Daave]

Let's have a look at these zillions of processes. At a Command Prompt
issue the following commands, pressing enter after each:

net start >C:\Startlist.txt
tasklist /svc >>C:\Startlist.txt

Tasklist only comes with XP Pro, not XP Home. But this should even the
score:

http://www.computerhope.com/download/winxp.htm

 

[Daave]

Tasklist only comes with XP Pro, not XP Home. But this should even the
score:

http://www.computerhope.com/download/winxp.htm

LOL! I need to get my vision checked!

 

[John John (MVP)]

Well, the reason I wanted you to post the list was to see if any virus
or spyware would have shown as being present, at a quick look I don't
see anything there that looks like malware so that would seem to be
eliminated as a cause of your slowness problems. One big hog that I see
there is Symantec, you may want to reconsider your use of this AV
program, there are much lighter AV programs available, Avast for one is
much less demanding than Symantec.

Other than that you will just have to go thru the list and consult the
web sites that we pointed you to earlier and decide for yourself what it
is that you really need running, if you see things in there that you
only use once in a blue moon then you should remove them from the
startup location. To disable the unneeded items you can go in the
programs that you want to remove from the startup and see if they have
an option to turn off the boot time autostart, the well written and
graceful programs always give an option to turn off the start at boot.
For the not so well behaved programs you can use utilities like Autoruns
that Daave suggested, or the built-in Windows Msconfig utility. I also
like this little utility, http://codestuff.tripod.com/ it is small and
easy to use, it has a very nice GUI, plus it will keep a list of what
you disabled so it is easy to later undo changes if you want to
re-enable them. Keep in mind that almost all of the utilities that you
remove from the list will still work just fine when or if you start them
manually.

As a first candidate for removal from your startup list I nominate
ati2evxx.exe, look here for it and see if you really need this running:
http://www.answersthatwork.com/Tasklist_pages/tasklist_a.htm

As for the services just use the Windows Services Management Console to
change the startup type of the unwanted or unneeded services or look in
the software that owns the service to see if it can be disabled. You
can print the output list from the Net Start command and use it as a
record keeping aid to keep track of the changes that you make with the
services.

Is your computer on a home network or is it a stand alone? Are you the
only user or do other users also use it?

John

 

[db.·.. >]

the list is interesting
however, these are
services and not a
true reflection of the
processes listed in
the task manager.

in addition to services,
you may also have non
services running as well.

but i can see a problem
in that you have symantec
and lavasoft.

therefore, one of the
antivirals has not been
successfully removed.

these two services are
non-microsoft.

 

[John John (MVP)]

the list is interesting
however, these are
services and not a
true reflection of the
processes listed in
the task manager.

Look at the second half of the list, where the Image Names and PID's are
listed, what do you think those are?

in addition to services,
you may also have non
services running as well.

but i can see a problem
in that you have symantec
and lavasoft.

therefore, one of the
antivirals has not been
successfully removed.

What on earth is that supposed to mean?

these two services are
non-microsoft.

No kidding, so are a pile of the other ones listed! His aim is not to
necessarily do away with all but Microsoft services, it is to get rid of
the ones he doesn't use.

John

 

[Plato]

fix your word wrap

 

[Plato]

System information on my XP PC tells me I have total physical memory of
1,024.00 MB, and Available physical memory of 491.98 MB. Does this sound
right?

Yes

 

[Sunny]

fix your word wrap

It's not my word to fix.

 

[Bill in Co.]

I think he's talking about "db", (who never listens to anybody's advice,
anyway, so it falls on deaf ears).

 

[JohnD]

Thanks for your help, John. You have given me quite a lot to do an also
eased some concerns and I appreciate it.

I must say that even after I will have done all that you suggest, I wonder
if my slowness problem will have been resolved. After all, I do have about a
half gig of available memory so it seems strange that after having loaded
Microsoft Word it should take so long to display a document. It used to be
almost instant.

To answer your questions - I am on a home network and I am the only user of
this PC.

 

[R. McCarty]

Sudden loss of performance ( App Startup times...) can be due to the
Windows volume becoming inconsistent (Dirty). If you've eliminated
Malware or lack of resources as the cause, then you might want to do
a read-only or cursory Chkdsk C:. If the Chkdsk recommends a full
or /R run of Chkdsk do not proceed unless your data is backed up.
Click Start, Run ( Type ) Cmd [Enter]

Chkdsk C: [Enter]

 

[John John (MVP)]

Taking a long time to load Word documents? Maybe Symantec is scanning
each doc for virus before the document opens? This is known to slow
things down considerably.

As you probably already know Windows XP Professional is designed to be
part of a network and as such by default it automatically starts many
network services when it is booted. When the machine is not part of a
network these services should not be started:

Computer Browser
Server
TCP/IP NetBIOS Helper
Workstation

I would simply Disable the Server service and set the others to Manual
start. Additionally you should probably stop these services from
starting automatically, most people with single user machines that
aren't part of a network don't need these services running:

Fast User Switching Compatibility
Remote Registry
SSDP Discovery Service
Terminal Services
Universal Plug and Play Device Host
WebClient

Also, these are not really needed:

Error Reporting Service
(Sends Error Messages to Microsoft)

Windows Media Player Network Sharing Service
(Self explanatory, do you use MS Media Player to share stuff?)

Wireless Zero Configuration
(If you don't have wireless devices you really don't need this)

Consult the sites you were referred to in the earlier posts for more
information on these and other services which are running on your machine.

John